14 members of Sun Devil baseball earn All-Pac-10 Honors

Fourteen members of the 2009 Pac-10 Champion Arizona State Sun Devil baseball team earned All-Pac-10 Conference honors, the conference has announced. Six players from the three-time defending conference champions were named to the All-Pac-10 Team, while eight others earned honorable mentions. Arizona State also took home three individual awards.

For the second straight season, junior RHP Mike Leake was named the Pac-10 Pitcher of the Year. Leake becomes the first ever Pac-10 player to win the award in back-to-back seasons and the fourth two-time winner. Leake is currently 14-1 with a 1.24 ERA, both of which lead the conference. He has fanned 128 batters in 115.2 innings, walking only 18. It is the fourth time an Arizona State pitcher has been named Pac-10 Pitcher of the Year (Leake 2008, Noah Peery 1994 and Marc Barcelo 1993).

Junior outfielder Jason Kipnis, who earned All-Pac-10 honors and the Newcomer of the Year award last season, was named the 2009 Pac-10 Player of the Year. He is the third straight Sun Devil to win the award, joining Brett Wallace, who won the last two. Kipnis leads Arizona State with his .380 batting average and has hit 14 homers and driven in 65 RBI. He has also stolen a league-leading 21 bases. Arizona State was the last school to have three consecutive Players of the Year when Willie Bloomquist won in 1999 followed by Casey Myers in both 2000 and 2001. Kipnis is the 14th Pac-10 Player of the Year in ASU history.

Head Coach Pat Murphy was named the Pac-10 Coach of the Year for the third straight season and fourth time in his career. Murphy has led the Sun Devils to a 44-12 regular season record, including a 21-6 conference mark and the Pac-10 crown. It is the first time since the Pac-10 divisions merged in 1999 that a coach has won the award three straight seasons. The award is voted on by Pac-10 baseball coaches. It is the ninth Pac-10 Coach of the Year award in ASU history.

Joining Kipnis and Leake on the All-Pac-10 team were freshman LHP Mitchell Lambson, sophomore OF/LHP Matt Newman, junior C Carlos Ramirez and junior LHP Josh Spence. Kipnis earned the honor for the second straight year, while Leake was the only member of the 25-man All-Conference team to earn the distinction for the third straight season. Arizona State led all schools with the six All-Conference student-athletes. California was second with four. 

Sophomore RHP Seth Blair, junior OF Kole Calhoun, freshman 2B Zack MacPhee, freshman SS Drew Maggi, junior INF Jared McDonald, freshman RHP/UTL Jordan Swagerty, junior 3B Raoul Torrez and freshman INF Riccio Torrez all earned Honorable Mention All-Pac-10.