From Rivals To Coworkers: Mark Kingston Talks Addition of Monte Lee
It's something that's almost unanimously unforeseen in college athletics, one head coach being fired from one school only to take on a role at the school's arch-rival. Despite this rarity, that's precisely what happened back in mid-August, with Monte Lee, formerly the head baseball coach at Clemson, being hired by South Carolina head baseball coach Mark Kingston to be his right-hand man for the 2023 season.
This caused quite the stir in Gamecock nation, with there seemingly being a split between two camps, one who sees Monte as a former South Carolina assistant and an ace recruiter. Conversely, some can't look past the fact that he wore purple and orange for the last six years.
No matter what you think about Monte Lee's hiring, in a press conference held over Zoom on Thursday afternoon, coach Kingston said things are going quite well so far between him and his new assistant.
"The transition with Monte joining us has been extremely smooth. We're on the same page in just about everything in terms of how we look at it, how things should be done, and we had a good relationship before this started, and it's only grown since the day he got here. So it's been very, very smooth."
The one real negative that can be pointed to for this hire, depending on how you look at it, is that Monte will be the 3rd hitting coach in three years for this South Carolina baseball staff, a factor that can make it difficult for players to ever find a groove with their game. Coach Kingston admitted that it's too early to say what will be different with Monte's coaching style compared to the previous hitting coaches, but thinks that he and Monte think similarly in terms of how to develop players as hitters.
"Probably too early to say what will be different... But what I will say is the things him and I have talked about in terms of what we want to do with our hitters is there are different areas that cause improvement to happen… and then if you create situations where they're challenged every day, they're going to get better. So we're making sure that those things are being done every day, not that they haven't been in the past cause they have, but just in terms of he's bringing a new [creative process], and we're sharing ideas of our long experiences. So I think the players have responded well, and I think offensively, we're going to be in a good place. I really do."
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