This Coast baseball star jumped on an offer to join a nationally-ranked program

Tate Parker’s first scholarship offer was too good to pass up.

The West Harrison senior outfielder verbally committed to Dallas Baptist University last week, a day after making a visit to the school’s campus.

Parker has long been considered and up-and-coming talent on the Coast with several programs showing interest, but the DBU offer still caught him off guard.

“It was a little overwhelming,” Parker said. “It didn’t hit me until the next day. To get a nationally-ranked team to offer you is pretty awesome.”

Josh Hopper was a member of the University of Alabama Birmingham baseball staff when he first made contact with Parker during the summer prior to his junior year, and it seemed only a matter of time before the Blazers would follow through with an offer.

Instead, Hopper was hired in June as the pitching coach at Dallas Baptist — an emerging Division I program that’s been to the postseason five consecutive seasons and garnered Top 25 rankings. The DBU Patriots, who compete in the Missouri Valley Conference, eliminated Southern Miss in the Fayetteville Regional in June before falling to Arkansas in the title round to finish at 42-21.

Hopper has long been a believer in Parker as a prospect.

“He was my guy,” Parker said. “He’s always been on me. He’s always been excited about me playing for him.

“He called me and told me he was moving to Dallas Baptist and he said he’d like to bring me with him. He said he’d bring me out on a visit and have all the coaches look at me. I guess they liked me. They gave me an offer.”

Tate Parker is the younger brother of Brandon Parker, a former West Harrison standout who had a breakout season as a freshman this year at Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College. Brandon Parker was named the ABCA/Rawlings NJCAA Division II All-American Baseball Player of the Year in June after hitting .424 with 24 homers and 81 RBIs.

Brandon Parker also picked up a Dallas Baptist offer two weeks before Tate made his visit, but decided to return for his sophomore season at MGCCC to keep his options open for the 2019 MLB Draft. He also holds a Southeastern Louisiana offer.

While Brandon Parker passed on his chance at DBU this summer, he was thrilled to see his younger brother take the leap.

“He was probably more proud of it than I was,” Tate Parker said. “He’s all in for me. He’s my best supporter.”

Brandon Parker is a slugging corner outfielder, but Tate Parker is speedy center fielder with pop in his bat. He hit .340 with five homers and 22 RBIs as a junior. The 5-foot-10, 185-pound senior was also successful on 11 of 12 stolen base attempts.

Tate Parker has been playing with the varsity squad at West Harrison since he was an eighth-grader.

“You could tell then that he’d be a special player,” West Harrison coach David Marsland said. “Each year, his power has gone up. He’s been an excellent player for us.”

Now that he’s made his college choice, Tate Parker can focus on fine tuning his game. He is a refined defensive player who will look to take a leap forward at the plate this season for the Hurricanes.

“I want to get better as a hitter, gain more power, gain more contact, get my average up,” he said. “It’s definitely going to make my senior year a lot less stressful. It’s big. It’s an honor.”

This story was originally published July 31, 2018 at 9:31 AM.