Graduation took his three best pitchers, so Wayne baseball coach Shane Collins is auditioning for replacements.

No easy task.

Jackson Dill, Ty Kemp and Duke Moore “threw just about every inning for me the last three years,” Collins recently told The Register.

“So, we’re trying to find a few guys that can cover some innings for us right now,” he said. “We’ve got a couple that are doing good and we’ve got to find one more.”

Sophomore Langstyn McClendon, who started at shortstop a season ago, has assumed most of the mound work through 14 games for the Bulldogs (5-10).

“He’s really good for us. He’s our big arm right now,” Collins said. “He throws a lot of innings for me. He’s a stud and he’s working hard.”

McClendon, a hard thrower with good control, has won four of his five starts as of April 1.

“We’re still working on off-speed a lot,” Collins said. “But he competes really hard and he hits his spots when he needs to.”

Wayne returns six starters from a team that finished 15-10, won a district title and advanced to the Class AI regionals last season.

Junior Layne Canfield, the Bulldogs’ No. 2 pitcher, plays first base when he’s not pitching and is the team’s third leading hitter.

“This is his kind of first year being thrown on the mound, so he’s learning as he goes,” Collins said. “He’s had a couple of outings where we struggle, and he’s had a couple of outings where he’s done really good for us. “He’s learning, he’s working his butt off for us so that’s all I can ask right now.”

After McClendon and Canfield, it’s “pitching by committee,” Collins said.

Whoever is on the mound, they’ll be throwing to catcher Sloan Jackson, a “legacy player” and the team’s second leading hitter with a .508 average.

“He’s been working really hard and doing a great job,” Collins said. “Great attitude, great leader.

Jackson, according to his coach, has “flipped the script this year and doing a really good job for us.”

“Last year he kind of had a little bit of a down year, and this year he came out on fire, working hard and doing everything right,” Collins said. “I think he’s going to leave a good legacy with those younger kids and kind of set the tone for how it needs to look in the future.”

Another returning starter, senior Lane Lewis, will man second base for the Bulldogs, who competed in the Big Six Tournament at Stratford on Thursday and Saturday.

The Bulldogs lost 11-1 to Alex on Thursday and 14-6 to Konawa on Saturday. Layne Canfield pitched both games.

Senior Ben Fisher, the basketball team’s leading scorer, leads off for Collins and starts in center field. He plays shortstop when McClendon pitches.

Sophomore Brody Kemp, Ty’s younger brother and another basketball player, is a returning outfielder. He leads the team with a .545 batting average.

Other players who figure to contribute on a regular basis are sophomore Dylan Jackson, a part-time catcher and designated hitter, and sophomore Dalon Parker, who plays first base and the outfield.

Parker tore his ACL playing football for the Bulldogs two seasons ago and is working his way back from the injury, Collins said,

“Dalon’s working really hard trying to get back into the groove of things,” he said. “He’s doing a really good job for us.

Jake Turner, a sophomore, is playing the outfield for Wayne, and Rhett Albert will DH for Turner.

“The top of the lineup has hit the ball pretty well,” Collins said of Fisher, Jackson, McClendon and Kemp. “I can’t really complain about them. They’ve run the bases pretty well for me.”

Consistency continues to be a problem for Wayne, which has struggled to maintain focus, Collins said.

“We will play well for four or five innings and then we’ll just have our one big inning with errors and dropped balls, and stuff catches up with us,” he said. “It kind of snowballs on us real fast.”

Competitive games can quickly become lopsided, Collins said.

“We will be in games and then we won’t be real fast, like in an inning,” he said.

For now, Wayne is working to establish an identity, Collins said.

“We’re going to have to play a little more small ball ... we’ve got to shorten our swings up and put it in play,” he said. “We’re pretty athletic if we can ever get on base, so we’ve got to figure out how to get on base and run the bases well. That’s going to be what we’re going to depend on.

“Right now, we’re just taking hacks for the fences, and we’re not those guys right now. We’ve just got to have a little more focus and know the situation and when we can take that big swing and when we need to shorten it up and put it into play.”