the lineup card: Season 2; vol 8
In the college baseball landscape, Noah Samol stands tall—both literally and figuratively. At 6-foot-8 and 255 pounds, he is an imposing presence on the mound, delivering sizzling 94 mph fastballs and sharp breaking pitches. A casual observer might be quick to categorize him as the quintessential jock, having been ranked as the No. 3 high school player in Ohio’s 2022 recruiting class and a top-35 left-handed pitcher nationally. Yet, peeling back the layers of Samol’s story reveals that his expertise extends beyond the baseball diamond. In the world of academics, he is not just a standout; he is a scholarly force to be reckoned with.
Samol’s intellect matches his physical dominance. In high school, where most athletes focus solely on perfecting their craft, Samol displayed an exceptional balance between the arts and sciences. He volunteered in the National Honor Society, played the cello and piano in the school orchestra, and even recorded a perfect score on the ACT. As a college freshman, he earned a coveted spot on the All-ACC Academic team while navigating the rigorous demands of Georgia Tech’s renowned engineering and aerospace programs. In his free time, the star athlete even surprised teammates with thoughtful 3D-printed gifts—a testament to his multifaceted and somewhat “nerdy” interests off the field.
School has always come first for the 20-year-old left-hander. His parents, John and Nancy, are both doctors and instilled values of hard work, education and gratitude from an early age. However, they still made time in their busy schedules to support the extracurricular interests of Noah and his two sisters.
Hailing from Mason, Ohio, a suburb of Cincinnati, Samol’s childhood was shaped by watching the Mason Comets varsity baseball team play. In his younger years, the Comets resembled big leaguers in his eyes, igniting a dream to one day don the Kelly Green uniform. Mason High School, boasting the largest enrollment in the state at around 3,500 students, adds a layer of challenge, as securing a spot on the roughly 20-man roster is anything but guaranteed for aspiring players.
By the time Samol made it to high school, his fastball sat in the low 80s, which coming at a downhill angle from a tall lefty arm slot, is a rather uncomfortable at-bat for the average high school hitter. It was enough to earn him a spot, but not enough to attract attention from Power Five schools. At least, not yet. A few smaller colleges showed interest early, however, Samol’s sights were set much higher.
“Not to sound arrogant or anything, but for me, if I couldn’t get myself good enough to play baseball at a school where I would go to regardless of baseball, then I probably wouldn’t play in college,” Samol explained. He felt it was most important to prioritize a valuable degree, but that did not deter him from chasing both dreams. “I wanted to play baseball so bad that I was determined to get good enough to play at one of those schools…like an ACC school or something like that”
Early bump in the road
Samol did not get to have a sophomore season in 2020 due to COVID, so he spent all spring doing at-home workouts and throwing bullpens with his friends. A couple of outings into summer ball that June, he felt something wrong in his elbow. He tried to tough it out, but the pain quickly progressed to the point where he had to take himself out of the game. Not long after, he was diagnosed with a torn UCL. He underwent Tommy John surgery on July 10.
The southpaw was devastated, knowing that the opportunity to pitch as a junior was lost. His year-long recovery was a daunting and slow process, beginning with his arm locked in a sling before getting to work on simple range of motion exercises with his wrist, hand and fingers.
Keeping his Division I goals in mind, Samol brainstormed ways to address weaknesses while awaiting clearance to resume throwing in six months. He researched pitch design, read into the mental side of pitching, and began prioritizing building muscle. Pre-Tommy John, he weighed a lanky 180 pounds, but post-recovery, a combination of increased food intake and varied leg workouts at the gym saw him add 40 pounds by the time he got the green light to throw.
During those first bullpen sessions, Samol effortlessly threw 80 mph. Even at 50% intensity, he was matching his previous top velocity. He knew his work was paying off, yet, there were fears that something was still off.
“People didn’t really tell me before, but there’s a lot of days when you’re throwing after Tommy John and your arm feels awful” Samol recalled. Training in Ohio’s cold winter months, the early aches and stiffness made him worry that he had reinjured himself. “You’re afraid to throw hard because you haven’t done that in so long and your arm feels fragile from the surgery.”
Over time, the discomfort subsided and the tall left-hander continued to surprise himself. In his first max-intent bullpen since the injury, Samol’s heater was clocked between 90 mph and 94 mph by a pocket radar. Pitching coach Scott Stocker uploaded the video to Twitter and it took off, along with Samol’s recruitment. Not long after, the southpaw was on the phone with countless Division I coaches.
After witnessing Samol’s development, his teammates joked that they should get Tommy John so their velocity would also jump 10 mph. “No, no, no, it’s not that simple,” Samol corrected, assuring them that the leg presses and revamped diet sparked his improvement, not the surgery itself.
Clearly a Power Five-level talent, Samol recognized the magnitude of the opportunity in front of him. He had seen some of his brilliant classmates from Mason’s esteemed symphony orchestra and award-winning Science Olympiad team still get rejected by their dream out-of-state schools. Even though his off-the-field résumé was impressive in its own right, he felt that his abilities on the mound could open doors that may have otherwise been closed.
During the recruitment process, Samol deliberated on various possibilities and prioritized what mattered most to him at the time: the chance to play in warmer weather and receive a top-tier education. Influenced subconsciously by his father’s college basketball experience while pursuing pre-med at John Carroll University in the ’90s, Samol felt confident in tackling both challenges simultaneously. The appeal of Georgia Tech’s top engineering program, specializing in aerospace, coupled with the opportunity to join Perfect Game’s No. 3 recruiting class, made his decision to become a Yellow Jacket seem like a no-brainer.
Adjusting to College
Prior to his freshman fall, Samol decided to get a head start on his degree and take summer classes on-campus at Georgia Tech. He became roommates with Carsten Sabathia III, son of future Hall of Fame pitcher CC Sabathia. While the campus was mostly empty, adjusting to a new city on their own was still a culture shock. Each had traveled around during their young baseball careers, but this was the first time either of them had been away from their families for an extended period. The two bonded over the shared experience, and helped each other through it.
“Carsten was huge that summer in my transition to Georgia Tech,” Samol said. “We’re on our own in Atlanta. Just having him to be like, ‘Hey, we should probably get groceries, we should probably do laundry, we should clean the apartment,’ like, you should probably do stuff that you would do as an adult. Stuff we hadn’t really done before. I think we both benefited from each other’s presence a lot.”
The two often went to the field to throw together and they followed a workout sheet given to them by their strength coach. One day that summer, Samol joined Sabathia, Pirates fourth-overall pick Termarr Johnson, Miami recruit Kaden Martin and Vanderbilt recruit RJ Austin in a pickup basketball game at the student rec center. Despite their outstanding abilities on the diamond, they got “cooked” by five random guys on the court who seemingly had no idea who they were.
Samol still laughs about that game today. He was making friends, having a good time, and thought he had everything under control. On the first official day of classes, that belief quickly changed.
Suddenly, the campus population rose from a few people to over 20,000. Samol struggled to navigate through the crowds and find his classes. He scrambled to learn the names of his 40 new teammates that arrived, all while learning the demands of a Division I college ballplayer – super early morning workouts, shagging flyballs that traveled faster than he had ever seen, and finding the time to shower and eat before class begins. Since a lot of his AP credits from High School transferred over, he was thrown right into advanced calculus and physics courses with sophomores.
“That first round of tests hit me like a bus,” Samol admitted. “It was crazy. I got some of the worst scores that I’ve ever gotten on any tests in my life.”
When pursuing an engineering degree at a university people travel from all over the world to attend, it is impossible to be a bystander in class. Samol knew he needed to adjust his preparation, and found help from teammate Terry Busse, a JUCO transfer who had some experience balancing college baseball and the rigorous demands of a challenging major before.
As Samol settled into his new surroundings and schedule, the grades returned to normal. He was able to hone in on baseball – learning the importance of getting ahead in the count, finding the confidence to attack hitters, and being decisive with pitch selection and location. Through a mix of realistic intrasquad scrimmages and simulated College World Series situations, Samol felt prepared for whatever role was thrown his way. Unlike the average freshman, the hard-throwing lefty was told he was in the mix to crack their rotation.
When the season opener against Miami (Ohio) arrived, Samol was beyond excited walking down the tunnel toward the field for his first taste of college baseball. Climbing onto the dugout rail, he felt a unique sense of belonging as he observed his teammates rallying behind their starting pitcher. The camaraderie in the dugout marked a departure from the days of rooting against each other in intrasquads. For the first time since fall began, they were a team.
Samol made his debut out of the bullpen that day. As he warmed up, he told himself that the game was no different than the reps he got in practice. He had success against college hitters in the past, and he could do that again. That was proven true in the first inning – three up, three down with two strikeouts. The left-hander was pumped, thinking that the college game was easier than he expected. He thought he had arrived.
The next inning? He gave up a six spot.
“I had not arrived. I have not figured it out, nor will I ever have it totally figured out. I don’t think anybody does,” Samol reflected. “It was just really humbling, but also learned a lot. That’s kind of like a worst-case scenario, but the sun came up the next day, I’m still on the team, my teammates are still there for me…it sort of puts things in perspective. Being so afraid of failure, and then having failure, yet everything’s okay.”
Battling Anxiety
Going as far back as Little League, Samol has battled performance anxiety. As a seven-year-old kid, his stomach would be filled with butterflies on the car ride to the field. His dad played songs by Rob Thomas to try and help calm him down.
By middle school, Samol stumbled into another way to relieve his tension. Before taking the mound for a tournament game, the lefty threw up. It was not a pleasant experience, but it did help him feel better. Over time, throwing up developed into a pregame ritual for Samol. He would usually pick a spot behind the dugout, but once every so often, he accidentally sprayed it on the mound. One of his closest friends, AJ Lefton, always warmed up before Samol’s starts just in case he needed to step in.
“One time, I didn’t warm up at all because I thought it wouldn’t happen. Sure enough, it did, right in the landing spot,” Lefton shared. That entire game, the eventual Jefferson University pitcher stepped in the vomit-stained mound without a single complaint. “I didn’t mind any of it because it was Noah and I always had his back. I’m very thankful for the experience because as a relief pitcher in college, it has taught me to always be prepared to go in and have my pitcher’s back if they needed help out of a jam.”
Grateful for Lefton’s “rubber arm,” Samol still could not help himself from feeling embarrassed, as if he let his team down. Longterm, Samol knew having an empty stomach would not give him enough energy to go deep into games as a starter. He tried snacking during in-between innings — that did not work, so the puking routine followed him to college. Transitioning into a relief role made it even more difficult to manage.
Sitting in the bullpen is a lot like being a spectator. The thought of entering the game made Samol nervous, so he distracted his mind by thinking about anything else – what classes he had the next day, whether he would have the time to call his family back home or his long-distance girlfriend at Clemson. After six or seven innings of peace, the radio would call:
“Get Samol hot.”
His adrenaline spiked from 0 to 100. There was barely any time to warm up or throw up. With his ERA soaring into the high double digits, and opportunities becoming lower and lower leverage, Samol was determined to find healthier alternatives than vomiting. He sought out help from the school’s mental performance coaches and therapists, and slowly but surely, found methods that worked for him.
While everyone else remains seated in the bullpen, the 6-foot-8 pitcher spends every inning stretching, pacing, doing lunges, mobility work, band work — anything to keep his body busy. He said that it kept him more mentally locked in, giving him an outlet to ease his nerves and feel more prepared to enter any game situation. Embracing the visibility of his anxiety reinforces his commitment not to avoid discussing the topic.
“I’m open about it because growing up, I didn’t really have any role models who were pro athletes and open about anxiety,” Samol shared. “I thought that I was the only person going through it and I remember going to see therapists when I was super young, not knowing what was going on. Part of my ‘why’ for playing baseball now is that I want to get to the point where I have a platform to speak out about my experience battling anxiety, how real that is, and sort of give the younger generation someone to look up to and say – ‘that guy feels the way I feel and he’s out there playing baseball every day.’”
Samol concluded his freshman season with an 11.40 ERA, 2.27 WHIP, and 8.4 K/9 rate, yielding four home runs in 15 innings of play. While the numbers were far from what he had envisioned, he views the season as a year of humbling lessons that he believes will contribute to his long-term improvement.
“People throw a lot of stuff at you in high school, telling you about the draft and how good you are. Then, you go to college and no one cares how much money you could have earned in the draft. No one cares what your ranking or max velo was. All that matters is competing against the guy in the batter’s box right now,” Samol said. “I think facing those guys in the fall, changing my role, getting through some really hard workouts, bad grades on tests, and really dark places opened my eyes to how playing baseball at this level really is. Now, it’s trying to bounce back and figure out what made me confident. How can I harness that? How can I improve my mental game? How can I make the most out of every rep?”
A fresh start
Once the season was over, Samol had an emotional conversation with the Georgia Tech coaching staff that had invested a lot of time recruiting him. He had made friends, finally became familiar with campus and adjusted to college life, but deep down, he was unhappy. Ultimately, Georgia Tech was not the right fit for Samol, so he decided to enter the transfer portal after just one year.
He spent his summer playing for the Traverse City Pit Spitters of the Northwoods League, a collegiate wood bat league that was once home to MLB stars Curtis Granderson, Max Scherzer and Pete Alonso among others. Through June into July, Samol still had no idea where he would be attending college in August.
“It was pretty scary,” Samol described. “I ended up ignoring the recruiting thing for a while because it was kind of overwhelming, like, ‘I need my full energy on just playing baseball and getting better.’”
His parents reminded him he had to attend school somewhere in the fall, so he eventually addressed it by making a list of things he overvalued and undervalued in his last recruiting process. One key difference? He wanted to live in a college town, not a city.
Two of his Traverse City teammates played for Clemson and were honest about their positive experiences at the school. Samol was intrigued. He had some familiarity with the campus from his initial recruitment and from visiting his girlfriend, although he was too busy playing summer ball to schedule official visits. Through connections, he was able to arrange a one-hour phone call with head coach Erik Bakich, whom he had admired as a Michigan Wolverines fan growing up. They shared a heart-to-heart conversation, as Bakich asked tough questions to get to know Samol the person more than the player.
Samol was sold on becoming a Clemson Tiger but not thrilled with the engineering specialties they offered, prompting him to switch majors. The All-ACC Academic honoree liked one of his computer science classes at Georgia Tech, so he is now pursuing a degree in computer information systems with a minor in cybersecurity.
In more ways than one, Samol was starting fresh all over again. He drove down to Clemson from Ohio all by himself, wondering for the entire trip if he had made the right choice. As soon as he arrived, he went straight to the field, where he was met by a bunch of unfamiliar faces wearing Clemson gear. All of the players quickly introduced themselves and showed genuine excitement to have him join their team. Not only did this make him feel welcome, but it also was an important head start on his first assignment at his new school. At their first team meeting, Coach Bakich informed them that he would quiz everyone on their teammate’s full names and hometowns by the end of the week.
Clemson places an added emphasis on team building. Instead of early morning workouts, each day begins with a classroom session, jotting down new lessons from the coaches and players in their notebooks. At some point, each player will have to deliver a presentation to the team about one of their passions — providing Samol the opportunity to teach everyone about 3D printing and bring in some props.
Samol believes Clemson is a great fit for his development, and he is learning something new every single day. However, he will have to wait until 2025 to showcase his progress on the field. This past fall, he suffered a dislocation in his non-throwing shoulder, resulting in a torn labrum. Rather than risk further damage, he underwent surgery in late December 2023 and will be a medical redshirt this spring.
While he is disappointed to wait for his Tigers debut, his past experience recovering from Tommy John surgery serves as a model for how he can still improve day-to-day. He has embraced the role of the ultimate teammate, bringing uplifting energy to those around him.
This will not be nearly as long of a recovery process, but it does give him enough time to slow down and learn more about the game. He has already discussed some of his goals with Clemson’s mental performance coach Cory Shaffer, who was instrumental towards the development of Atlanta Braves ace Spencer Strider. Samol will begin throwing catch again in the next couple of weeks, beginning the slow ramp-up process. This will allow him to work on his mechanics with pitching coach Jimmy Belanger in bullpen sessions and continue studying videos of himself and other major league pitchers with similar big frames and pitch repertoires – Tyler Glasnow, sinkerballer Clay Holmes, 6-foot-11 Sean Hjelle, and especially CC Sabathia, whom he got to meet a couple times through Carsten.
This part of the process fascinates the sharp-witted Samol, who aims to one day make a career out of blending his two passions, tech and baseball. Whether that involves motion capture or something potentially even more innovative remains to be seen. That being said, he is still a firm believer in blending new-school technology with old-school teachings.
“At the end of the day, it’s just a tool,” Samol said when asked about the evolution of data in baseball. “When you’re on the mound, you can have great stuff, you can have really good spin rate, but none of that matters if you aren’t going to compete and fill up the zone. Sometimes, I can get too into that realm of super nerdy bullpen pitch design but I’ve got to make sure that I’m also working on the old-school, ‘just compete.’”