Squad helped by player's swagger

Dalton Gress was deciding how to pose for a picture when he saw fit to explain to everyone in the room his typical disposition.

"I'm the only one in team pictures who usually smiles," he said. "You have to tell me not to."

Gress more than anything maintains a certain confidence, which he brought to the South Aiken baseball team the last two seasons. Gress, a senior outfielder and pitcher, helped the Thoroughbreds to the Region 5-AAA title and is The Augusta Chronicle South Carolina Baseball Player of the Year. He hit a team-best .423 and also topped South Aiken with 21 RBI and 28 runs. He will play at Francis Marion next season.

"He has a swagger about his ability that doesn't allow him to shy away from many situations," South Aiken coach Bob Polewski said. "He brought that (mentality) to us, and that's what you got to have: a competitive athlete out there."

Gress grew up in Columbia County and played his first two seasons at Greenbrier, the school zoned for his family's rural home near Appling. They moved into an apartment in Aiken before Gress' junior season, he said, and are still looking for a permanent place to live in the area.

Two things, Gress said, helped him have a standout season: not having to pitch the second-most innings on the team and hitting from the third spot in the lineup.

During his junior season at South Aiken, Gress pitched every other game, rotating with Alabama recruit Tucker Hawley. South Aiken missed the playoffs.

This season, the emergence of sophomore left-hander Andrew Faulkner allowed Gress to focus on his hitting. A right-hander on the mound, Gress hits left-handed, which gives him an advantage over most high school pitchers.

"I do everything else right-handed; it's something that just happened," he said.

After bouncing around the lineup as a junior, Gress hit in the No. 3 spot from the team's scrimmage games to the playoffs this season, which ended with a 5-2 loss to defending state champion Brookland-Cayce in the district championship.

"That helped me a ton hitting-wise," Gress said. "When you're out there pitching, you spend a lot of energy; you come up to the plate, and you're not as sharp. The way I was hitting this year dictated a lot of things for me."

Polewski still didn't hesitate to give Gress the ball in big spots. Facing elimination in the playoffs against Marlboro County, Gress started and pitched five innings in a 5-1 win. He finished with a 2.19 ERA in 24w innings. Three pitchers hurled more innings, but Gress was still second on the team to Hawley with four wins.

"It was a consistent year from start to finish," Polewski said. "The games he pitched in were big games, but it was really more about his offense. ... He had a hand in a lot of our success and it just wasn't one thing."

Reach Matt Middleton at (706) 823-3425 or matt.middleton@augustachronicle.com.