Hard play and consistency-that is what wins baseball games, and that is what earned Duke third baseman Jeff Becker a spot on the 1996 Mizuno Freshman All-America Team, as well as Atlantic Coast Conference Rookie of the Year honors.
Becker started at the hot corner for the Blue Devils from opening day and never missed a beat, getting the nod there for everyone of Duke's 57 games this year. Offensively, Becker provided both power and consistency, his trademark, batting fifth in the order for most of the year.
He finished with a team-best .364 batting average along with seven home runs and 41 RBIs, good for third and fourth on the team, respectively. He also led the team with 58 runs scored and ranked among the team leaders in on-base percentage (.421) and total bases (119). Defensively, Becker was extremely solid for the Blue Devils, committing only 11 errors on the year.
"It was his overall play and consistency that won him the awards," Duke head coach Steve Traylor said. "I think he was as good a defensive third baseman as there was in the conference. Offensively, the numbers that he put up overall, and also inside the conference, were some of the best numbers of any of the third baseman in the league, not just the freshmen."
The ACC award is one voted upon entirely by the coaches in the conference. Earning all of their respect requires the kind of strong showing throughout the ACC season that Becker had.
"Everyone wants to go out there and play well," Becker said. "That's one thing, but earning the respect of all the coaches and having them vote for me, truly, is a great honor."
"For an opposing coach," Traylor said, "I think they've just seen a guy that came in and was consistent all year offensively and defensively and who played the game hard with a positive attitude. I'm very glad that [Becker] won this award, because I felt that he was the most deserving of all the candidates. You never know how the voting is going to go though, so we were thrilled that he received that award. He's the kind of guy we're all out there looking for over the summer when the coaches are on the road scouting players and recruiting."
Becker came to Duke as one of it's more highly rated recruits in recent memory. He struggled slightly at first, but elevated his game quickly after becoming more comfortable with playing at the college level.
"[When I came to Duke] I was looking to start," Becker said. "I didn't really have any expectations-I just wanted to come down and play right away, but I didn't really have any goals set at the beginning of the year. [The season] started off slow. The first 10 games or so was getting used to playing outside again, because we were inside for quite a few weeks at the beginning of the year. After that I'd say that I was pretty consistent."
"He played like we had hoped," Traylor said. "He was one of our top recruits in that class and came in pretty highly touted. We thought he was going to be a real solid third baseman for us; I'm not sure we expected the kind of offensive numbers he put, but I certainly wasn't real surprised.
"Jeff didn't really have any slumps per say, but he started off slowly. Once he got acclimated and got some confidence, he started getting base hits and he was consistent from that point on."
The Thiells, NY product was extremely humble in acknowledging his accomplishments, citing mainly the excellent play of this year's team, which tied a school record with 39 wins.
"Receiving both of these honors is great," Becker said. "You always just want to go out and play your best, but along with these awards we've had a very successful year as a team. Both situations could not have worked out any better than they did."
Next year, the Blue Devils will be looking for Becker to contribute even more as they lose the offensive firepower of senior centerfielder Mike King (.343, 10 HR, 60 RBI).
"He's a guy that we are going to look to for a lot of offensive production and consistency," Traylor said. "He's probably the leading candidate to bump into the three-hole spot that Mike is vacating."
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