Warriors sporting different look

EDMONDS — It won’t be the type of season where the Edmonds-Woodway baseball team can depend on the same core group of players to produce each game.

After the exit of a hefty senior class that included four first-team, all-league selections, a more likely scenario is that the Warriors will sport a different look one day to the next.

E-W graduated 10 players from last year’s 13-7 club that narrowly missed out on the district playoffs and those who are returning are capable of filling a number of spots in the field and the batting order.

“Probably more than any year I can remember other than maybe my first couple years, there is still a lot of stuff up for grabs,” E-W coach Joe Webster said.

Defensive assignments were still taking shape going into the team’s league-opening series this week against Lynnwood and Webster expects the lineup to fluctuate while the coaching staff continues to evaluate talent.

“There is a lot of competition and there isn’t a lot of distance between the guys at several positions,” he said. “There are only a couple (places) where I’m confident saying the kid who’s there now will probably be there throughout the year. There might be some situations where guys flat-out split time because they both deserve to play.”

The Warriors bring back just two position players who saw considerable time in 2005.

“We’re not young necessarily,” Webster said. “We’ve got eight seniors. They just need some more experience.”

While the newcomers acclimate themselves to the varsity level, E-W will lean heavily on a deep pitching staff that features four seniors.

“I’m hoping they can kind of carry us through the beginning of the year if we have some growing pains offensively,” Webster said. “I don’t know if we have anybody who’s a dominating kind of pitcher. That remains to be seen. But the number of arms that we have and the ability to put a different look up there and change it up should be a strength.”

Ian Waldron looked to be the team’s ace, but the 6-foot-6 right-hander is sitting out the first part of the season due to injury. Fourth-year letterman Andrew Hutt, Kellan Mackey, lefty Justin Christensen and junior Owen Jones should see the most work.

“We’ll probably do a lot of mixing it up and trying to give teams different looks and not let them zone in on anybody,” Webster said. “Our main thing is just to have them throw strikes. They’ve got good stuff.”

After winning the Western Conference South Division title and reaching the Class 4A region final in 2004, last year marked just the fourth time in Webster’s 14 seasons the Warriors didn’t advance to a 21st game.

E-W opened the season 8-0 and sat in a four-way tie for first place in the Western Conference South Division with two weeks remaining. But the Warriors dropped four of their final six — including three losses by two runs or less — to finish in fifth place.

“We were the ones on the outside looking in,” Webster said. “Those other teams won the games they needed to down the stretch and we didn’t. Hopefully that’s not the case this year. Our league is always really competitive and this year should be no different. There are six or seven teams all capable of making it in that top four.”

Where the Warriors ultimately wind up will depend on if they can achieve consistency with a work-in-progress lineup.

“I’m looking forward to the fact that I really don’t know what to expect,” Webster said. “It should be fun figuring out where everybody fits and finding out their roles.”