2025 MSHSAA Team Preview: Miller Cardinals
February 13, 2025
The Missouri high school baseball season kicks off on Mar. 20, opening day for regular season action under MSHSAA regulations. Leading up to opening day, we’ll be publishing our team previews ahead of the 2025 spring season, touching on programs spanning all state classifications, counting down to the official Prep Baseball Missouri Preseason Power 25 Rankings.
Perennially, we’ve submitted a preseason questionnaire to high school head coaches across the entire state. Their responses have been flooding in and we’re using the detailed insight they’ve provided in our team-by-team preseason analysis.
Our 2025 preseason coverage continues today.
Head Coach: Justin Snider (19 years overall, 2 at Miller)
Classification: 2A
2024 Record (Finish): 9-13
2025 SEASON OUTLOOK
No. of Returning Position Players: 8
No. of Returning Pitchers: 9
Top Returners:
- SS/RHP Jarod Lung (2025) - 5'8", 160, R/R
- 1st team all district, 1st team all conf. Jarod’s baseball knowledge and IQ are second to none. He was our number 1 pitcher last year and lead off hitter. He has been a starter since he was a freshman. The last month of the season he was great on the mound, as someone that doesn’t throw incredibly hard, his bulldog mentality was what our team needed. Jarod had 61 strikeouts in 46 innings pitched. We will look for Jarod to lead us in all phases of the game and hit at the top of our order
- CF Gavin Hendricks (2025) - 6'1", 185, R/R
- 2nd team all district, 2nd team all conference. Gavin has been a starter since his Sophomore year in CF for us. He has great tracking ability in the outfield and is very athletic. At the plate he will again hit in the middle of our order. Our hope is that he maintains being one of our top RBI producers while increasing his power numbers as well.
- 3B/SS/RHP Hayden Schnake (2027) - 6'3", 160
- 2nd team all district, 2nd team all conference. Hayden started every game for us as a freshman. He did a little bit of everything for us, he pitched and also played 4 different positions in the field for us. This year he will mainly be in the top of our pitching rotation and on the left side of the infield, depending on who is pitching. Hayden also led our team in hitting as a freshman last year. He is about 3 inches taller and 15 lbs bigger than last year. Hayden is bigger and stronger than last year and we hope to see better power numbers offensively and better velocity off the mound. He is a hard worker and has a great baseball IQ as well. We expect really big things from him this year.
Top Newcomers:
- LHP/OF Jase Wilkinson (2027) - 6'1", 165, L/L.
- Jase may be our biggest newcomer/transfer in a long time. Jase is a mid 80s arm from the left side with 4 solid pitches. He will step right in as our #1 and also likely hit in the middle of our order.
- C/OF Sam Ferguson (2027) - 5'7", 150, R/R
- Sam likely would have been our starting catcher as a freshman, but broke his arm in the first week of practice and wasn't able to play until summer. He is extremely athletic catcher who does a great job commanding our pitching staff. He could also hit anywhere from leadoff, 2 hole or 9 for us to utilize his speed best for us.
- RHP Brodie Rinker (2025) - 6'3", 170, R/L
- Brodie took a year off from baseball last year after logging several innings on the mound as a sophomore. He is back and we look for him to compete for some spot starts, but especially help us out of the bullpen.
- OF Nathan Cunningham (2026) - 5'7", 155, R/R
- Nathan is a very athletic kid who has only seriously played baseball for 2.5 years. He is a great outfielder who has tremendous speed, and his bat continues to improve. He is someone that will battle for playing time and will for sure be one of our top runners of the bench.
Key Players Lost:
- Bodie Gubser
Coach’s Insight: “Our top strength will be our experience coming back, we have 9 starters back and our entire pitching staff. The biggest strength we will have is our pitching. Last year we lost 9 of our 13 games in the 6th or 7th inning because our staff was all freshman/sophomores (1 JR). We were so young on the mound, our team ERA went from the 5's in the first 1.5 months of the season, to the low 2s in the last 1.5 months of the season. The maturity in our pitching staff will be huge, with 3 LHP options our of our top 5 is another reason for excitement. Our team speed/baserunning is another area we feel like can be exceptional this year. We really believe the growing pains we went through last year caused us to become better and tougher throughout the year. We will need to learn to hit velocity better. Our entire off-season program is based around this. Our conference is so good with everyone having multiple quality arms, for us to make a run like we think we can this year, our ability to adjust and execute will be crucial. With 8 starting hitters back and some quality depth to push those guys, I think we can make those improvements and jumps. But that will be our biggest question mark. ” – Justin Snider, head coach
Find more information on the 2025 Miller program below:
+ Follow them on X: @Miller_CardsBB
+ Visit Prep Baseball Missouri’s 2025 MSHSAA Team Previews page to learn more.
+ If you are a high school coach and didn’t receive our questionnaire, please click HERE to fill out the form