AUBURN | Their season came to an abrupt end more than two months ago, they were sent home to complete spring semester remotely and they’ve been forbidden from team activities since. In the last week, they’ve seen programs at Bowling Green and Furman eliminated.

It hasn’t been a good spring for college baseball players and it’s not going to get much better over the next couple of months with many summer leagues delayed or cancelled.

It puts the onus on college coaches to find original ways to continue to develop their players remotely and Auburn’s Butch Thompson has done just that thanks to an all-star list of former Auburn players and associates.

Thompson has arranged for former Auburn and MLB players Bo Jackson, Josh Donaldson and David Ross, MLB Hall of Fame pitcher John Smoltz and former Auburn coach Hal Baird to all speak to his team via teleconference.

“We’ve done everything we can to try to put our arms around these players and let them know we care,” Thompson said. “Even though we can’t physically be there playing the game or working with them right now, we’ve tried to develop their minds.

“We’ve think that by continuing to talk about the game of baseball and bringing these speakers on to engage our team, that when we do get back they’ll know even during this phase we tried to invest in their game and make them better ball players.”

Auburn finished its 2020 season 13-5, just a day before it was scheduled to open SEC play against Texas A&M March 13-15. The SEC Tournament was scheduled to conclude this weekend and the NCAA Regionals would have started next week.