The Sooners made their SEC debut with many signs pointing in the right direction.
As coach Skip Johnson enters his eighth year in Norman, the Sooners have made five NCAA tournaments in six completed seasons, including the last three, with the first in that run being a national runner-up appearance. Last year’s Sooner squad finished 40-21 and a stellar 23-7 in Oklahoma’s last season in the Big 12.
The Sooners seem up for the challenge of entering the country’s best league.
“I think the biggest thing that’s changed (with joining the SEC) is the excitement and the attendance around it,” Johnson says. “Recruiting is still the same, but it’s really kind of got the fan base going. With us playing really good last year, it kind of helped going into the SEC, even though we probably lost 60, 65% of our offense and 55-to-60% of our pitching staff going into this year.
“I think that’s what’s exciting for me as much as anything, it’s like e football atmosphere in a baseball field. So I think that’s pretty cool.”
In what’s become a job with few breaks, Johnson says he’s intentional about resting before the SEC grind begins.
“When November gets here, don’t bring any recruits in, because I’m going hunting,” Johnson says. “Every weekend until November first to January the 15th, I’ve got to get away. And I think that’s a big deal for me. And I think it’s a big deal for our staff and how we go.”
Johnson’s personality influence extends to his roster. He boasts that the Sooners are “really good at lip-synching music” as part of talent shows on the bus.
“We do that early in the year,” Johnson says. “All fall. … I think kids, when they get comfortable around their players, other players, then they don’t worry about if they walk a guy in, if they strike out looking with a runner on third base, you know? Because they’ve already been ragged on because they couldn’t sing ‘Amarillo by morning,’ anything like that.”
Johnson’s Sooners should make things interesting on the diamond, too. With a stable of potential first-round prospects on the mound and also at key defensive positions, Oklahoma looks poised to compete right away in the SEC.
THE LINEUP
Easton Carmichael, the No. 81 prospect for the 2025 MLB Draft by Baseball America, anchors Oklahoma’s lineup. A career .340/381/.528 hitter, he’ll be one of the SEC’s top backstops.
“He has a lot of leadership abilities,” Johnson says. “He had a great summer. He was the MVP of the Cape all-star game. He’s really dynamic behind the plate. He’s really athletic. He could probably go out and play left or right or center field in the outfield. He’s a plus runner.”
Jaxon Willits, whose father, Reggie, is on Johnson’s staff, returns to start at short after fielding .955 as a freshman.
“Jaxon’s a baseball player. … He’s really a leader in how he goes about his business day in and day out,” Johnson says. “
Willits’ brother, Eli, is the No. 11 prospect for the draft according to MLB Pipeline and is a Sooners’ commitment for next season.
Freshman Kyle Branch and Dawson Willis, an LSU-Eunice transfer likely round out the starting infield at second and third, respectively. Willis stole 54 bases last year (including five in one game) while Branch’s brother, Kolby, is Georgia’s starting shortstop.
Center fielder Jason Walk also returns after making one error last season, while Mississippi Gulf Coast JUCO transfer Brandon Cain and Dasan Harris may be the starters at the outfield corners. Cain, who hit .359 last year, is the nephew of former MBL all-star Lorenzo Cain.
Scott Mudler, who made 40 starts at catcher for the Sooners last year, should be a starter again this year, though that might be at DH.
Freshman Drew Dickerson, whom Johnson says “…had a really good spring,” and JUCO transfer Mason Hamlin, an all-region pick last year, could compete for time as outfield and infield reserves, respectively.
JUCO transfer Dayton Tockey, who slugged nine home runs and walked 23% of the time at Weatherford College last year, may be the Sooners’ opening-day first baseman.
Liberty transfer Brayden Horton, a career .311/.408/.534 hitter over 409 plate appearances, could also push to start in the outfield.
Outfielder Taylor Tatum will be on the roster, though his role is uncertain. Tatum made three starts for the Sooners’ football team as a running back last fall, rushing for 272 yards on 53 carries while scoring three times.
“He’s got to get used to our culture. … He goes (to football) and lifts weights with them in the morning,” Johnson says. “He comes over here and works early on his own because we can’t spend any time with him.”
THE PITCHING
The rotation figures to be Oklahoma’s strength, and perhaps one of the country’s best. Johnson’s approach with his arms isn’t overly complicated.
“If they can throw two pitches for strikes, if they can hold runners, and if they can field their position, that’s kind of what I look at,” Johnson says. “And then I look at their head, how they handle familiar, I look at their heart. Do they have a will—if they have guts-all the other stuff, like, get them to repeat their delivery, watch their arm stuff, all that.”
The Sooners have four potential starters who could be drafted in the first five rounds in their respected classes. It’s headlined by Kyson Witherspoon and Malachi Witherspoon along with Cam Johnson and JUCO star Cade Crossland.
Kyson Witherspoon, who ranks 26th on MLB Pipeline’s list of prospects for the 2025 MLB Draft, is the SEC’s highest-regarded pitching prospect for the coming draft. His fastball has touched 99 and his slider, mid-80s, and MLB Pipeline grades both as “60”-grade pitches.
Johnson believes that he and his twin brother are both future MLB starters.
“Their stuff is first-round stuff,” Johnson says. “Everything. How they go about their business is first-round stuff. … How they talk, how they articulate, is first-round stuff. I mean, it’s incredible.
Sophomore Malachi Witherspoon is talented, but has thrown just 22 1/3 collegiate innings.
“He had a really good fall,” Johnson says of Malachi Witherspoon, whom Baseball America ranks as the No. 161 prospect for the 2025 draft. “He was with Team USA, went to the Cape and we got some starts under his belt, cleaned up his delivery a bit.”
The other starting spot is between JUCO transfer Crossland (140th by BA for the coming draft) and LSU transfer Johnson, who was MLB Pipeline’s No. 42 prospect for the 2023 draft before going to college.
Crossland went 9-2 with a 2.37 ERA and 100 strikeouts in 68 1/3 innings at Weatherford Junior College last season. He was one of the top JUCO pitching prospects for last year’s MLB Draft thanks to his quality secondary offerings, but went un-drafted.
Johnson, a lefty, is an elite talent, but simply couldn’t throw strikes—16 walks across nine innings and 13 appearances for LSU last year.
Grant Stevens, who made the Big 12 all-tournament team last season, has thrown 199 career innings with a 4.66 ERA, 167 strikeouts and 52 walks, those first three years coming at Pacific. Nine of his 18 appearances as a Sooner last season came as a starter.
Newcomers factor heavily into the Sooners’ bullpen, where roles may be determined on a situation-by-situation basks.
“When you start matching up… and you get those guys to the fifth or the sixth inning and try to start matching those guys up and the runways going to the ninth inning,” Johnson says.
Johnson says that Dylan Crooks, who showed incredible ability to hit the strike zone for the Sooners last year—he walked or hit just 3% of the batters he faced—but also allowed a whopping 40% fly ball rate. That could be a problem at Oklahoma’s L. Dale Mitchell Park, which Johnson describes as “a launching pad.”
Gavyn Jones, a two-way player at McLennan Community College, struggled with control on the mound in eight games but could have a role for the Sooners this year. The Mets selected Jones in the 18th round of the 2023 draft and he could be an end-game arm.
Michael Catalano was one of Oklahoma’s best recruits in its 2024 class after fanning 122 hitters over 68 innings with a 1.10 ERA for Texas’s Frisco High. He should be a big factor for Oklahoma right away.
Dylan Tate, who posted a 4.58 ERA with 98 strikeouts over 78 2/3 innings at the JUCO level for Jefferson College, should have a bullpen role if he’s healthy.
“He had a really good fall,” Johnson says. “And ten he got a little stress reaction in his arm and so he’s bouncing back.”
Right-hander Jacob Gholston is talented—Milwaukee picked him in the 17th round of the 2023 MLB Draft—but pitched in just two games for the Sooners last season. Also a high school shortstop, Gholston was a late-rising pro prospect who’s poised for a bigger role this year.
Sophomore Jason Bodin, who’s hit the mid-90s with his fastball, made two appearances at Texas A&M as a freshman but should have a bigger role in Norman.
Jamie Hitt, an honorable-mention all-Big 12 pick at Oklahoma in 2023 after transferring from Texas Tech, hopes for a 2025 season that’s more in line with that one, when he posted a 4.89 over 70 innings and 12 starts. A good summer in the MLB Draft League was encouraging.
Landon Victorian, a former LSU commit who was expelled from his senior year of high school and missed his senior season, will start over at Oklahoma. He was the 2023 MaxPreps Louisiana Player of the Year and could also be a factor for the Sooners.
POTENTIAL STRENGTHS
The talent on the mound is undeniable, and there seems to be depth, too. So is Johnson’s track record of finding undervalued players and developing them into NCAA tournament teams. There is experience here, even if it’s not at Oklahoma: twelve hitters had least 150 plate appearances at the collegiate level last season, while 10 pitchers threw at least 15 innings and 18 men on the roster start at least their third year of college baseball. The Sooners can also run a bit, with eight players logging double-digit steals at some level of college baseball last season.
POTENTIAL CONCERNS
Some of that pitching talent is still unproven—Johnson, Crossland, Gholston, Catalano, etc.—is still unproven at the Division I level. The same can be said of the lineup, with only three players being regulars at the high-major, four-year collegiate level last season. In addition to the meat-grinder of an SEC schedule, the Sooners also face a slew of potential out-of-conference opponents who are NCAA-tournament-caliber teams, the kind of thing that can turn another potential regional berth for Johnson into a premature summer vacation.
FINAL ANALYSIS
The Sooners feel like a regional team on paper with the pitching talent and Johnson’s track record, but are a bit of a wild card given the positional unknowns coupled with how they handle the schedule.