Wake Forest Athletics
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Hall of Fame Profiles: Kyle Sleeth
2/11/2019 5:17:00 PM | Baseball
Wake Forest baseball legend Kyle Sleeth will be inducted into the Wake Forest Sports Hall of Fame this weekend.
What became a Wake Forest Sports Hall of Fame career for Kyle Sleeth was perhaps just hours away from never even commencing.
Coming out of Northglenn High School in Colorado, Sleeth was a surprise 18th-round selection of the Baltimore Orioles. As the summer went on, the Orioles increased their signing bonus offer, eventually matching Sleeth's initial request.
"Coming up out of Colorado, being drafted was unfamiliar. My high school coach had told me there was a chance, I didn't really believe him at the time," Sleeth said. "Throughout that summer after my senior year I played really well and I was drafted by the Orioles. Towards the end of the summer they actually came up with what I was asking for. I was really close to signing at that point. I talked to my parents, I talked to coach Bobby Moranda who was the pitching coach at Wake, and luckily they convinced me otherwise. I was close to signing, but I'm really, really glad I didn't."
Sleeth made an immediate impact as a Demon Deacon. Though his 5.03 ERA wasn't quite what he wanted, he led the team in wins as he posted a 10-3 record en route to an ACC Championship.
"My first year, I threw right over the top, my fastball was really straight. I was trying to throw hard as opposed to pitch, and that's when I was throwing 88 to 91," Sleeth said. "But that year, one of the most fun experiences I remember was when we won the ACC Championship. That was a really cool feeling, being a part of a team that did so much."
He also played with a pair of upperclassmen who paved his path for success.
"We had a lot of success my freshman year. There were so many older players that I learned so much from, especially Cory Sullivan, Corey Slavik. Those guys were really great mentors and taught me how to stay grounded and stay focused at the same time."
That 2001 ACC title was Wake Forest's third in four seasons under head coach George Greer, capping off the most successful ACC run in program history.
"Playing for coach Greer was great," Sleeth added. "He was pretty intense, but he'd let you play the game. He wouldn't hold you back, which is one of the things I liked about him, and that's served him well in pro ball."
Greer has spent much of his post-Wake Forest career as a roving minor league hitting coordinator, before being bumped up to the big league hitting coach of the Cardinals last year.
"It was crazy seeing him in the Cardinals dugout," Sleeth said about his old skipper. "I texted him and told him congratulations, and he reached out to me after the Hall of Fame announcement. I'm just so used to seeing him in a WF hat and WF uniform that it looked odd seeing him in red, but I'm very happy for the success he's had."
For Sleeth, something clicked after the fall of 2001.
"I probably topped out at 92 during the fall of my sophomore year," he said. "I don't know what it was, but after I went home over Christmas break, my first three pitches when I got back were 96, 97, 98. It became different for me at that point, going from 88 to 95, I had to learn to pitch with that.
"It was after the first couple games my sophomore year when I started to see the success I was having. That's when I realized, 'this is something I might be able to run with here.'"
Sleeth parlayed that strong start into a dominant sophomore campaign. He finished the year with a 14-0 record – still the best in program history – and 2.97 ERA in 17 starts. In 118.1 innings, he struck out 113 batters, another mark which ranks in the top 10 in program history.
That season put Sleeth on the map nationally, as he started appearing on top prospect lists and was invited to participate with the USA Baseball Collegiate National Team the summer after that season. Representing the Red, White & Blue, Sleeth finished the summer with a team-leading 7-1 record and 1.44 ERA as he helped guide the U.S. to a 23-7 record.
His teammates on that team included big leaguers Dustin Pedroia, Huston Street, Phil Humber and Aaron Hill, among others. It played games in 10 different states, as well as spending almost two weeks in both the Netherlands and Italy and winning every series it played. He also befriended Justin Verlander, then a freshman at Old Dominion, who didn't make the cut with Team USA until the following year. The two became close when Verlander was also drafted by the Tigers the year after Sleeth.
"That was an awesome summer. We spent a lot of time in Europe playing, and played with a lot of guys who had a lot of success in the big leagues. I met some great people there who I still keep in touch with," Sleeth said.
"It was really cool to represent the U.S. It was the first time I learned how to live out of a suitcase. We never really had a home base, we were going from four days here to four days there over a month in Europe. It was really cool being able to see how a lot of other countries play the game and experience all the different cultures. It was a fun summer."
That summer heightened into another successful season at Wake Forest, as Sleeth wrapped up his career with a junior season in which he went 7-3 with a 2.81 ERA and 102 strikeouts in 96.0 innings. He tied the NCAA record with 26 consecutive victories with a March 28 victory over Duke, a streak which spanned back to his freshman year.
All of his collegiate success placed him at the top of the 2003 MLB Draft boards.
"Draft day was a nerve-racking day," Sleeth reminisced. "Talking with my agent, I thought it would be somewhere between No. 2 and 5, but I really had no idea. Now, they actually have a live draft where the players are there at the draft. Back then, I was sitting in my parents' office with my mom and dad. A selection popped up every 30 or 40 seconds and we saw my name come up with the Tigers third overall, we just started screaming. It's a day I'll never forget."
This time, with a signing bonus of more than $3 million, beginning a pro career was a no-brainer.
Ranking as the No. 34 prospect in baseball according to Baseball America, the highlight of Sleeth's pro career was playing in the 2004 Futures Game at Minute Maid Park in Houston. Playing alongside future stars like Prince Fielder, BJ Upton, Rickie Weeks, David Wright, and against legends like Felix Hernandez, Robinson Cano and Justin Morneau, the event still stands out as a highlight of Sleeth's career.
"One of the coolest experiences I had was playing in the Futures Game. In the minor leagues, you play in front of a couple thousand people max. At the Futures Game you were playing in a big league stadium with a ton of people around, the atmosphere was pretty amazing."
Unfortunately, injuries derailed Sleeth's promising pro career. He underwent Tommy John surgery in 2005 and never returned to his prior form.
"It was definitely frustrating. My sophomore year I went from 92 to 97, in pro ball the reverse happened. All of a sudden I was throwing 88, 89. It was a completely different game pitching at those two speeds," he said. "The biggest word I can come up with is frustrating. I enjoyed every moment of it and I am glad I got to experience all of it. Do I wish things turned out differently? Sure. Where I was and where I was going, it just wasn't going where I wanted to. In 2008 when I retired, I wanted to finish school. I finished up at Rollins College. Now I'm at a place in my career and in my life where I'm happy I made that decision at that point and glad I moved on."
Sleeth's time at Wake Forest prepared him well for an earlier-than-anticipated life after baseball. He also met his wife, Sarah, at Wake Forest, and they knew they wanted to get into business.
"We met with as many people as we could and picked as many brains as we could," Sleeth said. "We met with a guy who did build-ups for franchises and we explained our situation and what we were looking for. He mentioned Floyd's 99 Barber Shop, a franchise out of Colorado. There are 120 or 130 franchises nationally now. It was exactly what we were looking for. It gives us the freedom to go into the shop and interact with people on a daily basis which was one of the things that was really important to us. As soon as we went out to Colorado and got to see the concept, we loved it and we ran with it."
Now, Sleeth will return to Winston-Salem for the first time in around a decade to be inducted into the Wake Forest Sports Hall of Fame. He will join six other Wake Forest legends in the 45th induction class. The group will be honored during a dinner on Friday, February 15 at Bridger Field House and will be inducted into the Hall of Fame during halftime ceremonies of Wake Forest's men's basketball game with North Carolina on February 16.
Even though it's been a while since Sleeth has been to campus, he and his wife ensured that it doesn't feel that way.
"It's funny, we just built a house here in Orlando and one of my wife's stipulations was that there would be a lot of Magnolia trees. One of the things I miss was walking the quad and seeing those huge Mags. When Wake won a big game and they'd roll the quad, that's one of the best memories I have when I think of the school."
--
A limited number of $60 tickets are available for sale to the general public for the Hall of Fame dinner on Friday, February 15. Contact Amy Fleet at fleetac@wfu.edu to reserve a ticket.
Coming out of Northglenn High School in Colorado, Sleeth was a surprise 18th-round selection of the Baltimore Orioles. As the summer went on, the Orioles increased their signing bonus offer, eventually matching Sleeth's initial request.
"Coming up out of Colorado, being drafted was unfamiliar. My high school coach had told me there was a chance, I didn't really believe him at the time," Sleeth said. "Throughout that summer after my senior year I played really well and I was drafted by the Orioles. Towards the end of the summer they actually came up with what I was asking for. I was really close to signing at that point. I talked to my parents, I talked to coach Bobby Moranda who was the pitching coach at Wake, and luckily they convinced me otherwise. I was close to signing, but I'm really, really glad I didn't."
Sleeth made an immediate impact as a Demon Deacon. Though his 5.03 ERA wasn't quite what he wanted, he led the team in wins as he posted a 10-3 record en route to an ACC Championship.
"My first year, I threw right over the top, my fastball was really straight. I was trying to throw hard as opposed to pitch, and that's when I was throwing 88 to 91," Sleeth said. "But that year, one of the most fun experiences I remember was when we won the ACC Championship. That was a really cool feeling, being a part of a team that did so much."
He also played with a pair of upperclassmen who paved his path for success.
"We had a lot of success my freshman year. There were so many older players that I learned so much from, especially Cory Sullivan, Corey Slavik. Those guys were really great mentors and taught me how to stay grounded and stay focused at the same time."
That 2001 ACC title was Wake Forest's third in four seasons under head coach George Greer, capping off the most successful ACC run in program history.
"Playing for coach Greer was great," Sleeth added. "He was pretty intense, but he'd let you play the game. He wouldn't hold you back, which is one of the things I liked about him, and that's served him well in pro ball."
Greer has spent much of his post-Wake Forest career as a roving minor league hitting coordinator, before being bumped up to the big league hitting coach of the Cardinals last year.
"It was crazy seeing him in the Cardinals dugout," Sleeth said about his old skipper. "I texted him and told him congratulations, and he reached out to me after the Hall of Fame announcement. I'm just so used to seeing him in a WF hat and WF uniform that it looked odd seeing him in red, but I'm very happy for the success he's had."
For Sleeth, something clicked after the fall of 2001.
"I probably topped out at 92 during the fall of my sophomore year," he said. "I don't know what it was, but after I went home over Christmas break, my first three pitches when I got back were 96, 97, 98. It became different for me at that point, going from 88 to 95, I had to learn to pitch with that.
"It was after the first couple games my sophomore year when I started to see the success I was having. That's when I realized, 'this is something I might be able to run with here.'"
Sleeth parlayed that strong start into a dominant sophomore campaign. He finished the year with a 14-0 record – still the best in program history – and 2.97 ERA in 17 starts. In 118.1 innings, he struck out 113 batters, another mark which ranks in the top 10 in program history.
That season put Sleeth on the map nationally, as he started appearing on top prospect lists and was invited to participate with the USA Baseball Collegiate National Team the summer after that season. Representing the Red, White & Blue, Sleeth finished the summer with a team-leading 7-1 record and 1.44 ERA as he helped guide the U.S. to a 23-7 record.
His teammates on that team included big leaguers Dustin Pedroia, Huston Street, Phil Humber and Aaron Hill, among others. It played games in 10 different states, as well as spending almost two weeks in both the Netherlands and Italy and winning every series it played. He also befriended Justin Verlander, then a freshman at Old Dominion, who didn't make the cut with Team USA until the following year. The two became close when Verlander was also drafted by the Tigers the year after Sleeth.
"That was an awesome summer. We spent a lot of time in Europe playing, and played with a lot of guys who had a lot of success in the big leagues. I met some great people there who I still keep in touch with," Sleeth said.
"It was really cool to represent the U.S. It was the first time I learned how to live out of a suitcase. We never really had a home base, we were going from four days here to four days there over a month in Europe. It was really cool being able to see how a lot of other countries play the game and experience all the different cultures. It was a fun summer."
That summer heightened into another successful season at Wake Forest, as Sleeth wrapped up his career with a junior season in which he went 7-3 with a 2.81 ERA and 102 strikeouts in 96.0 innings. He tied the NCAA record with 26 consecutive victories with a March 28 victory over Duke, a streak which spanned back to his freshman year.
All of his collegiate success placed him at the top of the 2003 MLB Draft boards.
"Draft day was a nerve-racking day," Sleeth reminisced. "Talking with my agent, I thought it would be somewhere between No. 2 and 5, but I really had no idea. Now, they actually have a live draft where the players are there at the draft. Back then, I was sitting in my parents' office with my mom and dad. A selection popped up every 30 or 40 seconds and we saw my name come up with the Tigers third overall, we just started screaming. It's a day I'll never forget."
This time, with a signing bonus of more than $3 million, beginning a pro career was a no-brainer.
Ranking as the No. 34 prospect in baseball according to Baseball America, the highlight of Sleeth's pro career was playing in the 2004 Futures Game at Minute Maid Park in Houston. Playing alongside future stars like Prince Fielder, BJ Upton, Rickie Weeks, David Wright, and against legends like Felix Hernandez, Robinson Cano and Justin Morneau, the event still stands out as a highlight of Sleeth's career.
"One of the coolest experiences I had was playing in the Futures Game. In the minor leagues, you play in front of a couple thousand people max. At the Futures Game you were playing in a big league stadium with a ton of people around, the atmosphere was pretty amazing."
Unfortunately, injuries derailed Sleeth's promising pro career. He underwent Tommy John surgery in 2005 and never returned to his prior form.
"It was definitely frustrating. My sophomore year I went from 92 to 97, in pro ball the reverse happened. All of a sudden I was throwing 88, 89. It was a completely different game pitching at those two speeds," he said. "The biggest word I can come up with is frustrating. I enjoyed every moment of it and I am glad I got to experience all of it. Do I wish things turned out differently? Sure. Where I was and where I was going, it just wasn't going where I wanted to. In 2008 when I retired, I wanted to finish school. I finished up at Rollins College. Now I'm at a place in my career and in my life where I'm happy I made that decision at that point and glad I moved on."
Sleeth's time at Wake Forest prepared him well for an earlier-than-anticipated life after baseball. He also met his wife, Sarah, at Wake Forest, and they knew they wanted to get into business.
"We met with as many people as we could and picked as many brains as we could," Sleeth said. "We met with a guy who did build-ups for franchises and we explained our situation and what we were looking for. He mentioned Floyd's 99 Barber Shop, a franchise out of Colorado. There are 120 or 130 franchises nationally now. It was exactly what we were looking for. It gives us the freedom to go into the shop and interact with people on a daily basis which was one of the things that was really important to us. As soon as we went out to Colorado and got to see the concept, we loved it and we ran with it."
Now, Sleeth will return to Winston-Salem for the first time in around a decade to be inducted into the Wake Forest Sports Hall of Fame. He will join six other Wake Forest legends in the 45th induction class. The group will be honored during a dinner on Friday, February 15 at Bridger Field House and will be inducted into the Hall of Fame during halftime ceremonies of Wake Forest's men's basketball game with North Carolina on February 16.
Even though it's been a while since Sleeth has been to campus, he and his wife ensured that it doesn't feel that way.
"It's funny, we just built a house here in Orlando and one of my wife's stipulations was that there would be a lot of Magnolia trees. One of the things I miss was walking the quad and seeing those huge Mags. When Wake won a big game and they'd roll the quad, that's one of the best memories I have when I think of the school."
--
A limited number of $60 tickets are available for sale to the general public for the Hall of Fame dinner on Friday, February 15. Contact Amy Fleet at fleetac@wfu.edu to reserve a ticket.
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