Bear Turned Bulldog: Garrett Madliak Is Headed to UGA
Garrett ‘Bear’ Madliak of Carrollton High School baseball has Major League Baseball dreams as he enters his senior year.
The Trojan catcher was nicknamed ‘Bear’ as a newborn because of how visible his body hair was at a young age.
“I was kind of hairy when I was born so my mom called me her little bear. I’ve been Bear ever since. Everybody calls me Bear, even my teachers.”
The 18-year old picked up baseball when he was 3.
“I played with an older team because they didn’t have tee ball where I grew up at in Douglasville. Ever since then, I fell in love with the game. My first team was called the Lugnuts and I’m still friends with the guys that was on the team.”
From that moment he knew that he wanted to play in the Majors.
When he started playing travel baseball, he noticed that he could take things far with the sport.
“When I played on my first travel ball team, we played a good competition and me and my dad realized that I was a really good baseball player. At the beginning of my sophomore year, I started getting noticed by being in front of college scouts and in showcases. I was comparing myself to a bunch of baseball players and thought that I had a good shot. Then I got a couple offers and committed to UGA but still wasn’t satisfied and made my next goal the MLB if I worked hard enough.”
He would sign on with UGA on November 11 to play baseball.
“My dream school was Mississippi State because I grew up going to their baseball camps. I loved their facilities. But they had too many coaching changes and it made me skeptical. But UGA was always my favorite college football team and I grew up in Georgia. I always was a Bulldog. I got a call from Scott Stricklin and fell in love. He gave me enough time to make me realize that UGA was where I wanted to go.”
Check out the rest of his story in Georgia April/May 2021 Magazine for FREE!
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