Marble Falls baseball to lean on experience

CAPTION: Senior Canon Cochran has been used on the mound, behind the plate and anywhere he’s needed thanks to his versatility and mindset. Staff photo by Jennifer Fierro

The Marble Falls High School baseball team looks to do better than its third place finish in District 24-4A last season.

And these Mustangs, which lost only one player to graduation, have the experience and ability to do it, according to head coach Tyler Porter.

“We have kids who can cover two or three positions,” he said. “I think the cohesiveness has been really good. I think these kids are friends. Being a baseball kid is a big deal to them, and I think there’s a group of them who go eat team dinners, they grab breakfast, stuff like that, so cohesiveness is big.”

The Mustangs have competed in four scrimmages, most recently against Wimberley Feb. 13 where sophomore Crawford Maddox was on the mound.

“Crawford looked good,” Porter said. “That was his first start coming from football. He was dealing with a 102 (degree) fever and looked really good.”

Crawford, who just finished his first season as the Mustangs’ starting quarterback, was used as the baseball team’s closer a year ago.

That’s because of junior John Alan Whittle and senior Canon Cochran, who were the starting pitchers.

This season, Porter has more options on the mound, he said.

“We should theoretically be better as a pitching team,” he said. “So out of those three, we’ll find a combination somehow of two starters and who come in first and then we have a few left.”

The goal is to find a third-game starter who has the same mindset, strength and control of Cochran, Maddox and Whittle, though Porter stopped short of saying their pitching roles are etched for the entire season.

“It’s something we’re so very optimistic about at the moment,” he said.

That’s because the Mustangs’ multi-year lettermen have so much versatility that Porter has been putting them in different spots. Cochran, who also was an infielder, has been catching.

“If Canon’s catching more, Crawford may slide into a starting role more,” the coach said. “We’ll actually have to feel it out through all the non-district games and tournaments and stuff like that to see what works best. But Crawford will be a big part of it as will Canon and Whittle. It’s just where they all fit.”

Sophomore Braxton Dicken, who was the team’s starting catcher a year ago, has been at first base and the outfield.

“With Canon being one of our top arms, Braxton will still be catching half the time probably,” Porter said. “His bat’s good. There’s a ton of moving pieces.”

While the 2025 Mustangs, who lost to China Spring in the first round of the playoffs, had talent but not many reserves, this year’s squad has talent and versatility that should ensure the batting lineup doesn’t change even if there are position changes on the field.

In that sense, this team may be more reminiscent of the 2023 squad that went 18-7 overall and 12-1 in district play to win its first district title in two decades. The year before, when Marble Falls was still playing in District 25-5A, many of those athletes played Georgetown, which used three different pitchers in one inning until the Eagles found someone who could handle the Marble Falls hitters. The Mustangs, thin at pitching, kept the same pitcher for six innings. Then Georgetown’s depth finally prevailed.

So when Marble Falls returned in 2023, those Mustangs had all the elements to make a run at the district crown.

“And that team, we stayed healthy the whole time and it was a blessing because if we lost (someone), and we were kind of in trouble,” Porter said. “We’re not as thin now. Right now we have some guys on the shelf. During that Wimberly scrimmage (Feb. 13) we were down probably four guys, four starters, but were able to make it through. In 2023 that doesn’t happen. We’re playing some very average freshmen. We’re good, but we’re still not really deep. If we have to do it, we have the kids. It’ll be a drop-off – still serviceable, so definitely more depth.”

But not the experienced players who have gone through more than a semester or a year of Porter’s off-season program or a high school strength and conditioning program.

Other Mustangs who will play big roles are sophomores Cade Briseno, Ben Sowers and Anderson Liscum, juniors Grant Carter, Casey Layton and Owen Nash, and seniors Andrew Elwartowski and Atreyu Machacek, who are all lettermen. Freshman Landon White also can contribute.

“I keep telling the kids we have the pieces,” Porter said. “It’s on us to see where they all fit. It’s on us to figure out where they fit exactly.”

The Mustangs begin the season with a best-of-three series at Stephenville Friday and Saturday, Feb. 20-21. Game one is at 6 p.m. Friday, while game two is at noon and game three is at 2:30 p.m. both on Saturday.

CAPTION: Junior John Alan Whittle returns after a highly successful 2025 season where he was a solid pitcher and shortstop for the Mustangs. Staff photo by Jennifer Fierro