Dave Van Horn heaps praise on Florida's Jac Caglianone

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Kevin O’Sullivan said it best on Tuesday night. When Jac Caglianone steps to the plate or takes the mound the whole ballpark stops to watch. Something great or unforgettable could happen whenever Caglianone is up to bat.

This season, Caglianone leads Florida in every slash category (.410/.503/.888) in addition to runs (49), RBI (49), hits, at-bats, and OPS. He is UF’s only qualified hitter with a strikeout rate below 20% at a steller 7.3%. He holds status as the fifth player in UF history with multiple 20-homer campaigns (Matt LaPorta, Brad Wilkerson, Jud Fabian, Wyatt Langford) and is the fourth to do so in consecutive years (excludes LaPorta).

Caglianone is doing all of this with the attention of every head coach and pitching coach that he faces. This week the Gators will travel to Fayetteville to face the No. 2 Arkansas Razorbacks. Dave Van Horn is in his 22nd season at the helm in Fayetteville. He’s coached big leaguers and seen it all in his two seasons. Van Horn was asked about the matchup against the Gators this weekend and spoke glowingly about Caglianone.

“He’s unbelievable when you look at his numbers,” Van Horn told local reporters. “He’s hitting .410 with 25 homers and he’s only struck out 14 times. It’s amazing. I mean, he swings at pitches that are eye-high and hits them over the lights. He swings at bad pitches, but he hits them, and he hits them hard.”

Arkansas head coach Dave Van Horn on Jac Caglianone

(Thoughts on Caglianone as a pitcher?)

Well, obviously his stuff is amazing. Teams are hitting right around .200 against him. He’ll walk you every now and then, but he’ll also strike you out. He’s just kind of hard to hit. Big ‘ol guy throwing downhill like that from the left side, it’s firm. You just hope you can put together an inning or two on him or you get his pitch count up, but he’s awfully talented. He’s one of those guys that obviously if he wasn’t such a good hitter, he’s going to go probably in the first round as a pitcher. And if he wasn’t, you know… Teams will have to make that decision, but he’s probably going to be drafted to hit, is what I’m hearing. He’s just… When you see him, you’ll see how big he is. And his development has been amazing. What he’s done over the last 2.5-3 years, he’s just continued to get better.

(Remind you of any other two-way guys?)

Oh, man… I don’t know because of the power. It’s a big left-left guy. Nobody really jumps out at me right now on that. I mean, there’s been a couple of kids… There was a kid at Baylor a long time ago when I was coaching at Nebraska who pitched an also hit a ton of home runs hitting in the middle of their order. I can’t think of his name off the top of my head, but he’d probably be the closest thing.

How do you pitch to Caglianone?

Yeah, we were just in there talking about it. I think how you handle him is you get the guys out in front of him. Don’t let them get on base. You know, he’s going to get his. He’s going to take his swings and he’s going to make contact. The ball explodes off his bat. How do we pitch him? I don’t know. I’m sure everybody’s tried everything. You pitch him out of the zone a little bit, he still seems to find a way to get the barrel on it. It’s pretty amazing, he’s walked 24 times but only struck out 14. A lot of times, a big guy like that, he might have walked 50 times this year. But obviously he makes contact, and it’s pretty good contact. When you hit 25 homers and you’re still hitting over .400, that’s a pretty good stat. Yeah, I don’t know how we’re going to pitch him. Hopefully, very cautiously.

Pitching matchups and game times for Florida and Arkansas

	Friday | 8 ET (SECN)	Saturday | 1 ET (ESPN2)	Sunday | 3 ET (SECN+)
Florida	LHP Pierce Coppola (0-2, 18.00 ERA	TBA	LHP Jac Caglianone (5-0, 3.86 ERA)
Arkansas	LHP Hagen Smith (8-0, 1.53 ERA)	RHP Brady Tygart (4-1, 2.64 ERA)	TBA