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Collins at home with Wild Things

5 min read
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The list of Wild Things players from Washington and Greene counties is a short one.

The most successful, of course, was Cecil native Chris Sidick, who still holds several Frontier League single-season and career records. Pitchers Tyler Holt, Justin Schrader and Michael Lucas each played at Trinity High School and for one season with Washington and Patrick Sadler took the same path to two years with the Wild Things. Shayne Busti, an infielder from Carmichaels, played six games for the Wild Things in 2009 and Justin Gregula, a former Wash High standout, spent part of the 2007 season playing for his hometown team.

You can add outfielder Roman Collins to that list.

Well, maybe.

“I lived in Canonsburg for five years,” Collins said proudly before the Wild Things opened a three-game weekend series Friday night against the Evansville Otters.

“I lived there, from when I was two years old until seven. I went to Cecil Elementary School. I played youth baseball there and Little Macs football.”

Canonsburg is just one many places Collins has called home, in part because of his mother’s job with United Parcel Service that had the family relocating every few years, and his baseball, which has taken him from Iowa to Florida to Idaho to Australia to Washington and a few other locales. His hometown is listed as, depending on which roster you check, Charleston, W.Va., though he hasn’t lived there in more than 20 years, or Maple Creek, Minn.

Along the way, one thing the 24-year-old Collins has done is hit. And hit. And hit some more. That trend has continued with the Wild Things. After playing three seasons in the Kansas City Royals’ farm system, Collins signed with Washington this spring. He is one of six Washington players who will be in the Frontier League’s all-star game Wednesday in O’Fallon, Mo.

Collins is batting .284 and leads the league with 41 RBI. He’s also 12-for-12 in stolen base attempts.

“I’m just trying to get better,” the soft-spoken Collins said. “Just trying to play the best baseball I can.”

Though he’s excelled in the batter’s box and on the basepaths, the best play Collins made this year, considering the situation, came when he was playing left field. In a game last month in Marion, Ill., with Washington leading 2-1 in the bottom of the ninth inning against Southern Illinois, the Miners had runners on second and third with two outs. The Southern Illinois batter hit a sinking liner into the gap in left centerfield that appeared to be a sure game-winning hit. Collins, however, had a terrific break on the ball and while running at full speed, he made a diving catch, inches off the ground, to end the game.

“He’s a good player,” Washington manager Gregg Langbehn said of Collins. “He doesn’t dog it. That’s his personality. He’s a cerebral player. He has a very good aptitude for the game. He knows when to run, when to shift on hitters.

“That catch in Southern Illinois was a legitimate dive. If he doesn’t catch that ball, then we lose the game.”

Collins has an athletic pedigree. His father, Michael, was a four-year starter at defensive back for West Virginia University and played on the Mountaineers’ 1993 team that had an undefeated regular season and played Florida in the Sugar Bowl.

Though he played football and had “some offers” to continue the sport in college, Roman Collins’ sport is baseball.

He played at Des Moines Junior College and was the National Junior College Division II Player of the Year in 2014, when he batted. 435 and had 74 RBI in 58 games. That big season, along with the help of a teammate, landed him a scholarship at Florida Atlantic.

“I had a teammate in junior college who was from South Florida and was interested in being a walk-on at Florida Atlantic,” he said. “One of the coaches there asked him if there were any good JC players they should recruit. He mentioned me. So Florida Atlantic came to see me play one day when it was about 45 degrees and raining sideways. I went 4-for-5 and they offered me a scholarship.”

Collins batted .288 in his lone season at Florida Atlantic and was drafted in the fifth round by the Royals in 2015. He advanced to the high Class-A level with Wilmington in both 2016 and again last year but was released this spring.

That’s when two of Collins’ former teammates in the Royals system, Wild Things catcher Kyle Pollock and third baseman Mike Hill, each called to tell the outfielder about Washington and the Frontier League.

“They said good things about it. It came down to this being the best place for me,” Collins said.

Collins was born in Charleston, W.Va., and moved to Canonsburg when he was two years old. From there it was on to Omaha, Neb., for three years and then on to the Minneapolis area.

Now he’s in Washington, which has some advantages.

“My grandmother still lives in Bridgeport, W.Va., which isn’t far from here,” Collins said. “I’ve been able to see a lot of family. It feels like home.”

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