Quite a few members of the Florida State baseball team have improved dramatically over the last 12 months.
Right fielder James Tibbs III's ACC Player of the Year campaign has launched him into the first round of MLB Draft projections. Jamie Arnold has gone from inconsistent freshman pitcher to one of the best arms in all of college baseball. Brennen Oxford has established himself as a remarkably consistent bullpen arm for the Seminoles.
But the case can certainly be made that no member of the FSU baseball team has come further over the last 12 months than Marco Dinges.
At this time last year, Dinges had just committed to the Seminoles as a junior-college transfer from Tallahassee Community College. And he did so while in the middle of an extended hospitalization where he was battling hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (HLH), a rare but potentially fatal condition in which white blood cells build up in organs and do damage to them and other white blood cells.
Dinges regularly had fevers of over 100 degrees while hospitalized at Shands in Gainesville and was unable to do pretty much any physical activity. Understandably, Dinges' interest from D-I programs dwindled during this time after he decommitted from Maryland in April 2023.
Despite the illness and extended hospital time, though, former FSU assistant coach/recruiting coordinator Rich Wallace continued to offer Dinges an opportunity to join the Seminoles and stay in the town that had become his home after a transient few years to end his high-school tenure.
"I'm lucky that RIch Wallace gave me an opportunity at Florida State to walk on," Dinges told the Osceola.
When he was finally released from the hospital after 43 days — coincidentally now the number he wears at FSU — Dinges says he had about a month to prepare for joining the FSU baseball program.
While Dinges was successful in two seasons at TCC with a .360 batting average, 15 home runs and 78 runs batted in across 85 games, it was unclear how it would translate for him to a premier program like FSU, especially after a summer where he was hospitalized and lost a lot of his strength.
Dinges never had any doubts whatsoever about his ability, though.
"I knew from day one I belonged to play at Florida State," Dinges said. "I wanted to prove to myself, prove to everyone that all the long nights, the hard work was all worth it."
Even after a wild summer removed from baseball, it didn't take much time as a Seminole for Dinges to prove exactly that to FSU head coach Link Jarrett. Dinges' pure hitting ability was on display throughout the fall.
"We knew this is a dynamic bat. Now you fast forward into our world, with the arms that we had when this thing started, when you're facing (Gavin) Adams and (Cam) Leiter and Arnold and (Carson) Dorsey and (Conner) Whittaker and Ben Barrett and it just keeps going on and on, how well do they recognize pitches? Because what you see consistently in junior college, you see sporadic examples of that type of arm," Jarrett said. "Once we got into the fall and you started to see him handle some of those secondary pitches that we were running up there, you then realize that you have a complete type of hitter. Then you get into the season and the excitement and intensity of the season brings another dimension to how do people handle this. He's checked those boxes. There have been some dynamic at-bats, he's right in the middle of the lineup. His at-bats and his intensity with what he's doing, it's as good as you'll see. He cherishes those at-bats and every pitch and that's rare. He's good."
When TCC head coach Bryan Henry, a former ACC Pitcher of the Year for the Seminoles, saw that Dinges had hit a home run in his first unofficial at-bat as a Seminole in last October's scrimmage vs. Mercer, he certainly wasn't surprised.
"I just kind of chuckled. We just knew what they were getting. And then the type of kid Marco is, he works his tail off. He wants to be the best at what he does. He just eats, breathes and sleeps hitting..." Henry told the Osceola. "The talent level just stuck out on the field right away. The ball came off his bat different. Having played pro ball (myself), it was different than anybody else. It was just a matter of fine-tuning some things. After the first week of practice, my first phone call was to Rich Wallace and I said, 'Hey, I got a guy you need to look at.' "
Dinges' close call with enrolling at FSU wasn't his first close call with potentially seeing his baseball career end prematurely. After spending most of his childhood near Poughkeepsie, N.Y., and then moving to Leesburg, Va. before his junior season, he moved to Tampa with a friend's family and played at East Lake High for his senior season of high school.
His only offer to play college baseball was at TCC and he signed with the Eagles three days before the deadline.
"Luckily enough, my coach over at East Lake, he told me every day, 'Don't worry, I'm gonna find you a home. I'm gonna find your spot,' " Dinges recalls. "I believed in him, but there's also that thought in the back of your head where it could be done if you don't find an opportunity somewhere. I'm very fortunate that (former TCC assistant) Corey Pye gave me an opportunity."
That opportunity was parlayed, through an improbable path, to where Dinges now resides as a critical piece of FSU's potent offense this breakthrough season. While he's listed as a catcher/outfielder on the FSU roster, Dinges has primarily served as FSU's designated hitter.
It's a role that has fit him exceptionally well. He's established himself as the Seminoles' clean-up hitter and he accounted for a team-high seven hits in FSU's sweep through the Tallahassee Regional last weekend.
He enters this weekend's Tallahassee Super Regional vs. UConn third on the FSU team in batting average (.325), RBI (61) and runs (67) as well as fourth in home runs (13).
"It's been a dream come true. It's been the best year of my life..." Dinges said. "(My illness) gave me a lot of motivation, a lot of appreciation for the game for sure. You show up thankful to be at practice every day, you show up thankful to be in front of a great group of guys and very thankful to just play the sport, obviously. Because you never knew or at least I didn't know if tomorrow I would wake up. It was a pretty severe illness, but I'm very blessed to be where I'm at right now and play with a great team."
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