Announcing the KillerFrogs’ All-Big 12 2022 Baseball Team

With the season in the rearview mirror, we look back at the best players across the league

It’s been over a month since the baseball season ended for most of the Big 12 teams. And it’s been almost two weeks since the College World Series ended with Ole Miss winning the national championship.

So, with the season behind us, we thought we’d look back at some of the key players across the Big 12 and their impact on the season. We came up with our own version of an All-Big 12 team. Sure, some of these names made the official All-Big 12, and some were All-Americans. But others made a strong case based on their postseason performance.

For instance, Oklahoma came out of nowhere and had one of the hottest streaks in college baseball. The only problem is they met their match against another team with a postseason hot streak. But the Sooners had some players that were fun to watch while in Omaha, so they got listed on this All-Big 12 team.

And on that thought, because he took his team further than any other Big 12 coach, going all the way to the championship round, Skip Johnson is the skipper of this “dream team.”

We selected one player for each position in the batting lineup, three starting pitchers, and three relief pitchers. We tried to include at least one player from each team that made it into the NCAA Tournament. And sure, we may have our own homer bias as we selected some TCU Horned Frogs in positions that could arguably go to others, but hey, that was our call.

Here's the 2022 KillerFrogs All-Big 12 Baseball Team:

Starting Pitchers

• Jake Bennett (Oklahoma) – Bennett was an excellent ace for the Sooners. And with their performance in Omaha, one could almost argue we could have included two Sooners pitchers on this list with Cade Horton but opted just to have Bennett. He went 10-4 on the season with 19 starts. He had a 3.69 ERA with 117.0 innings pitched. He gave up 106 hits, 57 runs (48 earned), and 22 walks while throwing 133 strikeouts.

• Brandon Birdsell (Texas Tech) – Birdsell was the Big 12 Pitcher of the Year and had an incredible season. To be a complete list, it had to include him. He did lead the league with the lowest ERA at 2.75. He went 9-3 for the season with 15 starts. He pitched 85.0 innings and gave up 67 hits, 29 runs (26 earned), and 29 walks while throwing 106 strikeouts.

• Pete Hansen (Texas) – Sweet Pete was fun to watch on Friday nights. In the matchup with the Frogs, it was a pitcher’s duel, but Hansen was the more dominant. Hansen went 11-3 on the season with 17 starts. He had a 3.76 ERA with 107.2 innings pitched. He gave up 94 hits, 47 runs (45 earned), and 19 walks while throwing 120 strikeouts.

Relief Pitchers

Sure, there were plenty of great pitchers we could put here. Every team had at least one guy they could count on out of the bullpen. But we could only pick three. And yes, two of them were from the same team – TCU – but that’s who we cover. River Ridings and Luke Savage were both dependable and fun to watch. Both were selected to USA Baseball’s College National Team this summer, so they were worthy of our list.

Our three relievers are:

• Trevin Michael (Oklahoma) – 4-2, 2.85 ERA, 72.2 innings pitched, ten saves

• River Ridings (TCU) – 2-3, 6.95 ERA, 22.0 innings pitched, ten saves

• Luke Savage (TCU) – 1-1, 2.72 ERA, 39.2 innings pitched, two saves

Position Players

• Catcher – Silos Ardoin (Texas)

• 1^st Base – Ivan Melendez (Texas) – He did win the Big 12 Player of the Year and the Golden Spike Award – of course, we are picking the Hispanic Titanic.

• 2^nd Base – Jace Jung (Texas Tech)

• 3^rd Base – Nolan McLean (Oklahoma State) – Sure, we thought about putting our own Brayden Taylor on this list, but McLean also had a great year, and frankly, we needed to give OSU at least two players as they were selected as the No. 7 national seed.

• Shortstop – Tommy Sacco (TCU) – Sure, Peyton Graham (Oklahoma) and even Maui Ahuna (Kansas, now Tennessee) deserve mention here, but Sacco was a beast both defensively and at the plate. He had a remarkable turnaround offensively from 2021 and was always fun to watch. He was a great leader on the TCU squad and will be missed.

• Left Field – Kendall Petis (Oklahoma) – We picked him because of the plethora of SportsCenter Top 10 plays he made during the postseason.

• Center Field – Tanner Tredaway (Oklahoma) – Another beast at the plate and in the outfield who was fun to watch while in Omaha.

• Right Field – Murphy Stehly (Texas)

• Designated Hitter – Griffin Doersching (Oklahoma State)

Breakdown by school

So, how did this break down by school? Glad you asked! Here it is;

• Oklahoma – 5 (They did get to the national championship round)

• Texas – 4 (They did make it to Omaha)

• TCU – 3

• Oklahoma State - 2

• Texas Tech - 2

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