After struggling as a sophomore, it appears that the McAllen native will move on from the Longhorns.
Texas Longhorns right-handed reliever Aaron Nixon entered the NCAA transfer portal on Wednesday, a source told Burnt Orange Nation and also reported by D1Baseball.com’s Kendall Rogers, days after a disappointing season ended for the season. Nixon has two years of eligibility remaining.
A McAllen product who also played shortstop in high school, Nixon made an instant impact for the Longhorns in 2021, immediately assuming the closer role and impressing with his competitiveness on the mound and his power fastball-slider combination that held opponents to a .211 batting average. Nixon finished the year with a 4-3 record, 2.12 ERA, and nine saves while striking out 35 batters in 34.0 innings over 27 appearances.
But after a solid start to the 2022 season, Nixon began to struggle with his fastball command in March during an appearance against Texas State when he walked three batters in 1.1 innings. Nixon was unable to recover his command for the rest of the season, forcing him to rely heavily on his slider and resulting in his removal from the closer role, which went unoccupied for the rest of the season. The frustrating campaign for Nixon ended with a 1-3 record, a 5.04 ERA, and five saves while walking 25 batters in 30.1 innings over 26 appearances. Opponents only hit .214 against Nixon, but the frequent walks were his undoing.
Nixon now enters the transfer portal as a reclamation project with proven upside in the midst of some upheaval in the Texas baseball program with Monday’s dismissal of head coach David Pierce’s longtime assistant Sean Allen and the possibility that volunteer assistant Troy Tulowitzki becomes the new USC head coach in the coming days.base