East Prairie senior putting himself among elite, both on AND off the diamond

When you break down the 2023 Kenyon College baseball roster, there are student-athletes from 14 states, including six players from California and five from New York.

No one from the Bootheel is venturing to the incredibly elite private, liberal arts institution, which carries a price tag of over $66,000… per year.

With the exception of East Prairie High School senior Peyton Hodges, that is.

The Eagle pitcher and third baseman is not only putting himself in a select category in terms of college choice by attending the NCAA Division III institution in Gambier, Ohio, but his baseball exploits have placed him at another level, as well.

“He is a heckuva pitcher,” Kelly coach Josh Hopkins said of Hodges, who ended the Hawks’ season in the recent MSHSAA Class 3 District 2 Tournament. “He is going to the next level to pitch.”

Hodges, who recently graduated as his class Salutatorian, has been a cornerstone of the Eagle program over the past three seasons (his freshman season was awash due to COVID), but he was never any more critical than over the past couple of springs.

In the past two years, Hodges helped East Prairie win 40 games, including their first District championship (2021 Class 3 District 1) in well over a decade.

Individually, Hodges registered 109 strikeouts as a junior and added another 107 this season. Those numbers rank him 15th and 16th, respectively, overall, in MSHSAA history.

“Peyton has been big for us,” veteran East Prairie coach Gary Scott said.

The strikeouts would lead some to believe that the right-hander simply overpowers opposing hitters, however, Hodges’ success is much more nuanced than having a blazing fastball.

In the final victory of his career (that semifinal win over Kelly), Hodges reached into his deep arsenal of pitches to survive (barely) against the talented Hawks, which had beaten East Prairie 6-1 earlier in the season.

“I had a curveball, slider, and fastball going good,” Hodges said.

Hodges said he mixed in a variety of throws regardless of the count.

“I was able to throw, a couple of times, curveballs, on (full counts),” Hodges said. “I got them over the plate and got strikeouts.”

He’s going to have to pack that versatility when he leaves for college later this summer, for at Kenyon, when it comes to – well, anything – the Owls don’t mess around.

On the athletic fields, there isn’t an institution at the Division III level which has won more national championships (61). Oh, and by the way, there is only one other Division III school, which has produced more NCAA Post-graduate Scholars (89), considered one of the most prestigious academic accomplishments that any student-athlete can earn.

“It just felt like a family there when I visited,” Hodges told Semoball.com upon signing to play at Kenyon earlier this year. “There’s a great environment around the entire program with coaches and players, and it felt like a place that I could succeed at further on in life.”

The Owl baseball program won 21 games this spring, but again, success athletically tells only a sliver of Kenyon’s story.

Over 25 percent of the student-athletes who graduate from Kenyon end up residing in one of the three largest metropolitan markets (New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago) in this country.

That isn’t by happenstance, it is because those are the places where REALLY successful professionals work and live. Suffice it to say, Hodges, more than likely, will only be returning to his New Madrid home for visits.

The students who have attended Kenyon range from bestselling authors, cutting-edge researchers, Oscar-winning actors, a Supreme Court justice, a prime minister, and even a U.S. president (Rutherford B. Hayes).

“I wanted to prepare for life after baseball,” Hodges said. “And to go to a school where if baseball didn’t work out, I would still be set up for success with the academic quality that they have.”