Lugnuts Player Spotlight: Justin Watts

LANSING, Mich. via TORONTO, Ont. - If there's a single position on the baseball field that can help one understand and appreciate the intricacies of the game, it's catcher.
Nowhere else on the field can one be involved in every aspect of the game. For numerous players, being behind the plate is the only place they feel comfortable.
For a while, that was true for Lansing Lugnuts pitcher Justin Watts, who played catcher all throughout middle school and high school, only making the transition to pitching in college.
"I loved [being a catcher], it was so fun," Watts remembered. "I like to be in charge of the whole entire field and I felt like it was a good spot for me. I do miss it."
A native of Bryan, Ohio, a town of just over 8,000 people, Watts started his career at Lincoln Trail College, a public community college in Robinson, Illinois. He was thankful for the opportunity, given the physical limitations he was facing. "I was a small kid," he said. "I wasn't too tall or too big. I wasn't that great a hitter when I was young. They gave me a chance to go there, so I took it."

Though content behind the plate, Watts's high school and college coaches took notice of his solid arm at catcher, causing them to consider sticking him on the mound. In 2014 at Lincoln Trail, they decided to try him out as a pitcher, but only for a few innings.
Shortly after transferring to Northern Kentucky University in 2015, Watts underwent Tommy John surgery, which he acknowledges was "kinda hard." For someone who'd never missed any time due to injury, having to sit out for an entire year was, in his words, "saddening."
Still, he was able to come back, though not without difficulty. His two years at NKU were difficult but illuminating, because they were his first seasons as a full-time pitcher. "You really realize how hard pitching is and the level of competition that you're playing at," he remembered. "I really learned a lot about myself."
After two seasons at Northern Kentucky, and a lengthy conversation with Lincoln Trail head coach Kevin Bowers, Watts decided to make the move to Southern Indiana University in 2017.
He briefly mentioned the desire to go to SIU to Bowers in a conversation, and his junior college coach responded rapidly by getting him a phone conversation with Southern Indiana coach Tracy Archuleta the next day.
Just two weeks before school started, and Watts was to return to NKU for a third season, he decided to take a risk and commit to SIU, much to the satisfaction of Archuleta, Bowers and Watts's parents.
Serving as Southern Indiana's closer and simply looking to get drafted by a major-league club, Watts had a great year with the Screaming Eagles - so much so that his teammates tried to have him not pitch in every game, trying to keep deficits large so their closer wouldn't have to come in every night.
"They would be yelling in the dugout, 'we're not letting Watts pitch today!', he recalled. "It was pretty awesome. It was a lot of fun, a great group of guys. You really understand what it means to be a family".
Entering the draft as a senior, Watts wasn't exactly expecting much to come out of the 2017 MLB First-Year Player Draft. Still, he was selected by the Blue Jays in the 37th round.
In his first professional season, Watts tossed 32 1/3 innings of 3.62 ERA ball with Advanced-Rookie Bluefield. He spent the 2018 season in Short-Season Class A Vancouver, where he pitched to an ERA of 2.45 in 36 2/3 frames, striking out 52 and walking 10.
Now healthy and confident, Watts has pitched to an ERA of 2.53 in 10 2/3 innings this season for the Lugnuts, adding 14 strikeouts and a save in eight appearances. He hopes to continue to make a dent in the Midwest League this season, especially given how things have gone for him over the last few seasons.