Josh Cary a welcome return to Jones College lineup

ELLISVILLE, Miss. (WDAM) - Josh Cary may have a different postgame ritual than his Jones College teammates.

“Ibuprofen, lots of it,” Cary said.

It’s to combat the soreness Cary still deals with after undergoing three surgeries to his shoulder and elbow since last season.

The freshman outfielder wasn’t sure if he’d see a baseball field again.

“I thought about really hard quitting,” said Cary, a Petal graduate. “I didn’t personally want to hang the cleats up I just didn’t know if I could go through the pain anymore. I just decided to stick it out and I finally found my way back after getting some rehab. This year has kind of flown by.”

“The whole time he was saying I’m coming back, I’m gonna be back,” said first-year Jones College head coach Wes Thigpen. “In the back of our mind we’re like there’s no way between the shoulder and the elbow and Tommy John. He was motivated the whole time to do it and he dominated rehab, did everything that was asked of him. It proves if you put your mind to it, you can get it done.”

After missing the early part of the season, Cary has been the Bobcats’ leading batter since returning to the lineup with a .358 average and 23 runs-batted-in.

It reaffirms why Thigpen brought Cary with him from Mississippi Gulf Coast to Ellisville.

“A little spark plug, he plays the game the right way,” Thigpen said. “Sometimes you have to pull the reins back on him but you like to have that type of player where they’re going to play with their hair on fire at all times.”

“It’s just like me and [Thigpen] both kind of have the same mentality,” Cary said. “We like to play the game hard and we don’t like to give up on a lot and we play it kind of dirty sometimes when we have to. And I just like that mindset.”

Cary has provided a boost to the lineup but every Bobcat has changed their mentality in recent weeks – winners of four straight headed into the Region 23 Tournament.

“I think we were a little more scared than anything,” Cary said. “Now it’s like we took it from having a job to having fun. And now that we’re having fun everything’s just kinda flowing and going our way.”

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