The Long Road to Win Number Two
Feb 18, 2024 | Baseball
It was April 19, 2022. Ryan Prager got the monkey off his back, earning his first collegiate victory in Texas A&M’s 14-1 thumping of Dallas Baptist.
Little did he know his next win would be 669 days later.
Earning a spot in the weekend rotation as a freshman, the future was bright for Prager early in his career. But the first victory eluded him. He got no-decisions despite hurling one-run baseball in an Aggies’ loss to Penn and an Olsen Magic victory against Santa Clara. In a couple other outings, he came up shy of the 5.0-inning threshold as his pitch count grew early in the games.
Then a rough patch against SEC competition found him out of the weekend rotation and pitching in that game against DBU. The effort against the Patriots along with a strong performance the following midweek against UT Arlington found him back in the role as the series finale starter where he would play a key role in an unorthodox formula to get to the College World Series.
What was Prager’s job description? Pitch long enough for the Aggies to get the lead and hand the ball to a stellar bullpen, including Jacob Palisch and Joseph Menefee.
Despite not recording another win the remainder of the season, Prager was the starting pitcher in key triumphs over Mississippi State and Ole Miss late in the regular season along with the decisive regional-clinching victory against TCU.
“I got a different mentality,” Prager said following the sweep of Mississippi State. “It was being more aggressive. It was being more of ‘the dude’ up there on the mound that I know I can be and that I was at the beginning of the year.”
Prager’s stat line his freshman campaign, including a 1-4 record with a 5.16 ERA and 53 strikeouts in 59.1 innings belied his value to the team. He ranked second on the team with 16 starts on the mound.
The Aggies ultimately earned a spot in the program’s seventh College World Series where they advanced to the national semifinal round. Following one of the best seasons in school history, spirits heading into the summer were high with the expectations of a right-left weekend combo of Nathan Dettmer and Prager. With hard work and the resulting improvement, Prager felt he had the stuff to be a Friday starter in his second season.
“Coming off that first season there was a lot of ups and downs,” Prager said. “I was battling the mental side not knowing really what was wrong that year. I went through the ups and downs, and by the end I just didn't feel like myself. At that point I was battling more myself than the game. I knew when that was figured out, I had the ability to be someone the team could lean on in that role as a frontline weekend guy.”
With things looking up, Prager was presented with an unexpected detour. Heading into fall practice a UCL injury led to Tommy John surgery in mid-September and the talented lefty found himself on the shelf.
The next 10 months the guy who loved to pitch wouldn’t be able to pitch.
“The work was one of those things I wasn’t going to complain about or gripe about,” Prager said. “Once you get hurt, it’s part of the deal if you want to come back. I said that I was going to do everything in front of me to the best of my ability. I was going to rehab the best. I was going to work my best on nutrition. I was going to work the best in the weight room.“
As important as the physical part of rehabilitation is, the mental side may exceed it. The grind is every day, with a seemingly duplicate itinerary of tasks to achieve minimal improvement each week. Taken with the wrong temperament, the process can go south.
“As much as it got repetitive and kind of annoying at times, I took each day as its own challenge," Prager said. "If I wanted to come back at an elite level it was something I was going to have to do, so be positive about it.”
On days when teammates were practicing, Prager was rehabbing. On days when teammates were playing, Prager was rehabbing. On days when teammates were off, Prager was rehabbing. His efforts were noticed by teammates.
“He inspires me to come out to the field every day and give it my all,” Ryan Targac said. “You would see him doing all that work in the training room and the weight room. And then he would come out and give it his all in the dugout. He was cheering on the guys and making sure everybody was in the right spot, looking out for his teammates.”
One of the hardest things for Prager to deal with was the separation from the team when they were on the road. He wasn’t able to travel with the team for the five conference road series, but was part of the travel party for a deep SEC Tournament run in Hoover. Then he surprised much of the team by showing up to the regional at Stanford, paying out of his own pocket.
“That meant a lot and said a lot about who he is as a person,” Targac said. “I know it definitely hurt him to not be a part of what was going on, not being in the dugout. But he was trying to do his all and be there to support us.”
If ever there was a season the Aggies could use Prager’s presence on the mound, it was 2023. The Maroon & White struggled to cobble together a pitching staff and no starter earned a victory in SEC play.
With the pitching they possessed, Ol’ Sarge’s charges battled to the championship games of the SEC Tournament and the NCAA Palo Alto Regional. The services of a talented southpaw may have made a huge difference in the outcome of the 2023 campaign.
“If he was healthy, the sky is the limit for us,” Targac said. “You saw how far we battled without, so having his presence out on the mound every weekend would have meant a lot. But that was the story of last year’s team.”
The 2023 season ended with back-to-back losses to Stanford at the regional, but for Prager, not being able to pitch that year wasn’t out of mind until a few months later.
“I think that year of not playing kind of got put to bed a little bit in the middle of the summer,” Prager said. “When I started throwing on the mound again.”
Along with the injury and rehab, his path took another turn as former pitching coach Nate Yeskie departed. Head coach Jim Schlossnagle filled the void with highly respected Seattle Mariners pitching coordinator Max Wiener. For Prager the adjustment was seamless.
“When a new guy comes in there’s always that level of trust you need to build,” Prager said. “You aren’t able to trust somebody until your truly know them. Max and I kind of clicked right away and it was awesome. It’s one of those relationships where he’s not only your coach, but he’s your biggest supporter, your best friend and the guy you can always go talk to if something’s going wrong.”
The staff took it slow with ramping up the progress. His work was minimal in the fall and began to climb/increase in the January. It didn’t take long until he started looking like a weekend guy.
“His first few bullpen sessions when he was coming back, you could tell it was there,” Targac said. “There was some more behind it. He definitely had more time to work on some stuff. He was developing into a really good pitcher that could pitch on the front end of the weekend.”
When it came to picking the opening night starter, with Prager being fully healthy and ready to go, the decision was a no-brainer.
“Ryan is an elite human being. He’s super smart and he handles his emotions. He is the perfect guy to throw opening night at Texas A&M. Being able to go out in front of all the 12th Man and handle your emotions, that’s hard to do.”Jim Schlossnagle
“Ryan is an elite human being,” Schlossnagle said. “He’s super smart and he handles his emotions. He is the perfect guy to throw opening night at Texas A&M. Being able to go out in front of all the 12th Man and handle your emotions, that’s hard to do.”
Friday night, a year after he planned it, Prager made the opening day start and it was brilliant. The Dallas native allowed just two baserunners over 5.0 innings, scattering one hit and one hit batsman while striking out a career-high nine batters to earn his second collegiate win.
More importantly than the check in the win column, Prager showed the efficiency on the mound that hampered his progress as a freshman. He needed just 58 pitches to get through the five frames and with the Aggies up big, Coach Schlossnagle got work in for relievers Isaac Morton and Brad Rudis.
There may be some debate on whether it was Prager’s performance or the precision ceremonial first pitch by Aggie football head coach Mike Elko which set the tone for filling the zone, but Morton and Rudis followed suit as the Maroon & White trio combined on strikes with 69.3 percent of their pitches. The result was an opening day shutout the year after Texas A&M weaved just three on the season in 2023.
“I was super excited for Coach Max getting his first college game under his belt,” Schlossnagle said. “It was great to start with a shutout. Seeing that performance will make me sleep better, but we’ll instantly start thinking about tomorrow and repeating the performance.”
Next week, when the Aggies host the Wagner Seahawks, Prager is eager for the chance to get win No. 3 in 662 less days.
