As he looked in 2022, Zach Dezenzo spent just two years in the Houston minor league system before being called up this past week. (Press Pros Feature Photos)
The recent promotions of three recent Ohio State baseball players gives pause to the theory that talent doesn’t seek Big Ten baseball as a development path to the big leagues.
I swore I wouldn’t go here.
Said to myself that I would ignore those who have written over the past two years to criticize time and space given to coverage of Ohio State and Big Ten baseball that would have been better used to cover more spring football, and additional spring high school sports.
But an email received on Wednesday of this week was the tipping point. It read:
Logan Services sponsors the best area sports stories on Press Pros.
“If Zach Dezenzo was that good at Ohio State how come no one noticed?”
Duh! There’s a laundry list of reasons with players like Jacob Bosiokovic, Dillon Dingler, Dom Canzone, and Dezenzo that have slipped by unnoticed – past ‘Buckeye Nation’. And how come, you ask?
Indifference being one reason. And the cynicism of Big Ten baseball failing to attract that kind of talent in the first place is another. Just stupid!
Bosiokovic came to the Buckeyes in 2013 as an infielder with a strong arm, struggled to play third base, and was drafted after his junior year as a pitcher by Colorado. Four weeks ago, after eight years and and a trade to the St. Louis Cardinals, he was called up to bolster the Cardinal bullpen.
Canzone has been in the big leagues with Arizona and Seattle as an outfielder for most of the past two seasons, after being drafted by Arizona in the 8th round of the 2019 draft. Currently with the Mariners, he has 7 home runs in 142 at bats, hitting .211 as a reserve outfielder.
Catcher Dillon Dingler belts a home run against South Carolina in the 2018 NCAA regional tournament.
Catcher Dillon Dingler was called up two weeks ago by Detroit, after being a second round pick and four years in the Tigers’ system…and has two hits and a double in his first 13 big league at bats. He’s widely thought of as the Tigers everyday catcher of the near future.
And Dezenzo, taken in the 12th round of the 2022 draft by Houston, was hitting .306 with 7 home runs when he was recalled by the Astros from Triple A Sugar Land, Texas.
Those are four names in the big leagues, but there are numerous others, including reliever Andrew Magno (Detroit), who’s enjoyed his best season in Triple A this year since being drafted after the 2019 season.
The most interesting of the four players – Bosiokovic, Dingler, Canzone, and Dezenzo – was Bill Mosiello’s questioning of Dezenzo’s range as a shortstop, and his 19 home runs as a senior against “suspect Big Ten pitching”. Mosiello replaced Greg Beals as coach at Ohio State in the summer of 2022. Currently playing first base in Houston, Dezenzo has 2 hits (including a double) in his first seven at bats with the Astros and was a key figure in their Wednesday win over the Texas Rangers, going 2 for 3.
My point is that it’s not hard to be too quick to judge, or assume, even for a baseball veteran like Mosiello…and especially by those who never darken the gates of Bill Davis Stadium and thumb their nose at college baseball played anywhere north of the Southeastern Conference.
Case in point, Big Ten shortstop Matt Shaw (from Maryland) was the first round draft pick by the Chicago Cubs a year ago, and hit .272 this year in his first professional season at both Double AA and Triple AAA.
And while it’s true that players like Shaw, Dingler, Canzone and Dezenzo were not household names when they were drafted – like Dylan Crews, Paul Skenes, and Jackson Holliday – it also highlights the fact that if the college season was shifted to later in the spring – where all teams would play under better, equal conditions, and heightened attention – those same players would receive far more respect as pro prospects than they get presently. As it is, the issue is dismissed as just too much trouble, and money, for too little return!
Publisher/editor Sonny Fulks writes the Big Ten and Buckeyes baseball for Press Pros Magazine.com.
It might also put an end to some of the portal madness, where players change schools like you change your socks, seeking money to play college baseball, yes…but better opportunities to develop and attract attention as a pro prospect? Obviously, if you have talent and develop it you can be noticed at Ohio State, the same as you can at Vanderbilt. It’s a proportional thing, of course, but four OSU players in the big leagues in the last two years is eye-opening.
“It’s interesting,” said now-Marshall coach Greg Beals after Dezenzo’s call-up by Houston this week. “That’s three players from the last six years now playing the big leagues, and four if you count Bosiokovic (who’s since been sent back to Triple A).”
That’s all he said. That’s all he needed to say.
There’s been enough said – by the cynics – already.
And now, by me!
Orthopedic Associates of Southwest Ohio sponsor your favorite sports on Press Pros Magazine.com.