NC State baseball updated offseason prospectus: Outfield
The NC State baseball season ended a month ago with a loss to Campbell. With that came a quick turnaround to start assembling the roster for the 2024 season. With that in mind, TheWolfpacker.com is updating its series of outlooks moving ahead, starting with the outfield.
NC State Baseball Outfielders In 2023
The NC State baseball roster was overloaded with perspective outfielders in 2023, and finding continuity was an issue.
Some of the was injury related. Both Noah Soles and Trevor Candelaria missed time with health issues. Others revolved around consistency.
The Pack added three touted transfers in Candelaria and Parker Nolan from Davidson and Carter Trice from Old Dominion to go with the return of previous starters like Soles and Dominic Pilolli. Plus, promising young talent in sophomores Will Marcy and Chase Nixon made noticeable strides in 2023, and freshman Michael Gupton was a speedster considered one of the prizes of the incoming recruiting class.
However, with freshman catcher Cannon Peebles essentially locking down the designated hitter spot, finding room for all the outfielders was a challenge. Pilolli was noticeably squeezed out from the outset after hitting .261 with nine homers while starting 47 of 52 games in 2022. Pilolli only had one start and 15 overall appearances this year.
Gupton proved not ready, getting just seven total at bats, including a pair of walks.
When healthy, Candelaria was a mainstay, starting all 51 games. He finished the year hitting .295 with 10 homers and played good defense in both right and center field.
Soles was one of the Pack’s better hitters but missed about 20 games with a hamstring injury. When he was heathy, he oftentimes batted leadoff and hit .305 with a .443 on-base percentage.
Trice started most of the early games, but his struggles at the plate (.248 average) saw him demoted to primarily pinch-hitting status.
That left Marcy, Nixon and Nolan to get most of the remaining starts. Each had moments where they hit well. Marcy batted .301 with 5 homers and 12 doubles in 136 at bats. Nolan belted 10 home runs and hit .288 while providing impressive range in center in 51 games, including 41 starts.
Nixon hit .319 in 72 plate appearances, including a pair of homers and eight doubles among his 23 hits for a .514 slugging percentage.
Looking Ahead
Some of the logjam in the outfield will naturally take care of itself. Candelaria and Nolan were only at NC State because Davidson does not have a graduate school and each had a year of eligibility left going into 2023.
Gupton quickly entered the transfer portal after the season was over. More surprisingly, so too did Marcy. Neither have yet announced a new destination. Marcy would have been a projected as a potential starter next year.
Players like Pilolli and Trice, each with a year of eligibility remaining, will have to do some hard self-evaluations after their struggles last season. Both are also draft eligible and could entertain offers, even as non-drafted free agents.
On the surface, the return of Nixon and Soles would give the Wolfpack a competent starting point in the outfield, although those two have mainly played corner outfields in their careers. Furthermore, NC State has added a transfer in Wichita State star hitter Garrett Pennington, the Shockers’ everyday first baseman in 2023.
The significance of that is that Pennington could also theoretically play outfield, but so, too, could NC State’s first baseman for most of last season — impressive rookie Eli Serrano III. Serrano batted .292 with 7 homers in 185 at-bats.
Pennington hit .307 with 15 homers and 12 doubles in 225 at bats last season, driving in 55 runs and scoring 47 times for Wichita State. He was also 11 for 14 on stolen bases. He hit a pair of grand slams during the year.
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