After Transferring to Maryland, Elijah Lambros has found his new swing

Weeks after the 2022 season concluded, Maryland associate head coach Matt Swope’s phone started ringing nonstop. Swope picked the phone up to a familiar voice.

The call was from Jeff Petty, president and CEO of Canes baseball, a high school baseball developmental program. Petty had an offer for Swope: An outfielder prospect. 

Maryland baseball had just come off a heartbreaking loss to UConn in the NCAA Tournament, and were in the market for a new outfielder to replace a 2022 MLB Draft pick, Chris Alleyne. 

“I just think this guy would be a perfect fit for you guys,” Swope recalls Petty saying. “He’s a really good defender…would you guys be interested.” 

The player in reference was Elijah Lambros, a talented player he had coached within the Canes organization. The athletic 6-foot-2 outfielder hit .410 with five triples, 14 RBIs, and 30 runs in his senior year of high school.

The Virginia native garnered attention throughout the college baseball landscape, with offers from North Carolina, Virginia Tech and Clemson. Perfect Game dubbed him the No. 1 outfielder in the state of Virginia and the No. 7 overall player in his home state for the Class of 2021. For scouts, the biggest appeal of Lambros was his athletic ability, as coaches viewed him as a potential five-tool player.

Yet Lambros recalled himself as a raw tool of clay, someone who needed to be molded.

“Looking back now from how much I’ve developed, I would say I was trash,” Lambros said. “I just happened to be athletic enough to play at that level.”

Lambros ultimately chose South Carolina with a chance to fight for a starting spot. The Gamecocks pitched him on a chance to play elite SEC baseball and compete with the rest of their outfielders. But once the preseason arrived, Lambros couldn’t capitalize on the opportunity and didn’t win the spot. 

Lambros ended up appearing in only 36 games with just seven starts. He hit a measly .152 in only 33 at bats and didn’t register a single extra-base hit. With the lack of playing time, Lambros found he wasn’t developing either with the Gamecocks. 

Looking for a better developmental program, Lambros decided to enter the transfer portal at the end of the season. 

“I wasn’t getting any better, it was just kind of trial by fire,” Lambros said. “I didn’t need that, I needed to be in the cage developing my swing, my craft.”

He reached out to Petty after entering the portal. Petty talked to a couple of schools, including TCU and Maryland. 

Lambros was first interested in the prospect of joining Maryland after hearing high reviews of Swope’s development skills, especially when it came to reshaping players’ swings. Swope individually works with players, creating different developmental plans for each one. 

“It’s an insane amount of time he’s put into that, you know, and I think that’s the beauty of him…there’s not a one size fits all,” coach Rob Vaughn said. “There’s a lot of coaches that are smart but don’t communicate well. And he’s turned into an elite-level communicator, and I think he’s a massive asset to our program.”

After the phone call with Petty and a few weeks into his summer season with Lexington County Blowfish, a visit to Maryland was scheduled. 

For many, meeting with the head coach of a potential new home would be critical, but Lambros has a unique story.

Because of a delayed flight, the outfielder could not meet with Vaughn. Nonetheless, Swope picked Lambros up from the airport for his visit. 

Swope took him on a tour of campus, showing him the baseball facilities and building. Yet the visit didn’t mean much to the prospect as Lambros had his eyes set on Swope’s developmental program.

“That didn’t really bother me all too much,” Lambros said. “I came here to get better as a baseball player.”

About one week later, Lambros committed to Maryland. Once at Maryland, the work immediately began with Swope. 

To clean up his swinging technique, Swope worked with Lambros on his motor preferences, how his body wants to produce moves such as when batting. One main fix with motor preferences is balance. After finding what causes uneven balance in a swing, Swope will work to find which motor preferences cause that unbalance. Once it is fixed, a player will be able to see the ball better and be more coordinated in their swing.

“It could be the hands, it could be the feet, it could be the legs, it could be all these positions,” Swope said. “He’s coming to the one place in the country that’s doing this. So I think the specificity of him knowing what he needs to do in the game is what’s allowed him to have that mental freedom of okay, this is what I should be doing. I’m not just guessing or hoping.” 

The results from his work with Swope have been significant throughout the first 19 games of the season. Lambros has improved his batting average over 100 points up to .262 with 16 hits, over triple the five hits he had all of last season.

Lambros has also clubbed five home runs on the season, featuring a grand slam in the Terps’ 25-10 win over Maine on March 10th. 

Lambros drove in seven RBIs that game, the most of any player in a game so far this season. The outfielder has 20 RBIs on the season, second most on the team. 

The sophomore’s improvements are significant. Lambros has turned into an impact piece in Maryland’s everyday lineup. He hasn’t credited the developmental program for only his play, but also his teammates. 

“[Maryland’s] so focused on developing everyone individually,” Lambros said. “It’s turned into a solid nine players on the field that work together and play the right way.