Milford Grad Off to Strong Start
with Red Dragons Baseball
By WRILEY NELSON
ONEONTA
No one at Milford Central School is surprised by Martin Thorsland’s success pitching for SUNY Oneonta this season. Thorsland, a freshman right-hander from the Town of Maryland, has been part of an historic year for the Red Dragons. Oneonta’s 13-game winning streak in late March was the longest in program history. Their sweep against Fredonia on April 21 and 22 brought them to 22-9, their most regular-season wins since 2010, with eight games left to play. It is all but certain they will secure a spot in their conference playoffs.
Thorsland was a three-season star for the Milford Wildcats. He was named school Most Valuable Player and conference first-team all-star in soccer, basketball, and baseball. His coach in all three sports, Gregg Eggleston, has fond memories of Thorsland’s presence on and off the field.
“He’s just a genuinely good guy,” Eggleston said, reflecting on Thorsland’s constant hard work and support for his teammates. “He fixed our backstop, too, as part of working his way to Eagle Scout.”
Eggleston repeatedly expressed his gratitude that Thorsland has gotten an opportunity to continue playing, and that he’s making the most of it.
Thorsland strongly agrees. Throughout his conversation with “The Freeman’s Journal,” he rarely passed up a chance to say how grateful he is for his many opportunities to play baseball.
“I enjoyed basketball and soccer,” he said, “but baseball was my first love. I was lucky to do Little League with [coach] Dan Powers. I wouldn’t be where I am today without him.”
Still, Thorsland continued, a full university baseball program is a world away from his small high-school team.
“We just have so many more resources here than we did at Milford. Here I get a full breakdown of my mechanics and constant coaching. It’s easier to work on my pitching,” he said.
By all accounts, Thorsland lives and breathes baseball. He is a mathematics major and intends to move toward engineering or business for further studies, but his team takes up a huge part of his schedule. He has classes until early afternoon and then practice and workouts from 3-7 p.m.
“By the time I’m out of practice, it’s time to go to bed and be ready to do the whole thing over the next day,” he said. “I’m glad the team is so close, it makes it much easier. We do things socially together and I’m very close with some of the other freshmen. Everyone is part of the group and part of the team.”
During the off-season, Thorsland plays intramural sports obsessively to stay in shape. For much of high school, he commuted to Boston every weekend.
“That was my first experience of what I’d call ‘real baseball,’” he recalled. “Everyone just cares so much about the sport at that level and at college. Everyone truly wants to be there and everyone really works hard.”
Thorsland will play for the Oneonta Outlaws this summer, alongside Cooperstown Central School graduate Chris Ubner.
Thorsland is cautiously optimistic about the rest of the season. The Red Dragons all but locked up a spot in the conference playoffs by sweeping Fredonia.
“We honestly beat ourselves against Cortland,” Thorsland said, referring to the series Oneonta dropped 0-3 on April 14 and 15. “They’ve historically been the real powerhouse in our conference and we psyched ourselves out. But we also beat Brockport 2-1 in a series and they won two of three against Cortland this past weekend. Now that we know that, and we know they can be beaten, it’s just a matter of going out and playing as well as I know we can.”
“I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but I definitely think we have a shot at the championship,” he concluded.
However this season shakes out, Oneonta will have a champion in Thorsland for years to come.