College Baseball Player Off To Bruising Start, Hit By 7 Pitches In 8 Plate Appearances

The 2024 NCAA baseball season is underway, and we already know one dude who is going to tear through his team's ice-pack supply and we're not even through the first weekend of the year.

The Sacramento State Hornets opened their campaign with a Friday doubleheader against Loyola Marymount. This was also outfielder Matt Masciangelo's Sac State debut after previously playing at CSU Bakersfield.

The Hornets wound up losing both games by 4-0 and then 12-10 in eleven innings, but it's Masciangelo's debut that will be remembered because it was flat-out bizarre.

The junior out of Huntington Beach made eight plate appearances between both games, but only one wound up on the scoresheet.

That was because he was hit by seven pitches.

Seven. Three in the first game, four in the second.

If that sounds unbelievable, Sac State tweeted out the video of Masciangelo getting beaned more than half a dozen times.

Yup; that was seven…

First and foremost, science may need to look into this. Not all of those looked intentional, so we need to look into whether or not Matt Masciangelo generates some bizarre baseball-attracting force field. I mean, if he is, he's going to be in agony by the time we get to the end of the season but his OBP will be something to behold.

Secondly, what a way to ingratiate yourself to a new team than by staying in the box and getting clobbered that many times? What a team player Matt Masciangelo is.

Now, Masciangelo is obviously leading college baseball in HBPs, but what was the top total last year?

It was 33, and two players were tied for the D-I lead: LSU's Gavin Dugas and George Mason's Connor Dykstra.

Well, Masciangelo is more than one-fifth of the way to topping that after two games.