In the eighth inning on Saturday, what seemed at first like a nothing play turned out to be a season-altering moment for Florida State baseball.
As Caleb Anderson’s pickoff throw got away and Carter McCulley touched home for the game-winning run, Myles Bailey sprinted to steal second base. But as he slid, he suffered a gruesome injury, ending his season in a cruel twist of fate to one of the best people and players in the Seminole athletic department.
Bailey, a Tallahassee native who went to Lincoln
High School, was in the midst of turning his potential into reality after going on a tear to end his freshman season. The first baseman ranks second in the ACC in home runs (13), on-base percentage (.582) and OPS (1.495). Last week, he earned ACC Player of the Week honors, and on Saturday against Duke, he was intentionally walked to load the bases. In front of the college baseball world, he developed into a superstar, and once he makes a full recovery, as Link Jarrett said was the expectation, he should continue to be on his path to one day being a professional baseball player.
Without Bailey, an impressive force but an even better person if you ask those in the program who voted him as a team captain, there is a 6-foot-4, 250-pound gap in the lineup and the clubhouse. Bailey ranks first in most major categories in FSU’s offense, and a few by a large margin, such as leading the team in RBI by 10, being the only player with an OBP over .500, and hitting more than double the amount of home runs to second place (13 to 6). Bailey was not just the engine for the offense, he was the offense, and it will be the challenge of the season for Florida State to collectively replace that.
Although those numbers sound daunting, there are some statistics that point in FSU’s favor. The Seminoles are winners of their first three ACC series, including a road sweep against Wake Forest, which vaulted their metrics and will buoy their resume as they figure out how to win without Bailey. Even though it is still super early, the Noles are in first place in the ACC with 10 teams either at .500 or below in conference. The Noles are seventh in the RPI and have the fifth-hardest strength of schedule, according to D1 Baseball. At the halfway point of the regular season, Florida State would be a top-8 national seed. For all the talk of the campaign being over, this team is already a lock to make the NCAA tournament with two massive series on the road against Virginia and Georgia Tech in the next two weeks. Win one of them, and FSU is 4-1 in weekend series to begin ACC play. Even if they drop both, they face a surprisingly good Notre Dame team a week later at home, where the Noles are 16-2.
Whether this team could have won a national title with Bailey in the lineup was a stretch anyway, so they are certainly in deep water without him. But I feel confident writing that postseason baseball will be played in Tallahassee in the last weekend of May, and once that happens, who knows what comes next?
However, as mentioned earlier, there has been an ocean between Bailey and the rest of FSU’s lineup, and without the Tallahassee native in the mix, teams will pitch Florida State differently. Almost any name could be written down as someone who needs to step up in Bailey’s absence, as not one person can replace his impact, but here are three names that the Noles have to get going to help fill the void.
#1: Cal Fisher
It has been a nightmare season for one of Florida State’s team captains as Fisher continues to struggle at the plate and in the field. Fisher played three different positions on the infield this weekend, third base, second, and short, partly due to the Bailey injury, but also because he has not found a home. Offensively, Jarrett moved Fisher up in the lineup — from the ninth to seventh — but it made little difference as the junior went hitless in four games last week with five strikeouts, dropping his batting average to .236. While Fisher does not seem close to breaking out of a year-long slump, Florida State needs him to break through and replace some of Bailey’s production. The potential was there last season as Fisher batted over .300 on the year while being named to the Tallahassee All-Regional team. But whether or not he can get back to that place remains to be seen.
#2: Eli Putnam
Putnam comes onto this list for two reasons: he was supposed to be a power bat coming in from Davidson, and he takes over for Bailey at first base defensively. Starting with the latter, Bailey papered over as many cracks as he could in an already poor infield unit. As Jarrett likes to say, his play at first base blended into the game as he smoothly operated his position. Now, Putnam, who struggled at second, slides over to his left to become the everyday first baseman, or at least it appears that way. Florida State has been lucky the last three years to have strong defensive play at first with Daniel Cantu and Bailey, and Putnam needs to find a rhythm quickly as he gets the nod. On the offensive side, after hitting 19 home runs with a .662 SLG% with Davidson last year, Putnam is at four homers with a .472 SLG%. His power will need to be a driving force in a lineup that just lost its best impact bat.
#3 Hunter Carns:
Carns came to Tallahassee alongside Bailey as a highly-rated recruit last season. Both players are now draft-eligible sophomores. It was easy to project that Carns and Bailey would carry this lineup in 2026 before declaring for the draft. Bailey held up his end of the bargain, and now Carns needs to take the baton. The Jacksonville native has been banged up throughout the offseason and into the year as the day-to-day of playing catcher takes its toll. His numbers reflect that, with no home runs and six RBI on the year. However, Carns made a small technical change to his swing. Jarrett told the local Tallahassee media on Sunday that he found a tweak to fix his timing, and that paid off with picking up a hit in every game against Duke this past weekend. If Carns can start scratching his potential, Florida State could have an impressive bat in its cleanup spot, as was the intention at different points during the season.
