HawgBeat’s in-depth season preview of the 2019 baseball team continues with a look at the infield, where the Razorbacks lost all but one primary starter and even he isn’t in the same spot as last year.

Yesterday, we took a broad look at Arkansas’ offense and examined how it’ll be much different than last year. Our preview series has also included a thorough look at the pitching staff, as well as shorter updates on Caleb Bolden having Tommy John surgery and Connor Noland splitting his time between two sports.

Catcher

One of the several players Arkansas lost to the MLB Draft was Grant Koch. He started 134 games behind the plate over the last three years, including 91.0 percent of all games the last two seasons.

Both of his backups return in 2019, with Zack Plunkett turning down a 37th-round draft pick to come back as a fifth-year senior and Casey Opitz back as a sophomore.

Head coach Dave Van Horn said he anticipates both of them playing quite a bit in order to keep them fresh, something Koch never benefitted from, but said one might eventually take over as the primary starter.

It’s an interesting battle because they are very different players defensively and as hitters.

“If you look at just the throwing part of it, Plunkett’s as good as anybody in the country,” Van Horn said. “As far as receiving, catching and blocking, Opitz is as good as anybody.”

Offensively, Opitz has the ability to hit a home run every now and then, but he’s more of a hit-for-average guy who puts the ball in play to move runners.

“He’s going to be a guy that Coach can use in a lot of different ways, kind of like a Swiss Army knife,” hitting coach Nate Thompson said. “(He could) be just a productive offensive piece for us, whether that’s getting hits, drawing walks, bunt game, hit-and-run.”

By contrast, Plunkett is going to hit for power - as evidenced by his towering home run against Kentucky - but he’s also a risk to swing and miss more. Van Horn was complimentary of his ability to sacrifice bunt, as well.

“Zack’s done an outstanding job with his swing,” Thompson said. “He has a chance to drive the ball. I think he has a good approach, feels confident. The fall was really big for him in that way.”

The Razorbacks have the luxury of switching them out if one of them is slumping, too.

Although ace pitcher Isaiah Campbell said he likes throwing to both catchers and most of the staff feels the same way, Van Horn said there are a few who might be more comfortable with one or the other and that might dictate playing time early on.

“There’ll be some cases where a pitcher likes to throw to one guy more than the other guy,” Van Horn said. “So maybe at the beginning of the season that’s what we do, just so the pitchers can get comfortable, but they’re both going to play a lot.”

First base

Among the “new” faces in the infield, Jordan McFarland is probably the most experienced in an Arkansas uniform. He actually started 29 games at first base and appeared in 16 others as a defensive replacement, pinch hitter or pinch runner last season, while starting 16 games at the position as a true freshman.

Now a junior, McFarland looks the part of an SEC first baseman at 6-foot-3, 220 pounds. Aside from a four-game stretch against Kent State, Texas (twice) and Kentucky, though, he struggled to move runners around and knock in runs.

He had 11 RBIs in those four games compared to only four in his other 41 appearances, with his .299 season batting average somewhat misleading from a production standpoint.

In 13 opportunities with a runner on third and less than two outs, McFarland managed only four RBIs for a .308 average. The rest of the team converted those opportunities 63.9 percent of the time. He also advanced runners only 41.8 percent of the time, which ranked last among the 15 players with at least seven chances.

Frustrated by the lack of production he was getting from his first baseman, Van Horn eventually replaced him with Jared Gates, who was a senior and is a student assistant this year.

After a good showing in the California Collegiate League over the summer, though, Van Horn said he noticed a change in McFarland going into his draftable season. Despite missing some of fall practice with mono, the junior from Illinois has looked good in batting practice thanks to some offseason adjustments.

“He’s kind of changed his hitting approach where he’s not so jumpy and what I’d call guessing too much and swinging at balls out of the zone,” Van Horn said. “Obviously when they start throwing the ball 95 mph and they’re spinning it and throwing changeups, we’ll see how that approach works, but I like what I’ve seen.”

Instead of trying to pull the ball all the time, McFarland is staying through the middle of the field more. Van Horn added that he is one of the strongest guys on the team and capable of hitting it out of the park anywhere.

There were also times last season when McFarland struggled with the defensive aspect of the position. Although he made only three errors in 221 chances for a respectable .986 fielding percentage, he had a hard time tracking pop ups that sometimes landed in foul territory and didn’t go down as errors. That is another area in which he has improved during the offseason.

“He’s listened to me, listened to Coach Thompson, and I think he’s been more coachable this year than ever,” Van Horn said. “He’s been told that defense is huge and he’s put a lot of time in on that.”

If McFarland can’t put it together and have a good junior season, the Razorbacks could turn to Matt Goodheart or Opitz. Goodheart is a JUCO transfer who will likely be in the lineup - whether at first base, left field or designated hitter - because of his bat, while Opitz is a versatile guy who started at first base in the fall scrimmage at UALR because a couple players were out sick.

Second base

The heart and soul of Arkansas’ national runner-up team was fifth-year senior and Fayetteville native Carson Shaddy, so it will be tough to find a replacement for him at second base.

The Razorbacks actually dipped into the transfer market to find Trevor Ezell out of Southeast Missouri State. An Arkansas native who played at high school powerhouse Bryant, he will be a fifth-year senior this season.

With the Redhawks, Ezell hit .336 with 45 doubles, 16 home runs, 128 RBIs and 194 runs in 181 games, all of which he started. He also flashed his speed with 13 triples and 48 stolen bases and showed good plate discipline with 140 free passes (122 walks, 18 HBPs) to only 134 strikeouts.

That helped him earn NCBWA Freshman All-America honors in 2015, second-team All-Ohio Valley Conference honors in 2016 and first-team All-OVC honors in 2018. A back injury forced him to miss almost all of the 2017 season, which is why he still has eligibility remaining.

Just as an injury paved the way for him to return to his home state, one has also limited him during his time with the Razorbacks. Ezell actually dislocated his shoulder early last season and played through it, but it required surgery in late June that kept him out all fall.

Although the cold weather hasn’t helped, Van Horn thinks he should be able to play at the start of the season, even if he isn’t 100 percent in the field.

“Routine ground balls, turning the double play, he’s fine,” Van Horn said. “Going to the right, it’s a little bit of an issue making that throw right now. … We’re going to set up our defense differently on relays with him out there.”

Now seven months removed from his surgery, Ezell has displayed the same plate discipline he had at SEMO and Thompson think he’ll have similar success here. However, he’s been even more pleased with what he brings to the team in other areas.

“He has leadership ability, too,” Thompson said. “You can see that. He’s a guy that the guys respect and like. He works hard, has a good head on his shoulders and stays poised, and I think that poise will trickle down to some of the younger guys that haven’t been there yet.”

While Ezell was recovering in the fall, redshirt freshman Jacob Nesbit filled in at second base and performed well. In scrimmages against Wichita State and UALR and two intrasquad Fall World Series games, he went 5 for 13 (.385) with three RBIs, five runs, four walks and only two strikeouts.

Third base

Arkansas had a freshman All-American at third base last season, but is moving Casey Martin over to shortstop. That opens the door for junior Jack Kenley in the hot corner.

Kenley has been a reserve at both positions, making 77 total appearances with 12 starts at third base and 10 at shortstop over the last two seasons. While he would probably prefer playing shortstop, Kenley doesn’t mind swapping with Martin.

“We’re both very capable of playing those positions,” Kenley said. “It’s just a matter of getting to know each other’s range and working with each other that way. It’s going to be a lot of fun getting to play the left side of the infield no matter what because that’s where I’d rather be.”

Known more for his glove than his bat, Kenley didn’t have particularly good offensive numbers last season, hitting .222 with two doubles and 10 RBIs in 54 at bats.

When asked to fill in as a starter for Arkansas’ final four SEC series because of injuries to Shaddy and Jax Biggers, though, he stepped up to the challenge several different ways. His .200 batting average over that span doesn’t jump out, but he did draw six walks, drive in six runs, score six runs and laid down two sacrifice bunts in those 12 games.

His backup will likely be Nesbit, who Van Horn described as a “utility man” who could play multiple infield spots if needed.

Shortstop

Even though he made 55 of his 62 starts at third base last season, Van Horn has said from the beginning that Martin projects as a middle infielder and they made the switch this offseason.

The move was partially made with the 2020 season in mind, as Van Horn likes the idea of having his starting shortstop back for another year. That’s something Martin can guarantee as a non-draft-eligible sophomore, while Kenley is a junior.

A positive side effect of having both of those players, though, is that the Razorbacks can give Martin an occasional day off or use him as a designated hitter and still feel confident in Kenley’s ability to field the position.

“I feel like we have two really good shortstops for this level,” Van Horn said. “I just feel like Casey’s range is a little more right now than Kenley.”

That’s not a knock on Kenley, either, because Van Horn describes him as a “pretty consistent” fielder who makes all of the plays you’d expect from an SEC shortstop.

In addition to Martin’s range, another thing that sets him apart is what he brings to the table as an offensive weapon. He led Arkansas with a .345 batting average last season, while also slugging .556 with 14 doubles and 13 home runs. On the base paths, he stole a team-high eight bases and with the Razorbacks’ new aggressive style, he could steal as many as 20 this season.

That earned Martin second-team All-SEC and NCBWA Freshman All-America honors and has landed him on multiple preseason All-America teams, including a first-team nod by D1Baseball.com. The same publication also rates him as the top college prospect for the 2020 MLB Draft.

Martin seems to have picked up where he left off. In two scrimmages open to the public last weekend, he went 4 for 6 with a triple, two home runs and four RBIs.

HawgBeat’s preview series concludes Friday with an in-depth look at three outfield positions and designated hitter spot.

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