Baseball is known as America’s pastime and is a beloved sport of many fans throughout the country.  Although the sport has been bashed due to it’s slow pace, baseball is still popular around Cincinnati.

When looking at Elder sports, the first that comes to mind is football because of the intimidating and glorious Pit located right next to the school.  The sport that goes under the radar is Elder baseball.

Elder baseball has the most State Championships in school history with 12 championships.  Elder also holds the record for the most wins in OHSSA state tournament history.

Elder baseball is not just a historic program in Cincinnati, but in the state of Ohio.

Well as the months pass and as spring slowly makes it way to town, baseball will start again and this year they are more motivated than I have seen a team entering a season in a long time.

Last season, the Panthers of the diamond struggled and finished with an overall record of 13-14 while accumulating only two wins in the GCL.

Senior Drew Klaserner explained that last season was a roller coaster of ups and downs.

“Last season gave us a lot of learning experiences to build off of,” added Klaserner. “One thing this year that is promising is we have a lot of experienced guys in the line up.”

Elder brings back 11 seniors and also a couple juniors who experienced some playing time during last season.  A lot of leadership will be brought back and will be needed to help carry the team far in the postseason.

As for players to watch this season, Ben Farwick, a senior leader for the team, mentioned Danny Nieman.  Nieman will play the role as Elder’s ace on the mound this year after leading the team in strikeouts and era last year.

Other top fielders and hitters include TJ Kearns, Max Lendhart, and Brandon Meyers.  All of them got pretty good playing time last season and look to have bigger roles this year.

Now, as I explained before, Elder baseball has a pretty impressive stat with all their State Championships and wins the program has earned over the past decades.

One stat that has been on the mind of all Elder baseball fans is if the team will be able to win a championship either this year or next year.  Why would that be?

Well, since 1940, Elder has been able to win a State championship at least once every

decade.  It is an unbelievable feat to think that for seven straight decades the Panthers have been able to to bring a championship home.

In an interview with Farwick, I brought this up to him and he didn’t think much of it.

“I know it’s something that people always think about, but I don’t buy into it,” said Farwick.  “It’s not something I lose sleep over.  We just have to take it one game at a time and trust the process.”

It will be very interesting to see if this team can live up to the hype this season and continue the Elder baseball tradition of winning and proving that they are still among the best teams in the state.