Long Beach State freshman right fielder Richard Prigatano was tabbed as the 14th best freshman in the nation by Baseball America coming out of St. Francis High School in Northern California.
Beginning the 2012 season, the Los Gatos native started in right field for Troy Buckley’s squad, yet lacked the signs of the lofty expectations placed upon his young shoulders.
Prigatano recorded only six hits in his first 32 at-bats for a .187 batting average, but since March 5th, the 6-foot-4 freshman has 21 hits in his last 66 at-bats.
“He has a lot of baseball [ability] at such a young age,” Buckley said. “He has all the tools to succeed here at Long Beach State.”
Coming out of St. Francis, Prigatano was selected in the 16th round of Major League Baseball First-Year player draft by the Toronto Blue Jays, but elected to further hone his baseball skills with the Dirtbags.
“My parents are from the area so it was a desirable place for me and I wanted to be apart of what goes on here,” Prigatano said. “It was a big decision to make, but my parents came to [Long Beach] so I wanted to be here.”
The Dirtbags faced top pitching staffs in UCLA, USC, and other Pac-12 heavyweights Oregon and Cal contributed to Prigatano’s early season woes.
Prigatano leads the diminutive Dirtbags offense in strikeouts at the plate with 28 through 28 games played, but Buckley has stuck with him because of the freshman’s upside.
“We played good teams early so he shouldn’t have been down on himself because he has the talent,” Buckley said. “He’s played fairly well [this year] for being so young.”
As of April 8, Prigatano is hitting .276, but with little power registering only three extra base hits all three of which being doubles.
Luckily for Prigatano and the rest of the Dirtbags offense, their schedule eases up as Big West Conference play begins.
The Dirtbags have taken four of six Big West games so far, two each against Cal Poly and UC Riverside, respectively. LBSU’s two losses have been by a combined three runs.
Only time will tell if Prigatano can take advantage of Big West pitching, but if his rebound after March 5 is a sign of things to come, the freshman should be hitting in the middle of the Dirtbags order for quite some time.