Jester makes most of return to Ray Winder

Arkansas Dem/Gazette

July 25, 2001

Joe Jester has been to Ray Winder Field before.
    Growing up in Ashdown, and later as an Arkansas Razorbacks shortstop, Jester came to see the Arkansas Travelers on a few occasions.
    He made a couple of trips from southeast Arkansas as a youngster. Once in college, he came to watch J.D. Drew, back when Drew, a minor-league phenom, was with the Travs.
    None of those trips were nearly as fun as his most recent one, however. Jester, a recent addition to the Shreveport Swamp Dragons, made sure his playing debut at Ray Winder was a memorable one.
    Jester went 3 for 5 with a home run, two doubles and four RBI as Shreveport blasted the Travs 14-7 in front of a crowd of 1,284 Tuesday night.
    "I wanted to get off to a good start being back at home," Jester said. "There was a little added pressure on me coming back here."
    Jester couldn't have gotten off to a much better start, hitting the first pitch he saw from Travs starter Jeff Hundley over the left-field wall for a two-run home run in the first inning.
    In the third inning, again swinging at the first pitch, Jester hit an RBI double. His performance was capped in the seventh with another RBI double.
    Of course, Jester didn't have to get a bunch of hits to make his night perfect.
    "I watched games as a little kid and now it's kind of weird being back playing here," Jester said. "It's kind of a dream come true, I never thought I'd have a chance of playing here. But then I never thought I'd have a chance to play at Arkansas, either. Hopefully things will just keep going for me."
    Following a solid junior season in 1999 for the Razorbacks, when Jester hit .338 with 10 home runs and 59 RBI, the San Francisco Giants made him a seventh-round draft pick, No. 228 overall. Jester gave up his senior season and signed for $73,000.
    In his first season with the short-season Class A Salem-Keizer Volcanoes, Jester hit .300 in 72 games, earning him a promotion to Class A San Jose.
    With the San Jose Giants in 2000, Jester hit .263 with 8 home runs, 46 RBI and 24 stolen bases. In 81 games with San Jose this season, Jester was hitting .254 with 20 stolen bases before coming to Shreveport.
    Now hitting .344 in nine games with the Swamp Dragons, Jester would like to stay.
    "I had a blast at Arkansas, and then it was time to move on," he said. "Every game I've played in Double-A has been great."
    Not much was great for the Travs on Tuesday.
    The Swamp Dragons' first four batters got hits off Hundley, as Shreveport scored five runs in the first inning and never let up. The Swamp Dragons scored in the first seven innings and had 19 hits, 11 for extra-bases.
    Hundley (2-3) gave up 14 hits and 13 runs in 5 1/3 innings, as starting pitching continues to be a question mark for the Travs in the second half.
    "That's going to be the bottom line with everything we do," Travs Manager Mike Brumley said. "Tonight was just one of those games. I know it sounds weird, but I didn't think Hundley pitched that bad. He's going to be one of our starters down the stretch, and in the first game of a series, you can't go and just pitch every bit of your bullpen in the third inning. You hate to see a guy give up runs, but in that situation there's not a whole lot you can do."
    After all the espressos, traffic and bustle of the West Coast, there's nothing Jester wants more than "one of those games," as long as he's back in the South.
    "I've been out on the West Coast, and it's completely different than being here," Jester said. "Everything is a little more laid-back here, it's a fast-moving world there. I feel so much more comfortable here. I'm just glad to be back."

Jester rebounding from slow start

By Neal Shulenburger ­ Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
August 18, 2002

Sometimes a guy just needs a break.

At least, that's all it took to get former Arkansas Razorback Joe Jester back on track this season with the Class AA Shreveport Swamp Dragons.

Jester, a second baseman, was mired in such a slump early in the season that he found himself thinking about giving up on baseball. He wasn't hitting the ball and, worse, he wasn't fielding it very well, either.

"I started off very slow, batting around .200, but what really got to me was that I was struggling defensively," said Jester, who played high school baseball at Ashdown. "Defense had always been what I had done best, and all of the sudden I was making a lot of errors.

"When I went home [for the Texas League's mid-season break], I was thinking that if my season kept going the way it was that this might be it for me."

Jester ended up returning to Shreveport after the break, and it turned out to be a pretty good move.

His batting average has risen steadily in the second half of the season, climbing to .275. Jester has nine home runs to go along with 18 doubles and he's stolen 12 bases in 16 attempts.

Most importantly, he is enjoying baseball again.

"I think I had some big expectations at the beginning of the season," Jester said. "I was putting too much pressure on myself. I think I just needed the rest."

It's not the first time Jester has turned around a dreadful season.

Jester caught the attention of the San Francisco Giants in 1999, when he was the starting shortstop for the Razorbacks' SEC championship team. But even that season started a little shaky.

"He started out the season by making a lot of errors," said Norm DeBriyn, the former Razorbacks coach. "Then, at a team meeting, he got up in front of everyone and said, 'I'm not playing really well right now.' Then he made only three more errors the rest of that season."

Jester also led Arkansas in batting average (.338), stolen bases (35) and runs scored (89), fueling the Razorbacks' run to their only SEC title.

At the end of the season, Jester surprised many of his teammates and fans by not returning for his senior season after being taken by the Giants in the seventh round of the major league draft.

"Until very late in the season, I thought he was going to be coming back," DeBriyn said. "But by the end of the year, with the attention that the scouts were giving him, I knew he would probably go."

Jester was assigned to San Francisco's Class A team in San Jose, then was promoted to Shreveport last season.

Jester said he isn't ready to give up on baseball just yet, but he also doesn't plan on hanging around in the minors for long. He said he is about 50 credit hours away from completing his degree in criminal justice at Arkansas, and if baseball doesn't pan out he'll return to finish school.

"I'm not going to be one of those guys who spends 10 years in the minor leagues," Jester said. "Next year, I'm hoping I get to move up to AAA. In three years, I hope that I'm getting a chance at the major leagues.

"But the Giants are really slow promoting players to the major leagues. They tend to trade for the players they need. I've just got to be patient."