Back-end Boppers

OMAHA, Neb. – Go ahead and close your eyes. Imagine you're in a pitcher's cleats. You've just navigated through the first six batters in a lineup. It was stressful, but now you're in the back third of the batting order. You're hopeful for an easy out or two.

Then striding up to the plate is a 6-foot-5, 250-pound mountain of a man that looks like a relative of Paul Bunyan's. Right behind him, over in the on-deck circle, is a guy that from afar looks to be about a mirror image. You quickly come to the realization, in this lineup, there are no breaks.

That's the situation opponents find themselves in nowadays when facing Mississippi State back-end boppers, Brad Cumbest and Kellum Clark. The duo's development in the latter half of this season has given the Bulldogs one of the deepest batting orders in the country.

In some ways, the two are alike. They're close on the lineup card as Cumbest bats seventh and Clark hits eighth. Cumbest is a football player and Clark sure looks like one. Both can play the outfield or serve as a designated hitter.

In other ways, they're different. Cumbest hits right-handed, Clark, left-handed. Cumbest is bold and loud. Clark is a bit more reserved.

Yet it has all come together to give Mississippi State a potentially lethal combo in the back half of the batting order night in and night out. It's a mixture that is now paying dividends for the Bulldogs as they make a run in the College World Series.

The Sociable Slugger

Odds are, you'll hear Cumbest coming before you see him. The good, old country boy from Hurley, Mississippi, has a personality that matches his huge frame.

"He can talk to anybody," Clark says of Cumbest. "He can talk to a fencepost and have a really good conversation. It's unreal."

Cumbest is one of those guys that'd be right at home just sitting on a front porch conversing about your topic of choice.

"I flow freely," Cumbest said. "I don't have nothing to hide. I'm an open book."

The man they call Mule has gotten to where he's just as comfortable in the batter's box as he is shooting the breeze.

Cumbest has had a fantastic 2021 season. He'll enter Friday's game in Omaha with a .321 batting average, five home runs and 19 RBIs. He's put up pretty good numbers all year long when he's gotten opportunities, but those chances certainly increased over the second half of the season.

Why? Cumbest said it has all come down to comfort.

Cumbest also plays football for Mississippi State. He doesn't get the chance to go through fall baseball workouts like his teammates, so his acclimation process and timeline each baseball season is a bit different than that of his fellow Diamond Dawgs.

"I'm already a little behind the 8-ball [early in the baseball season]," Cumbest said. "That's no excuse, it just takes me some time. It's just getting in the batter's box for me and seeing pitching. Last year in the [COVID-shortened] year, we finished [March 11]. I didn't see another live at-bat until about February [of this year]. So almost a whole year, I didn't see a live at-bat. So I go out to baseball and I'm like, 'Dude.' I felt like somebody was shooting BBs out of a Red Ryder at me up there at the plate. I couldn't even see the ball. So it just took a little time."

Slowly though, as the 2021 campaign rolled on, Cumbest got his feet under him.

"Around SEC play is where I started feeling comfortable and confident," Cumbest said. "I was just like, 'Dude, I just feel so good in the box right now I don't think anyone can beat me.'"

Cumbest cites the Sunday, April 25 game at Vanderbilt as the moment he felt like he really arrived this season. The box score from that day might not look all that impressive – Cumbest was only 1-for-1 with a couple of walks – but he knew he was on to something.

"I had good at-bats," Cumbest said. "You have good at-bats and coach will keep playing you. That's where it started for me."

The next weekend in Starkville, against Texas A&M, Cumbest had several big hits and a 3-for-4 game in the series finale. He's essentially been a big piece of State's batting order ever since.

The Reserved Rookie

While Cumbest can be a bit boisterous to say the least, Clark is a bit more on the quiet side than his back-half-of-the-order brother…..at least to the common eye. But down deep, Cumbest seems to think there's a little Mule in Clark.

"You've got to break service a little bit with him I feel like," Cumbest said of Clark. "When you break service with him, he'll let loose on you."

Social traits aside, Clark sure has the capability of letting loose on opposing pitchers these days. Like Cumbest, Clark has gotten better as the season has worn on.

Clark became a consistent part of the MSU starting lineup around the beginning of May. Since then, his batting average has risen 43 points headed into Friday night's upcoming action. He's blasted majestic home runs. He's put up strong plate appearance after strong plate appearance. And he traces it all back to one thing: confidence.

It bears remembering that last baseball season, Clark was playing on Mississippi high school diamonds for Brandon. Now, he's getting baptized by fire in some of the most pressure-packed situations and on some of the biggest stages in all of college baseball. Each day, he's growing more and more sure of himself and it's showing.

"For me, it's been about confidence," Clark said. "As I keep building confidence, I feel more comfortable in the box. So as long as I'm getting some quality ABs, having good at-bats, that's what gives me confidence."

A confident Clark? That's a dangerous Clark.

"If he's on time and hits the barrel, there's a lot of good things that can happen," MSU head coach Chris Lemonis said of Clark earlier this season. "There's a lot of force generated in that big body."

And for Clark, the best is almost assuredly still to come. Just ask Cumbest.

"Kellum is going to be an unbelievable ballplayer here," Cumbest said. "People might not know it yet, but I know it. You'll see. Coaches already know, but pretty soon everybody will know. He's going to be something special."

Coming Through When it Counts

The best ballplayers deliver when it matters the most. Perhaps that's the surest sign yet that Cumbest and Clark provide the Bulldogs with a luxury not too many teams have at the tail end of their lineups.

Mississippi State is currently 2-0 in Omaha and sitting just one win away from the College World Series Finals. Cumbest and Clark played humongous roles in getting the Bulldogs to this point.

In the Omaha opener, it was Cumbest as one of the heroes. His RBI triple on a fly ball that dropped just inside the right field line gave MSU a 2-0 lead and the run Cumbest drove in ended up being the decisive one in a 2-1 victory.

Now Cumbest, in his brutally honest style, doesn't take too much credit for his clutch knock. In fact, he said he thought he was about to get in trouble.

"When I hit the ball, I honestly didn't know where it went," Cumbest said. "You can see it if you watch the video. I hesitated a little bit and then I realized when I found it, son, I had to get running. In the back of my mind I'm thinking, 'If I don't at least get a double out of this, [Lemonis] is not gonna be happy. He's going to be so mad.' I get to third and I was like, 'Dude, I just hit a triple in the College World Series. That's awesome.'"

Awesome indeed. Mule had himself a postseason moment he'll always remember.

"That's everybody's dream," Cumbest said. "Home run, triple, double – you score somebody in the World Series to put your team ahead, you're like, 'This is what it's all about. This is every kid's dream.' This was my dream. This was my dream for a long time. I finally got to live it out."

Then as a result, Cumbest got to stand on third and perform his celebratory dance inside T.D. Ameritrade Park. After a big hit, Cumbest reaches up and grabs the ear flap of his helmet as if listening to music in headphones. He bounces to the imaginary beat.

"It's the DJ," Cumbest calls it. "When we get done some days, we start dancing in the locker room. Well I did it in the locker room one day and they started calling me DJ Mule. Or DJ Mewey. That's my nickname for it. That's just what I do – DJ Mewey."

While DJ Mewey got things popping on Sunday, it was Clark getting the Bulldogs grooving Tuesday. State was no-hit through 7 1/3 innings against Virginia. MSU trailed 4-0. Then Clark sent a bolt of electricity through the Dawg dugout with a two-run blast over the right field wall.

Clark wasn't so reserved in that moment. He flew around the bases and pointed to his teammates in an emotional display that almost foreshadowed the comeback was just getting started.

"I didn't know if [the ball] was going to go over [the wall] because it was lower than I usually hit them," Clark said. "But I knew I hit it good. I was going [for a double] out of the [batter's] box just in case. But I saw it go over and I kind of blacked out a little bit… I was very excited. I was trying to get everybody else excited too because I knew with the top of the lineup coming up, we were going to do some damage."

And that's precisely what State did. The Bulldogs added four more runs in the inning to take the lead and eventually claim a 6-5 victory. It all began with the sweet swing of Clark.

Just Getting Started

Virtually no one is thinking about MSU's future right now. The present is too important as the College World Series rolls on.

However if one wants to go ahead and peek to next year, it doesn't seem like much of a stretch at all to think Cumbest and Clark are currently only laying the foundation for bigger swings to come.

They might not always hit back-to-back in the order as they do now, but they might forever be somewhat linked because of how they've both come on strong at virtually the same time in the latter half of 2021. And they seem OK with that. They've got a pretty good bond between them anyway.

"We've gotten pretty close over the last year," Clark said of he and Cumbest. "I didn't really know him coming into the season just because he was at football and stuff, but as things have moved on and I've played a little outfield and he's been teaching me a bunch of stuff, we've gotten a lot closer. Us hitting back to back, when we do good, it's pretty cool."

Adds Cumbest: "We're throwing buddies. That should tell you all you need to know. We're throwing partners and we hit right behind one another in the lineup. It's just cool."

Cool indeed, and they're both hopeful it could get a whole lot cooler in the days to come in Omaha.

"I know it's corny, but I tell everybody this – It's a dream," Cumbest said. "I'm just waiting to wake up right now."

Mississippi State University Athletics

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