Beavers Conforto: Consensus First-Team All-American

Also honored on Wednesday is junior outfielder Dylan Davis, who was named a second-team all-region selection.

Michael Conforto has been named a First-Team All-American by the American Baseball Coaches Association (ABCA), becoming the first player in Oregon State history to be a consensus First-Team All-American. Photo Courtesy: Oregon State Athletics

(CORVALLIS, Ore. ) - Michael Conforto has been named a First-Team All-American by the American Baseball Coaches Association (ABCA), becoming the first player in Oregon State history to be a consensus First-Team All-American.

Jace Fry was also named first-team on Wednesday, giving him five All-American honors – three first team – while Ben Wetzler was honored as a second teamer, with two of his five All-American honors coming as first team.

Also honored on Wednesday is junior outfielder Dylan Davis, who was named a second-team all-region selection.

Conforto had been named a first teamer by Baseball America, Collegiate Baseball, Perfect Game and the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association (NCBWA) before Wednesday’s honor, which also distinguished the junior as a first-team all-region selection and a Region 8 Rawlings Gold Glover.

He is now the first OSU player with four or more first-team honors in a single year since Dallas Buck garnered four in 2005, in addition to a second-team selection.

Conforto batted .345 for the Beavers this season, and led the Pac-12 in slugging percentage (.547), on-base percentage (.504), walks (55) and runs scored (52) and was second in runs batted in (56), third in home runs (seven) and doubles (16), fourth in total bases (111) and seventh in hits (70). He set the OSU single-season record for walks and broke the school’s career record for RBI with 179.

He was also named the Pac-12 Player of the Year for the second consecutive season.

Fry, meanwhile, earned his third first-team honor – the other two coming by Collegiate Baseball and the NCBWA. He’s an all-region first-team selection as well after finishing the 2014 season with an 11-2 mark and 1.80 ERA In a team-leading 120 1/3 innings. He was named the Pac-12’s Pitcher of the Year – the Beavers’ first since the league unified prior to the 1999 season – after holding league foes to a .159 batting average in going 8-1 with a 0.92 ERA.

Wetzler topped Fry for the Pac-12’s lead in wins with 12 and will likely end the season with the nation’s lowest earned run average at 0.78 – the third-lowest in Pac-12 history and the best mark in NCAA Division I play in nearly 35 years.

The left-hander leaves the Oregon State program as the Beavers’ all-time leader with 36 wins and 369 1/3 innings pitched and is second only to Jonah Nickerson with 291 strikeouts. Wetzler was 22-2 over his last two seasons; the Beavers were 27-2 when he started over that same stretch.

Source: Oregon State Athletics