GAINESVILLE, Fla. – New York Mets first baseman
Pete Alonso's rookie season is less than three months old and he is already just three home runs shy of tying
Daryl Strawberry's franchise record for a rookie (26) set in 1983.
A former UF standout, Alonso belted his 23rd homer of the season on Saturday in New York's 8-7 win over St. Louis, launching a 458-foot shot off the facade of the third deck at Citi Field.
Alonso's three-run homer was the longest of his career to date and the latest highlight of a memorable start to his career. Alonso was hitting .263/23/53 through Sunday with a .951 OPS.
Alonso has quickly become a fan favorite and joined teammate Jeff McNeil in a social media campaign Monday to garner votes for the National League All-Star Team.
ALL-STAR INDIA
In his first full season of professional baseball, former UF standout
Jonathan India earned a spot on the Florida State League All-Star Team. India started at third base and went 0-for-2 for the North Division in its 2-0 loss to the South Division on Saturday night in Jupiter, Fla.
The 2018 Southeastern Conference Player of the Year, India was Cincinnati's first-round pick (No. 5 overall) in last summer's MLB amateur draft. He has spent this season playing for the Daytona Tortugas, the Reds' advanced Class A team. Through Monday, India was hitting .260 with eight homers, 24 RBI in 60 games.
India is teammates in Daytona with a pair of his former UF teammates, catcher Mark Kolozsvary (.221, 3, 13) and pitcher Michael Byrne (2-3, 6.17 ERA, 35 IP).
PLAYER SHUFFLE
The Gators will open fall camp in late July with the season opener scheduled for Aug. 24, the earliest opener in UF history. As always, the roster will have a different look compared to when spring practice ended.
While UF's fall roster won't be finalized until next month, if you are one of those who fans who takes a break once the season ends, you might have missed some of the recent comings and goings (unlikely perhaps, but just in case).
First, four true freshmen enrolled at UF at the start of the Summer A semester: LB Khris Bogle (Fort Lauderdale Cardinal-Gibbons), CB Kaiir Elam (North Palm Beach Benjamin), DE Lloyd Summerall (Lakeland) and ATH Trent Whittemore (Gainesville Buchholz). Those four are part of the Gators' 25-player 2019 signing class.
Meanwhile, two of the nine early enrollees from the class who participated in spring camp – CB Chris Steele (USC) and QB Jalon Jones (Jackson State) – have transferred. In addition, LB Diwun Black did not meet NCAA Clearinghouse standards and has signed with Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College in hopes of transferring to UF in the future.
As for those returning players who entered the NCAA transfer portal since the start of spring, all but LB Rayshad Jackson have found a home. OL T.J. McCoy (Louisville), LB Kylan Johnson (Pittsburgh) DE Antonneous Clayton Sr. (Georgia Tech) and DL Malik Langham (Vanderbilt) have moved on, with Langham the latest to resurface elsewhere.
ROCKING RIFFICE
As a UF freshman,
Sam Riffice played an instrumental role in helping the Gators men's tennis team make the Final Four for the first time in 16 years. In singles play, Riffice advanced to the NCAA quarterfinals, the first UF player to advance that deep in the tournament since 2014.
Riffice's run of success continued over the weekend when he won the Wichita Tennis Open singles title, defeating
Brandon Holt 6-1, 6-4 in straight sets. Holt is the son of two-time U.S. Open champion
Tracy Austin and a Southern Cal junior last season.
Congrats to Riffice, who went 26-11 in singles play in his first season with the Gators, including a 10-0 regular-season record against SEC opponents.
THE SOCIAL FEED
After writing about late Gators OL
Mike "Pops" Stanfield last week, I received an email from
Steve Quattry of Longwood, Fla., who pointed out that the photo I used from
The Orlando Sentinel archives of Stanfield and his O-line teammates at UF also featured former Gators OL
Kris Anderson. Quattry and Anderson were teammates at Orlando Edgewater High and he noted that Anderson is also deceased, having passed away in April 2009.
Here is Anderson's obituary for those who remember the former Gators starter who also was an avid gardener ...
A story in the Aug. 28, 1971, edition of The Miami News on former Gators offensive lineman Kris Anderson. (Newspapers.com)
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I'm admittedly in the same camp as Sully here as Florida State coach
Mike Martin ends his career at the College World Series ...
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Most of you already are familiar with the major University Athletic Association facility projects either completed or underway, but UF has quite a list of prominent projects over the next decade in its campus plan ...
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In an incident that made news in April, former Gators staffer
Otis Yelverton released a statement ...
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As someone who passed through the UF College of Journalism & Communications and the Alligator back in the day, hopefully this works out for both sides as the media landscape continues to shift ...
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We'll close on this festive day -- #NationalMascotDay for those who haven't heard -- with a clip of my all-time favorite sports mascot (behind Albert and Alberta of course) ...
