Streater makes early impact in new location

Mason Streater (Walters State CC photo)

I've known Mason Streater's maternal grandmother and most of her siblings for more than 50 years because we attended the same church and schools. My future sister-in-law married into the family and remains good friends with them decades after the marriage ended. We had a holiday meal at the grandmother's house several years when Streater was there and of grammar-school age.

I covered a few of his baseball games at Byrnes High School during my tenure as a free-lance writer for The Herald-Journal in Spartanburg before Streater moved to Boiling Springs and helped the Bulldogs reach the Class AAAAA finals in high school football in 2016.

So when he committed/signed to play at the University of South Carolina, it was nice to know there would be someone on the roster I was a little familiar with off the field.

I was at Founders Park in Columbia when he got what turned out to be his only hit as a Gamecock. There's no way of telling from the boxscore, but the ball was a squibber down the third-base line. The Charleston Southern third baseman had no option other than to let the ball roll and hope it went foul. It hit the bag.

Welcome to college baseball, Mason Streater.

His batting average remained at 1.000 for several weeks as he rarely saw action. He was stuck as a backup to third baseman Jonah Bride, who was producing offensively and defensively for a Gamecocks team struggling to find its path under first-year coach Mark Kingston.

Streater, a shortstop for most of his high school career, went hitless in his final five at-bats, with three of those AB's coming in a lopsided loss to Arkansas in the SEC Tournament.

He played in nine games and had seven total plate appearances.

As is sometimes the case for holdover recruits from a previous staff, Streater found himself not in the current staff's plans moving forward.

He was encouraged to look elsewhere and another coach directed him toward junior college power Walters State in Morristown, Tenn. He's listed as an infielder/outfielder on the Senators' roster.

Walters State, ranked No. 2 in the preseason NJCAA rankings, opened its season at USC Salkehatchie this weekend. Streater wasn't in the starting lineup for Saturday's opener, but had a walk in two plate appearances and played left field as a sub in an 18-1 victory.

Streater cracked the starting lineup in left field for both games of Sunday's doubleheader. Batting ninth, he had a home run, walked twice, scored twice and drove in two runs in a six-inning 14-1 win in the opener. Walters State's Twitter feed described his home run to lead off the third inning as a "bomb."

Fellow USC transfer Corey Stone was the beneficiary, getting the win as the Senators' starting pitcher.

Sounds much more memorable than a squibber to the third-base bag.

Streater added two more walks, stole two bases and scored two more runs in an 11-5 win in Game 2, where he had duty at second and third base.

For the three games he had 4 at-bats and 5 walks, so one week into the season it looks like the move could be beneficial for Streater.

He and the Senators have two more trips to South Carolina this season. There's an appearance in a tournament hosted by USC Sumter at Riley Field Feb. 23-24 and a March 13 twinbill at Spartanburg Methodist. He may feel pretty close to home there. Mooneyham Field is almost halfway between Streater's high school haunts of Byrnes and Boiling Springs.