Floyd Decides To Stay Close To Home At UMass-Amherst

Asa Floyd C / OF / Worcester Academy, MA / 2020

HOLDEN, Ma. - When Asa Floyd arrived at Worcester Academy as a freshman his outlook on baseball changed.

“Ever since I got to high school I knew I wanted to play college baseball,” explained Floyd, now an incoming senior. “There were others on Worcester, seniors at the time, that were going to play Division I ball, and it was then I knew that’s what I wanted to do. Before that I just enjoyed it. Now that I’m going to UMass, I enjoy it even more.”

The commitment to college came this summer after a long process of weighing all the options.

“I started talking to them last September once I was able to talk to coaches,” the 35th-ranked 2020 in New England reflected. “They offered me in November, but I wanted to wait it out and look at every option. Our conversations continued the past several months.”

Floyd took a visit to the school, located an hour from home, back in November.

“I have a lot of family members, uncles and cousins, that went there,” Floyd noted about the Atlantic 10 Conference school. “They all had nothing but good things to say about it. The atmosphere was great and I saw a baseball practice and spent time there.”

Offers from Quinnipiac and Rutgers as well as a visit to Rhode Island did, admittedly, bring some uncertainty to Floyd.

“I was waiting on them as well as a few Ivy League schools,” Floyd said. “I was trying to see if I could maneuver my way into one of them.”

However, Massachusetts-Amherst had a lot going on for itself in the eyes of Floyd.

“I wanted to get into the best academic and baseball school that I could and UMass fulfilled both,” Floyd pointed out. “Academically, it’s a very good school, and athletically, they have two players (Christian Walsh and Jack Steele) right now playing for them that were at Worcester.”

The 5-11 180-pound catcher finally came to a decision.