As the transfer portal continues to take key players from every team, LSU has now lost a starter in the 2024 season in sophomore outfielder Paxton Kling. Kling entered the portal on Tuesday morning after playing in 61 games and starting 39 in his rookie year in Baton Rouge.
It was an uphill battle for the talented prospect from Roaring Spring, Pennsylvania, ending the year batting .222 on 126 at bats, with 28 hits, nine doubles, and one home run to 43 strikeouts. Still, Kling was a valuable defensive piece with his speed and range in the outfield which got him a place in the order.
In 2023, Kling started 22 games, batting .289 with four home runs in 90 at-bats, showing exciting upside for the future.
Out of high school, Kling was the Gatorade Pennsylvania Player of the Year and ranked the No. 2 player in the state and the No. 104 overall prospect in the MLB Draft rankings in 2022.
Jay Johnson is taking an aggressive approach to the transfer portal, already with one commitment under his belt and the departures will continue to roll in after a disappointing year that ended in the region finals. The standard at LSU is lofty and falling short of Omaha has Johnson ready to shake things up in Baton Rouge.
After a year where the starting lineup was always in flux and the best players on the team rotated, Johnson knows he needs more consistency in 2025.
“Going into the season, It’s really simple. I’m going do what’s best for LSU baseball in 2024 and that’s put our team in position to win every game we play,” Jay Johnson said in March. “Now the complex part of that is you could take any one of them out and put any one of them in and it would be the same thought, if that makes sense. So it’s just like, hey, this is what we need you to do to be the best player that you can be for our team. And then when you’re in there, you’re in there to help the team win. And I think we actually took a step forward this week in our approach to the game where it’s like if you’re trying to play for more playing time and putting all this pressure on yourself, you’re holding a water balloon and waiting for it to pop versus like, no, I’m gonna get in there and I’m gonna get my job done to help our team win. And that’s how they’re operating. You take any one of those guys out, whoever’s out is like the best guy on the bench that day.”
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