After batting .500 in junior college, player develops into baseball basher for Blue Hens

As inconceivable as it actually sounds, Aaron Graeber batted .500 as a college baseball player in 2023.

That was in the National Junior College Athletic Association’s Division III, a very serious and competitive level with players who have significant talent and great ambition.

While sparking Rowan College of Gloucester County, New Jersey, to the national title and earning a bevy of regional and national awards, Graeber hardly looked like someone who’d belatedly settled on playing college baseball. He’d planned to attend King’s College in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania and play quarterback.

Baseball had been secondary in his athletic pursuits until, as a senior at New Jersey’s West Deptford High in 2021, Rowan coach Rob Valli spotted Graeber and saw something special.

“I wasn’t gonna play my senior year of baseball,” Graeber, now the University of Delaware’s junior right-fielder, said after a recent practice at Hannah Stadium. “We had a COVID year my junior year [erasing the season], so I was kinda just like ‘All right, I didn’t play last year. I’ll just practice for football and just head off to school.’ ”

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Bashing baseballs provides new career path

Graeber did decide to play baseball as a senior, and it became his new launch pad.

A stellar season batting leadoff while exhibiting both power and speed demonstrated the hordes of potential he has continued to exhibit. Now Graeber stands to perhaps earn a professional baseball opportunity, either this year or next.

“I say this with zero exaggeration,” Delaware baseball coach Greg Mamula said. “If you stick him in Citizens Bank Park to take BP [batting practice] with one of the two major league teams, nobody would bat an eye.”

Last spring, his second at the South Jersey JUCO, Graeber went 107-for-214 to post that stunning .500 average in 57 games on a 52-5 team. That included 15 doubles, eight triples, 18 homers, an equally astounding 102 RBI, plus 20 stolen bases in 22 attempts.

Graeber was voted NJCAA Division III Player of the Year, while also earning conference and region best-player awards and being MVP of the regional and national tournaments. He was also a gold glove outfielder.

“[Valli] told me first day I could create a dream in this sport,” Graeber said. “ . . . It definitely came true and I trusted him and I’m grateful for that path.”

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Difficult adjustment to DI Delaware

Baseball is, Graeber confessed, “a hard sport” that allows its best practitioners to treasure what they’ve accomplished while knowing stiff challenges always lurk.

Having transferred to Delaware, NCAA Division I baseball immediately demonstrated its difficulty. A left-handed hitter and thrower, Graeber has been a fixture in right field for the Blue Hens since the season started.

But the transition was tough. After his 14 ^th game, March 13 against Georgetown, Graeber was batting .192. He did hike that to .253 until before an April 9 trip to Lafayette, where Graeber found his stroke. He smacked two homers in the Blue Hens’ 22-2 rout.

“Every day we would write his name in the lineup and be like ‘OK, today is the day Graeber is gonna break out,’ ” Mamula said. “Lafayette, his first home run was like 450-some feet. His next one was, whatever, like 410 feet, and we were like ‘OK, here we go,’ and it’s been pretty impressive ever since.”

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In a groove heading to postseason

Graeber is still in that groove as the fourth-place Blue Hens (27-22 overall, 14-10 CAA) host first-place UNC-Wilmington for a 3-game set beginning Thursday to close the regular season. Delaware needs one win or one Hofstra loss to clinch a berth in the CAA Tournament May 22-26 at UNCW.

He is now batting .324, second best on the team, with 12 homers, 45 RBI and 10 stolen bases. Graeber is on a 14-game hitting streak and has two hits or more in 13 of Delaware’s last 21 games.

“I knew coming in it would be difficult,” Graeber said of the adjustment to NCAA Division I baseball. “Even when I thought that, it got even more difficult. Going home after a game I was like ‘What do I have to do to get going?’ ”

Finally putting football behind him

Mamula and his staff knew patience was key.

“He’s one of those kids,” Mamula said, “who’s already swinging at the pitch before he gets in the box.”

That comes, Mamula added, from perhaps wanting “to play baseball like it’s a football game.”

“The change for him has been he’s much more selective,” Mamula said. “He’s starting to walk a lot more. He’s starting to get more favorable hitters’ counts.

“There’s still room for growth in that area but that’s been the turnaround for him, which has allowed him to put up big numbers for us now.”

Contact Kevin Tresolini at ktresolini@delawareonline.com and follow on Twitter @kevintresolini. Support local journalism by subscribing to delawareonline.com and our DE Game Day newsletter.

This article originally appeared on Delaware News Journal: After batting .500 in junior college, player develops into baseball basher for Blue Hens