LJ baseball: Holdgrafer All-American

Timmy Holdgrafer's only defeat in 2015 came when

he pitched a four-hitter against Mission Bay in the

Western League opener April 13. His counterpart,

Imani Abdullah, also pitched a four-hitter. The only

run scored in the 1-0 decision against Holdgrafer

was unearned. (Photo by Ed Piper)

I've been out with surgery, but in the meantime the awards keep piling up for Tim Holdgrafer, the CIF Player of the Year in baseball this past spring.

Holdgrafer was named Second Team All-American by MaxPreps. In so doing, he became the first La Jolla High baseball player to be an All-American, according to Coach Gary Frank.

The 6'1", 165-pound graduated senior's statistics have become familiar, they've been repeated so often for each of his awards:  First Team All-Western League for the third year in a row, Western League Player of the Year, San Diego Union-Tribune Player of the Year, MVP of the Bully's East Tournament, in addition to his recognition as CIF Player of the Year.

Timmy set a La Jolla High record with his 10 wins this season (10-1 record). He also set season and career records at the school for innings pitched in 2015, with 88 1/3 and 203 1/3, respectively. His microscopic ERA of 0.87 this season and 1.62 ERA for his career were both second on the all-time LJHS list.

The right-handed ace of the Viking pitching staff also recorded 86 strikeouts and gave up only seven walks in 2015, which make up a ridiculous 12.2 K/BB ratio. In this week's Sports Illustrated story on the New York Mets' pitchers, the writer was making a big deal out of Bartolo Colon's K/BB ratio of 7. Holdgrafer's was nearly double that.

At the plate, Holdgrafer, who led off much of the first half of the season, then was switched by Frank to the third slot to take advantage of his ability to drive in runs, batted .364, with 24 RBI's, 5 doubles, and 2 triples.

Surprisingly, the 20 stolen bases the St. Mary's-bound pitcher/position player racked up during his season were left out of the MaxPreps citation which appeared recently. Timmy stole home once, and was called out at home plate on a disputed call on a second attempted steal of home.


Copyright 2015 Ed Piper