On Friday, Loyola Marymount University’s baseball team and their entirely new coaching staff will begin the 2024 season. The team went 21-6 last season, claiming the West Coast Conference regular season championship. Now, with new head coach, Donegal Fergus and Mathew Troupe, Travis Buck, and Justin Dedman as assistant coaches, the team is eager to get back on the field and defend their title.
“It’s been nothing but a blessing to have a group that is so tight and a group that has had that success, but is still hungry.” said LMU pitching coach, Mathew Troupe. “The energy is going to be different this year, go watch any practice that these boys have…we have high standards and expectations.”
With new coaches come new ideas, strategies, and technologies. The team has implemented software like Trackman and Hittrax, which present data analytics to help coaches see areas of strengths and improvement. Pitchers are able to see release speed, spin rate, velocity, pitch movement, while hitters are able to see distance, exit velocity, strike zone analysis and so much more.
“Troupe saw that I struggled in the fall and saw it as a positive thing,” said pitcher Cole Chimenti. “We weren’t able to see any of our data last year. Now, since we are able to use the Trackman, it was easy to see what was going wrong, and fix it.”
Along with the high intensity comes a great sense of community and unique culture. The organization is not only focusing on baseball and statistics, but also personal growth as young adults. “My goal as their pitching coach here is helping them understand who they are in all lanes possible,” Troupe said. “We also need to know what bogs us up in our mind, what kind of takes us off the path, and we need to know what drives us moving forward.”
The community between players has additionally grown. “We have ‘leadership meetings’ every week that focus on becoming better leaders, respecting our teammates, others in the organization,” said Chimenti. “To just work on ourselves on and off the field.”
An additional goal the new staff has is to fill the stands. “I think sometimes it goes unnoticed how special it is to all of our players when [fans] do show up and how much of an impact that can make just being there,” Troupe said. “I can’t stand by the wins and losses, that’ll sort itself out, but I can stand by our boys really feeding off of it and appreciating it.” With new pitching strategies, new technology, and new perspectives on the game, this organization is constantly working hard to better itself for the team and for the university. The team wants to work hard to make LMU fans proud to wear a lion on their shirts.
The coaches have built up a positive mindset throughout the organization that focuses on and encourages players and coaches to explore new things, see what works, and change it if it doesn’t. “We’re going to fail a lot,” said Troupe.” That’s kind of the culture that is here. Let’s fail. Let’s learn. Let’s be okay, failing and learning.”
