La Salle's Bowdien Derby Headed to San Diego State

The Pasadena Star-News reported Wednesday afternoon that star rising senior Bowdien Derby has decided to end the drama surrounding his recruitment by giving an early verbal commitment to San Diego State University.

Derby, , told the Star-News he had offers from Loyola Marymount, Arizona, UC Santa Barbara, San Diego State, Oregon, Hawaii, Fresno State, Dartmouth and Azusa Pacific. He then narrowed his options down to a top three of LMU, UCSB and San Diego State, ultimately choosing the Aztecs.

From the Star-News’ story:

"All these schools I was talking to for a while," Derby said. "People were telling me to wait and see what else comes up and if there would be any other offers. I was like, in my mind there are not any other schools that would really change my mind. But I knew I wanted to be close to home. I'm a family man and want to be close to home as much as possible. For me, a two-hour drive is nothing compared to Arizona which was an eight-hour drive."

Derby also said in the article that San Diego State wants to use him both as a pitcher and a shortstop. Derby excelled at both positions this year for the Lancers this year as he led La Salle to an 18-11 record and a trip to the second round of the CIF-Southern Section Division 4 playoffs.

Derby paced La Salle with a .435 batting average and hit three home runs and 12 doubles while driving in 19 runs. On the mound he threw five shutouts (including a ) and struck out 101 batters en route to posting a 0.94 ERA in 82 1/3 innings. 

Perhaps his most dominant performance of the season came in the In that game Derby came out of the bullpen to throw up just one hit while fanning four batters in four scoreless innings. Derby’s fastball was clocked as high as 93 mph that day, creating a buzz among the scouts who were there to watch Palm Desert’s more highly touted players like Ryan Garvey (son of Dodgers legend Steve Garvey).

“I think the Palm Desert game was the breakout game for him,” Lancers coach Harry Agajanian said in May.

While it seems the Aztecs will give Derby every chance to pitch, Agajanian said Derby will need to develop a third pitch in order to be effective at the Division I level.

“He is going to have to develop a third pitch,” Agajanian said. “We’ve been getting away with two pitches this year. To move on to the college level he’s going to have to develop at least one more pitch. … Change up or a splitter … something like that.”

Read the full story on the Star-News’ preps blog by clicking on the following link:

Baseball: Bowdien Derby commits to San Diego State.