South Carolina Baseball: Ranking the top-15 pitchers in Gamecock history
By Kevin Miller
South Carolina Baseball’s No. 7 Greatest Pitcher of All-Time:
Matt Price
Matt Price (2009-2012) was as intimidating of a closer that college baseball has seen in recent memory. He was big but not that big. He threw fast but not overly fast. But that stare, oh man, that stare. Matt Price could make the biggest, strongest man on the planet feel tiny in the batter’s box whenever he looked down the bill of his hat from the pitching rubber.
After a lightly-used freshman season in 2009, Ray Tanner and even Price, himself, were wondering if he would ever be able to make it at South Carolina. Well, during fall practice that year, Price showed he was ready to be the man in the bullpen for the Gamecocks. When the season came around, it didn’t take long for #22 to get inserted into the closer’s role.
His sophomore campaign ended with a 2.29 ERA and 1.02 WHIP. He also struck out an absurd 13.6 batters per nine innings. Oh, yeah, and he shut down everyone in the postseason on the way to the Gamecocks’ first national championship.
In the Regional and Super Regional, he picked up saves against The Citadel and Coastal Carolina (twice). In the World Series, he pitched 9 2/3 innings, allowing just 1 run, and striking out 15 opponents. He got the win in both the game that knocked Clemson out of Omaha and the title-clinching game against UCLA.
Price was even more dominant in 2011, and his College World Series performance saw him pick up two wins and two saves, including shutting the door in both games of the championship series over the Florida Gators.
2012 was another great year for Price after a so-so early portion of the year in which he was tried out as a starting pitcher. The Gamecocks returned to Omaha and the championship series but fell to Arizona. Price parlayed his success in garnet and black to a brief pro career.