Notre Dame baseball coach challenges young players: 'Go be a Jack Radel'
In beating Clemson for the second time this season, Jack Radel improved to 8-4 with a 3.29 ERA this year for Notre Dame baseball.
SOUTH BEND — An exhausted Jack Radel, ace righthander for Notre Dame baseball, sat silently to coach Shawn Stiffler’s right after pitching the Irish past Clemson and into the second round of the ACC Tournament . A junior projected as a potential first-round pick in this July’s Major League Baseball draft, Radel earned a public “Thank you” from his coach after throwing 93 pitches on a 92-degree Tuesday evening, May 19 in Charlotte, N. C.
“My guy to my right is ‘him’ again,” Stiffler said after Radel recorded the first 19 outs. “I’ll be looking for one of him for 20 years from now. ” And then the fourth-year Irish coach gave an impassioned plea to young ballplayers everywhere to emulate the patience, diligence and work ethic Radel displayed over his three seasons in South Bend.
“Over the next three weeks, we’re going to see everybody looking for something better,” Stiffler said, referencing the transfer portal. “We’re going to see everybody looking for something easier, something new, something shinier. Everything will become about transactions.
“What (Radel) did is he delayed his gratification. We laid out a plan in front of him. The work had to be done by him.