Top Baseball Prospect Waves Hello to Pepperdine

baseball received good news late last month when highly touted junior third baseman Trey Williams made an oral commitment to be on the team. The Valencia High School player cannot make a formal commitment for another 10 months, and nobody at Pepperdine can comment about Williams until he signs a letter of intent.

Williams has already tasted success at the Malibu campus. He hit a homerun at Eddy D. Field Stadium as a member of the Cubs scout team. And the school was an easy choice, because Pepperdine baseball coach Steve Rodriguez is a family friend who was a Detroit Tigers teammate of Williams’ father Ed.

“He has had a lot of schools send him stuff,” Ed Williams said. “You want to go to a place where you trust the coach. What better place than Malibu?”

Ed Williams has been through this before. He was heavily recruited coming out of Hoover High in San Diego, and had signed to play with Arizona State, where Barry Bonds would have been a teammate. Instead, he was taken fourth overall by the Mets in the 1983 draft, and enjoyed a 12-year major-league career.

“You look at the situation,” Williams said. “We know he’s going to be a high draft choice, but we have another option.”

Trey Williams said a burden has been lifted with his choice to be a Wave. Now, he can focus on his next two seasons as a high school ballplayer.

“Yes, it’s relaxing now,” he said. “I don’t have any worries.”

As a sophomore, Williams hit .388 with a team-best 113 plate appearances, 10 home runs, 10 doubles, 32 RBI and 34 runs. This included an April 28 game against West Ranch, when he hit three home runs and drove in six.

As a freshman, Williams hit .429 in 20 games while producing five home runs and 17 RBI. This included a two-home run, five-RBI game against Golden Valley.

Trey Williams said the coaches told him to keep his grades up and to score at least 1500 on the SAT.

He also said Rodriguez is happy “because he can go out and watch other players.”