Still home in Harrisonburg EMU transfer finds footing at Division I level after midweek success

By WILL MORAN The Breeze

Two outs. Tie game. A 1-2 pitch was hammered to left field for a two-run home run. It put JMU up two and eventually won it the game. Not only was it a game winner for the Dukes against Radford on March 21, but it was the first home run for graduate transfer outfielder Jaylon Lee in purple and gold. He said it felt like a weight off his shoulders.

“It always feels good to get the first one under your belt, because everybody loves to hit the long ball, so getting that first one in, it felt good,” Lee said.

JMU baseball head coach Marlin Ikenberry said he was excited to see Lee hit his first home run and said he “knew he had that in him.” Ikenberry described the homer as a “no doubter.”

“It was a bomb. I mean, he hit it over the scoreboard,” Ikenberry said. “I think TrackMan [a distance and velocity tracker] had it at 108 exit velocity and 484 feet.”

Lee didn’t stop there.

On Tuesday against Richmond, Lee went yard not once but twice. Two solo shots, both to left field, one to put the Dukes up four in the third, and another to extend the lead to six late in the game. Redshirt senior first baseman Kyle Novak said the team was almost more excited than Lee in those moments.

“It was honestly awesome, I feel like we were happier than he was,” Novak said. “The home runs he hit weren’t just, like, wall scrapers, they were absolute bombs. I think he hit two of them over 450 feet, which is probably both the longest home runs we have this season.”

Novak praised Lee for his performance early on in the season, especially in JMU’s opening series against Florida State. In this series, Lee recorded five hits and an RBI in 11 at-bats.

“In the beginning of the season, he started off hot in Florida State, he did really well,” Novak said. “Then he started to slow down a little bit, right, like after Florida State, I think they found out how to pitch him … he’s obviously never seen arms like we’ve seen this year, especially being in the Sun Belt.”

In the seven games following the Florida State series, Lee combined for only three hits in 18 at-bats before a three-hit, three-RBI game against VCU on March 8. Lee has rebounded since then and is currently hitting .290 for the Dukes with 17 RBIs and three home runs. This is off the back of a successful career at Eastern Mennonite University (EMU). Lee averaged .332, had 132 RBIs and 30 home runs in his five seasons for the Royals.

Before joining the Royals, Lee visited JMU for a camp during his senior year of high school. Lee wanted to come to JMU, but at the time the Dukes had already filled their outfield roster, so Ikenberry told him to talk to the coaches at EMU.

After being All-ODAC first team twice in five years at EMU, he finally has his chance to make the move that Novak said he’s wanted to make his whole career.

“He’s wanted to play at JMU, he says, for five years, so him getting here and then playing his butt off is, honestly, awesome to see,” Novak said, “especially coming from D-III for five years, then his sixth year he comes here and he’s chopping 450-foot home runs. That’s awesome to see.”

Lee followed his time at EMU by spending this past summer playing for the Harrisonburg Turks in the Valley Baseball League (VBL). He hit .285 for the Turks in 41 games with 38 hits, 28 RBIs and four home runs. Lee credited his time in the valley league as a reason for his early success in D-I at JMU.

“Playing the Valley actually was a huge step to transferring over to Division I,” Lee said, “as it allowed me to see somewhat what D-I arms would look like, especially because they had some guys from Power 5 schools in there.”

Lee said the biggest changes from the D-III to D-I level are in the quality of the players and the pace of the game. He said the D-I level has more “pro-style” players and he could “tell from the jump that these guys are legit and that they are on this level for a reason.”

Another aspect of the game that increases the game from D-III to D-I is pitching velocity. Lee said the normal speeds from weekend arms in D-III ranges from 89-92 miles per hour, with a few being able to push 93-94. This is about 8 mph slower than what he said some pitchers can bring in the Sun Belt Conference. Lee expected South Alabama to have some closers throwing 97-100 mph in its series this past weekend.

He also said the D-I level has more athletic players, and while that brings another challenge to playing, it also makes the game more exciting.

“As a position player, the pace of the game also gets quicker too, as more people are, like, athletic,” Lee said. “It’s been fun experiencing all that.”

Part of the way to combat the change he’s facing in the jump from D-III to D-I is in his preparation. Lee said there isn’t much difference in his preparation from last season to this season, just making sure that he’s keyed in on what assistant coach Mike Roberts is telling him and the team in practice.

“It’s tough on us, and it’s like that on purpose,” Lee said. “It creates a better player, and it creates more consistency with us and makes the game slow down for us … the training that we do is really hard, and it’s basically meant to fail you, so that when you get into the game, it’s a lot easier for us.”

Novak has noticed all the work Lee puts in and how it has been paying off. Ikenberry said he’s a hard worker and “always has a smile on his face.”

“He’s just been working really hard in the facilities and Memorial Hall, just getting his swing down, working on breaking balls … and he’s adjusted really quick, like, honestly quicker than anyone else,” Novak said. “He just hit two home runs yesterday off two sliders, which was awesome.”

As far as individual expectations, Lee wants to continue to build consistency in the batter’s box.

“Hitting is always a challenge, as everybody knows, it’s one of the hardest things to do in sports,” Lee said. “I always say just try to be more consistent, in general, when it comes to hitting because everybody wants to be consistent.”

This was echoed by Ikenberry.

“I think minimizing strikeouts is something he knows he has to try to do,” Ikenberry said, “and just being more consistently on the barrel because when he does barrel the ball, it has a high exit velocity, and, you know, in the world of baseball, if you have a certain exit velocity and certain line drives the odds of getting hits are extremely high.”

Lee has gained a lot of experience at the D-III level at EMU and in theVBL, but he and his coaches aren’t letting him be defined by his previous level, but by his love, knowledge and skill for the game of baseball.

“I just came in and the coaching staff, they basically just let me know, like, ‘You’re not a D-III guy transferring into D-I, you’re a baseball player,” Lee said. “You’ve always deserved to be here.”

CONTACT Will Moran at at breezecopy@ gmail.com. For more baseball coverage, follow the sports desk on Twitter @ TheBreezeSports.