Healthy Maupin looks to ace his final season

~ The right-hander missed almost the entire 2005 season.

Perhaps no Southeast Missouri State baseball player is more anxious for today's season opener at Arkansas State than senior pitcher Anthony Maupin.

After being Southeast's top winner in 2004, Maupin missed virtually all of last year with a shoulder injury that resulted in him being granted a final season of eligibility.

Now fully recovered, Maupin is considered the Redhawks' No. 1 starter, and he will be on the mound today against the Indians, who opened their season Sunday by beating Henderson State 13-8.

"I'm really looking forward to it," Maupin said prior to Monday's practice at Capaha Field. "The year off ... it was kind of a long time to watch everybody else play."

As glad as Maupin is to finally take the field again, Southeast coach Mark Hogan is just as pleased for his tall right-hander, who stands 6 feet, 7 inches and weighs 220 pounds.

"I'm really happy for Anthony, because he's worked very hard to get to this point," Hogan said. "He had a good fall, and an excellent offseason in the weight room. He's bigger and stronger.

"We were counting on him last year, then he couldn't pitch. We're really looking for good things from him this year. The way he's come back, it looks like he never had an injury."

Maupin, a wildlife biology major who is scheduled to graduate in May with hopes of being a conservation agent, concurred.

"I think I am better than I've been. I'm very confident and comfortable, and I put on about 20 pounds since the beginning of the fall," he said. "I'm throwing consistently harder than I ever have. I've been hitting 87 to 89 [miles per hour] consistently."

Maupin was a durable workhorse for a 2004 Southeast team that reached the final game of the Ohio Valley Conference tournament.

In his first season at Southeast after transferring from Alabama Southern Community College, Maupin went 8-7 with seven complete games, including one against national power Alabama as he allowed two runs in a loss.

Although Maupin's earned run average was 6.01, his 23 appearances were the fifth-most in a single season at Southeast, and his 103 1/3 innings pitched placed him sixth on the school's all-time single-season list.

"I thought Anthony really did a good job for his first year of Division I baseball," Hogan said.

Maupin injured his right shoulder during the fall of 2004 -- he believes it must have been a gradual thing, because he never felt an actual pop -- and had surgery.

He appeared to be coming along well in 2005 and made two early starts to test the shoulder, but he just never felt right. So, after six innings, he was shut down for the season.

"My arm just wasn't ready," he said. "So I just rehabbed it all spring, and come June it was so much better."

Not wishing to take any chances, Maupin did not pitch for a summer team. He elected to simply continue working out in his hometown of Milton, Fla.

"Now I feel 100 percent," he said.

Maupin appreciates the fact that he enters the season regarded as Southeast's No. 1 pitcher, especially since two of last year's top starters -- fellow seniors Derek Herbig and Jamie McAlister -- also return.

"I like that role. It's nice to hear I'm No. 1 out of all those guys," Maupin said.

McAlister said Maupin deserves that status to enter the season.

"He looks phenomenal. He's one of the hardest working guys I've ever seen," McAlister said.

With an inexperienced lineup around the field, Maupin knows that he, Herbig and McAlister will be counted on to carry much of the load for the Redhawks, particularly early. He doesn't seem to mind.

"To start off with, I think we'll have to, but all the other guys, I have confidence they'll adjust to Division I ball pretty well," Maupin said. "I look for us to have a good season."