St. John's University Athletics
St. John's Baseball Names Captains for 2005 Season
12/16/2004 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
Dec. 16, 2004
Queens, NY - St. John's University head baseball coach Ed Blankmeyer announced the Red Storm's team captains for the 2005 season this week as team members prepared for final exams and headed home for the Christmas break.
Blankmeyer, entering his 10th year at the helm of the baseball program, named seniors Joe Burke (Brooklyn, NY), Blake Hershelman (Georgetown, DE), Jim Martin (Norwood, MA) and Jim Wladyka (Rutherford, NJ) as the team's captains for the upcoming season.
The four seniors are expected to lead a Red Storm team that should be among the best in the BIG EAST. St. John's is coming off a 2004 season in which the team finished 37-23 overall and advanced to an NCAA Regional for the first time since 1997. The Red Storm, picked to finish seventh in the league last year, went 17-9 in BIG EAST play and were the conference runner-up.
Burke, a second-team All-BIG EAST selection as a catcher last year, is in his second year with St. John's after transferring from Nassau Community College. Burke's play was a major factor in the Red Storm pitching staff finishing among the best in the league, lowering the team earned run average from 5.30 in 2003 to 3.86 in 2004. He finished third on the team in batting with a .340 average, hit 11 doubles and drove in 28 runs.
Hershelman is one of three fourth-year seniors on the team, joined by Martin and Wladyka. The trio enters their final season on campus with a record of 91-73, and a league record of 43-35. After playing his first two seasons as a catcher, Hershelman moved to right field last season and enjoyed a stellar campaign. He finished the season with a .315 batting average, hit 16 doubles (the third-most in a single season at St. John's) and led the team with 10 home runs and 48 RBI. Hershelman enters his final season ranked fifth all-time in home runs (21).
Martin, meanwhile, was among the most consistent hitters in the league last season. A two-year starter at third base, and three-year starter overall, Martin batted .351 last year, including a .391 mark in the BIG EAST, which ranked third in the league. He also moved into the Red Storm record books for single-season marks in hits (79, tied for second) and at-bats (225, second). Martin is one of the team members who oversees the Red Storm's community service work, which has included weekly visits to homeless shelters in the Queens area since the start of the school year.
Wladyka has been one of the steadiest pitchers for the Red Storm during his three years on the Queens campus. He finished the 2004 season with a 3-3 record, one save and a 3.83 earned run average, appearing in 14 games, with seven starts. A member of the University's prestigious President's Society, Wladyka has a career record of 9-10 overall.
St. John's opens the 2004 season on Friday, February 18 against Northwestern (LA) State.