BOMBS AWAY

Home runs are being hit at near historic levels in college baseball, but this time the surge is not the result of equipment changes

- TEDDY CAHILL

With top-ranked Arkansas trailing Georgia by a run in the sixth inning of the rubber game of their early May series, DH Matt Goodheart stepped to the plate to face lefthander Ryan Webb. Goodheart, a left-handed hitter, got ahead in the count 2-0 before Webb threw him a 91 mph fastball low and on the outer half of the plate.

Goodheart didn’t try to do too much with the pitch. He got his bat extended and rocketed the ball to center field, taking aim at the light pole just to the left of the batter’s eye at BaumWalker Stadium. By some estimates, the ball hit three-quarters of the way up the stanchion, higher than the batter’s eye. TrackMan measured the home run to have traveled 460 feet with an exit velocity of 107 mph.

It was, by any definition, a nuke.

“I was like, ‘Oh my gosh,’ ” Arkansas hitting coach Nate Thompson said. “It was ridiculous. The wind didn’t hurt it, I know that, but I was blown away.”

Thompson said it was the farthest ball he’s ever seen hit at Baum-Walker Stadium. While he hasn’t coached at Arkansas as long as Dave Van Horn, who is in his 19th season as head coach, Thompson has worked with some impressive power hitters in his time, including Heston Kjerstad, the No. 2 overall pick in 2020.

Home runs of epic proportions and otherwise have been flying at Arkansas and across the country all season long. The Division I home run rate has jumped from 0.75 per game in 2019, the last full college season, to 0.85 per game in 2021.