University of Georgia Athletics
King Came Out Swinging
February 18, 2019 | Baseball, The Frierson Files
By John Frierson
Staff Writer
Riley King's feet appeared to be touching the ground as he walked toward the Georgia baseball dugout at Foley Field on Saturday night. If they weren't, well, that would make sense.
"It was an awesome weekend," King said, his smile about as wide as it can get, "couldn't have asked for anything more."
When something you want so badly you can taste it finally happens, when you've spent two full years waiting and working, doing everything possible to make that dream come true, and then it's even better than you had any right or reason to imagine, that's pretty magical.
"It's been a long journey, obviously," said King, a redshirt sophomore, after the No. 9-ranked Bulldogs' three-game sweep of Dayton. King made the first three starts of his career in Georgia's season-opening series, and to steal a line from Nuke in "Bull Durham," he announced his presence with authority.
After three games, the right fielder has a team-high seven hits in 11 at-bats — a .636 average — along with six RBIs, five runs scored and a slugging percentage of .909.
"It's been a lot of hard work going into it and it's been kind of cool to see it kind of play out on the field," King said.
After a great career at Collins Hill High School, the Lawrenceville, Ga., native, like every freshman, arrived at Georgia hoping to make an impact right away. Instead, King was one of the players Georgia's Ike Cousins Head Baseball Coach. Scott Stricklin, opted to redshirt. King said he still vividly remembers the day Stricklin told him Georgia wanted to redshirt him.
"Mason Meadows, my freshman year, we both got redshirted. We both on the same day went into Strick's office and were told we were going to redshirt," King recalled. "I'll never forget, we tell the story all the time, we sat down in the bullpen and looked at each other. Obviously, we were discouraged for a second, but we looked at each other and were like, 'There's two ways of doing this: shutting down or just going up from here.'"
They both used that redshirt season to their advantage. King arrived at Georgia as a lean, semi-babyfaced freshman, one that weighed about 175 pounds. By the end of his freshman year, thanks to strength coach Ryan Gearheart's program, King weighed 198, he said. That proved to be more weight than he was comfortable playing with (he's now at around 185), but King certainly wasn't shutting down during his redshirt year.
In his second year in Athens, while Meadows was Georgia's new everyday catcher, King was struggling to get on the field. Between a variety of injuries and the strength of the Bulldogs' lineup, opportunities were few and far between for King. By the time Georgia's 39-win season came to an end, King had appeared in eight games, getting just six at-bats.
"There were discouraging moments, but they felt so short just because my teammates and coaches were always there to urge me on and encourage me," King said.
With the departures of Georgia's top three hitters from last season and King's return to good health and top form, he started Friday's opener in right field, batting fifth in the lineup. After those singles in his first two at-bats, King stepped back into the box in the fifth inning and smacked a two-run home run to left field. Yeah, that felt pretty good.
"Well, I was saying to myself when he went up for his first at-bat today that I hoped he would get a hit. ... He plays really hard and he plays the game right," Stricklin said after Friday's win. "He's taken his time, battled some injuries, his knee and his elbow, but he's back and is fully healthy and now we're seeing what he can do."
As fond as he was of the home run, King said he liked the previous at-bat almost as much. With two on and one out, King got behind in the count 0-2, but then a curveball came his way. He stayed with it and slapped it into left. "That one felt really good, felt solid," he said, not because it was a highlight-reel play, but because it was a good, intelligent piece of hitting.
In his first start since high school, after that long two-year journey, King went 3-for-4 with a home run, three RBIs and two runs scored. And that was just Friday's opener, with Saturday's doubleheader still to come.
King went 2-for-3 with a walk and a run scored in the first game Saturday. In the second, he went 2-for-4, driving in three runs and scoring twice. Because we seem to measure so many things by social media these days, it seems worth noting that King was trending on Twitter, at least regionally, during Saturday's games.
"That's pretty cool," he said.
In his first two years at Georgia, King's most notable achievements were making the J. Reid Parker Director of Athletics Honor Roll both years, as well as the SEC Academic Honor Roll last year. It certainly appears that, after Georgia's opening series at least, there will be much more to tell once this season is complete.
"I've been playing with him since I was in high school, and I've always known him to be a grinder," third baseman/closer Aaron Schunk said. "He's a kid that goes out and works every day, and he tries to be the best player he can be and just soaks up information.
"It might be new to some people, but we've seen him playing well before. You can ask anybody on the team, we're all his number one fan right now because of all the work he's put in and how he's getting to play now."
After two years of waiting, King delivers with seven hits in 11 at-bats, six RBIs and he touched home five times, including elatedly after his first career home run.
"Yeah, the whole weekend, I couldn't have asked for more," he said.
John Frierson is the staff writer for the UGA Athletic Association and curator of the ITA Men's Tennis Hall of Fame. You can find his work at: Frierson Files. He's also on Twitter: @FriersonFiles and @ITAHallofFame.
