The CWU baseball season doesn’t start until February, but that doesn’t mean that the team has not been practicing hard before the harsh Ellensburg winter hits.

Anyone who lives east of the mountains knows that the winter can be very cold and snowy, which isn’t exactly baseball weather.

In a perfect world for a baseball player, it would be sunny and 75 degrees outside.

CWU is just wrapping up a successful fall season, which leaves a small window of preparation time before heading into winter. Fall season is where the team is able to first see their competition of the year.

“The fall season has been going pretty well. We have a bunch of new guys and they are starting to look more comfortable out there. The thing we are looking for is just to improve each and everyday,” Graduate Assistant and former second baseman Dylan Freyre said.

Now that winter is coming, baseball teams all around the country have to struggle with being confined into a basketball gym to practice.  

This is a chance for the team to see live competition before their practices become limited. The way the NCAA works is after Oct. 29 the team can only practice three days a week. Which will result in less team practices and more individual work.

“We’re trying to get as much done as a team before we shut down,” head coach Desi Storey said.

Baseball is primarily an outdoor sport, so being forced indoors for the winter months is not ideal.

The team is limited to what they can practice while inside; inside the gym are batting cages where they are able to hit, pitch and work on defensive fundamentals.

“Nobody wants to be inside for an extended period of time, but the guys do a good job of preparing during the time that we are,” Storey said.

CWU baseball, and the rest of the residents of Ellensburg, hope that this year’s winter isn’t as bad as last year’s, as the city experienced snow all the way through April.

“It all depends on how the winter is this year, because last year we could not get outside until our first game of the year because the snow was so bad,” Freyre said.

Pitchers require a lot of throwing to maintain their arm strength. That includes long-toss, which is throwing the ball over 300 feet back and forth with a partner, so during the winter months the pitchers still need to throw outside every once in awhile to maintain their abilities.

“Right when we get outside after winter is over we try to take as many live reps outside as possible. We do ground balls, pop ups for the outfielders and play inter-squad games to see live pitching,” senior shortstop Chris Dalto said.

The season starts Feb. 10 for CWU, and as October sees the weather getting colder and colder every day, it is a long way from baseball season and the team is in for a cold winter.