Never underestimate the importance of having confidence as a hitter. Last year, one bad game caused Lake Region outfielder Margaret “Chic” Jenkins to lose that confidence and she struggled through the worst season — a good season for most players — of her high school career.
This past season, however, was different, or rather, it was a return to form. Jenkins started strong and went on to have the best season of her four years on varsity and set career highs in every offensive category.
Jenkins is The Ledger’s Softball Hitter of the Year.
There was no hesitation from Jenkins when asked to explain her bounce-back senior season.
“I just came in this year with tons of confidence in myself,” Jenkins said. “Last year I didn’t have much because, — I honestly I don’t know why. I just had one bad game and then it just kept going and it was just my mental state. It wasn’t there. But this year I was like, yes, I got to do it. I’m coming in confident senior year, I’ve got to contribute to my team and honestly, I think I did pretty well this year with doing that.”
Jenkins had a spectacular senior season. After batting .393 and .420 in her first two high school seasons, respectively, Jenkins average slumped nearly 100 points to .321. Her senior year, she went 3-for-3 with runs scored in the season-opener against Sebring and never looked back. She finished with career-highs with a .476 batting average, 41 runs scored, 13 RBIs, six doubles, three triples, three home runs and 36 stolen bases.
Jenkins was an impact player for Lake Region as a freshman and credited former teammate Gabby Willis with helping her those first two seasons.
“She was the second batter, she was behind me, and she was just a really good player,” Jenkins said. “She would really help me boost my confidence in batting and just playing the field in general.”
Jenkins’ junior season might have been worse were it not for a strong finish. She batted .529 (9-for-17) in her last five games to raise her batting average from .262 to her season-ending .321. That strong finish carried over into her senior year.
Whatever were the causes of the struggles of her junior season, Jenkins felt good at the start of her senior season.
“I think it was right off the bat coming in, just knowing that I have to do my job,” she said. “We were a senior-based team, so I just knew that I had to contribute everything that I got this year, knowing that that we had the potential to go to states.”
Jenkins never really slumped. She hit in 23 of 28 games and an 0-for-8 stretch over three games in mid-April was the only hiccup to her season.
Jenkins batted either first or second this season, switching spots at times with pitcher Makenna Meadows, and it wasn’t a good idea to let her on base. She had the green light to steal and her 36 stolen bases were 12 more than her second-best total in her four years of high school.
Jenkins was more than a softball player at Lake Region. She played volleyball for three years, the latter two on varsity. She also joined the girls weightlifting team.
“It helped a lot with power and just being able to like manage my body,” she said. “We would do a lot of conditioning and stuff like that and weightlifting, so that would help like help myself stay in shape during softball.”
Next up for Jenkins is college softball. She has signed with Jacksonville after drawing interest a year ago when she went to a softball camp there after her junior season.
“I’m looking forward to just having a good competitive season, bringing what I have to the team and just being able to have a good good freshman year without like injuries,” she said.
This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Head games: Confident Jenkins bounced back with career year to emerge as Polk’s top hitter
Reporting by Roy Fuoco, Lakeland Ledger / The Ledger
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
