Josh Knoth (Pat-Med 2023) has made a significant jump this offseason. He was highlighted as part of our “Up Next” Series pic.twitter.com/vz4xFAiGWk
— Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) February 15, 2021
If you’ve been following Long Island baseball over the past couple years, you are certainly familiar with Pat-Med RHP Josh Knoth. The flamethrowing ace has continued to dominant hitters and light up the radar gun since se featured him as part of the “Up Next” series a couple years ago.
All his did in 2021 was nearly fire a no-hitter in the playoffs on the road against Ward Melville (he allowed a single with 2 outs in the 7th). He followed that up by winning the coveted Carl Yastrzemski Award in 2022 and has since gone on to receive national attention after exceling in events such as the PG All-American Game in Arizona.
Knoth was committed to the College of Charleston but recently announced that he was de-committing and was opening back up his recruiting. Every major program was interested and now he has announced he found a new home – the University of Mississippi. To my knowledge, there’s never been a Long Islander play at Ole Miss but there’s rarely a pitcher of Knoth’s ilk come through our area.
He is likely to get selected in the top 3 rounds of the 2023 MLB Draft assuming he continues to perform well and match his junior season in which he set a program record in strikeouts and struck out 20 in a perfect game against Riverhead. Pat-Med has a penchant for developing pitchers – they had Marcus Stroman selected in 2009 and Matt Vogel just four years later.
Knoth is a special talent and has already dealt with adversity at a young age with his father dealing with a serious medical condition. We can only hope and pray that his father’s health improves.
“I’ve been fortunate to have seen him develop since he was 8 years old,” said Pat-Med coach Anthony Frascogna. “I believe there was an Axcess post from the early days. We’ve always known he was a special player. I’m extremely proud of how he’s developed from an emotional and mental standpoint.”
In terms of on-the-field performance, Knoth has already entered rarified air and there is no reason to believe he’s stopping anytime soon with his high-octane fastball that has touched 96 and a slider that is already big league caliber.
