Taylor Rogers hopes to build on summer,
make statement as UK baseball’s new ace

Newly appointed UK Friday night starting pitcher Taylor Rogers will likely face some tough environments on the road in Southeastern Conference play this season.

Still, none of those environments are likely to rival his experience last summer, when Rogers was selected to start the Cape Cod League All-Star Game at Fenway Park, home of the Boston Red Sox.

“That was a dream come true,” Rogers said at UK baseball media day Wednesday. “You get out there and the mound is absolutely perfect. You can feel the Green Monster from your back, and you can just see it out of your eye. It was quite the experience.”

Rogers earned the win for the East squad after surrendering one run on two hits in one inning of work. His memory of the experience is a blur.

“I kind of blacked out through that inning,” he said. “You get done and you’re back in the dugout, and you’re like ‘whoa, what just happened?’”

The All-Star game start was the cap to an impressive summer in the Cape — considered the most prestigious summer league for college baseball players — for Rogers. In eight starts for the Harwich Mariners, Rogers was 3-4 with a 1.57 ERA and 40 strikeouts with six walks in 46 innings pitched.

“I learned a lot about myself up there,” Rogers said. “Being successful up there, facing that kind of quality of competition definitely gave myself come confidence.”

Rogers’ experience is common for players who have success in the Cape, said UK head coach Gary Henderson.

“I think anytime that you run those guys up there and you play against the best amateurs basically in the world in our game and they have success, it does exactly what you would think it does,” he said. “It gives them confidence to understand they can do it against any level player and then they can come back here.”

Rogers wasn’t the only Wildcat to experience success in the Cape last summer. Sophomore right-handed pitcher Trevor Gott was 0-1 with a 2.86 ERA and 12 saves with 28 strikeouts and six walks in 23 innings pitched for the Orleans Firebirds. Gott was named Reliever of the Year in the league and earned the save in relief of Rogers in the Cape All-Star Game.

Rogers and Gott benefited from pitching to wood bats in the Cape.

“You have a little bit of a benefit there,” Henderson said of the bats. “I think anytime you go up there and you are successful it gives you the confidence of being successful and knowing that you can come back here and perform at a higher level.”

Rogers, who was the 37th round pick of the Baltimore Orioles in the 2009 MLB draft out of high school, burst onto the scene for UK as a freshman with a seven and two-thirds shutout innings performance versus West Virginia in his first career start. He finished his freshman campaign at 4-7 with a 6.40 ERA but made a start in each of UK’s 14 weekend series.

As a sophomore, Rogers was 3-7 with a 5.14 ERA and 49 strikeouts in 77 innings pitched. He made 13 starts for the Wildcats last season.

Henderson will turn to Rogers as his Friday night starter to begin the season, filling the hole left by Alex Meyer, who was the first-round draft pick of the Washington Nationals in the 2011 MLB draft.

“I’m not trying to go throw 100 m.p.h like (Meyer) does,” Rogers said. “I just want to do the same things he did for the team playing those next two games on the weekend.”

“We don’t have anybody as spectacular as Alex, but that’s the case for most people in the country,” Henderson said. “We are going to have some depth in terms of competitiveness and being able to match up in terms of depth on each side.”

Rogers hopes his experience in the Cape will carry over into his junior season.

“Figuring out myself and what I can do and what I can’t do, trying not to go outside my limits, that gives me confidence,” he said. “Being in the league two years already, I feel very confident starting the season.”

Rogers and the rest of the UK weekend rotation, know they have to perform to keep their spots this season.

“While I’m willing to suffer a bump in the road and a skinned knee, we’re not going to need run someone out there that can’t do it for very long,” Henderson said. “We are going to have some viable options. That’s an exciting thing.”

Photo of (left to right) Gott, Henderson and Rogers at Fenway Park from UK Athletics