JERSEY CITY, NJ…New Jersey City University freshman first baseman/outfielder
JOE STEINBERGER (San Diego, CA/San Diego) has hit his fifth homerun of the season, but his latest one has nothing to do with baseball. On April 30 at NJCU’s annual ‘Celebration of Journalism’ banquet,
Steinberger became the first Gothic Knight student-athlete to be awarded the distinguished
Peter Weiss Journalism Scholarship.
Steinberger, who tied NJCU single-season baseball records this year by playing and starting in all 40 games, demonstrated his well-rounded abilities as a sports writer for NJCU’s student newspaper, “The Gothic Times.” He also wrote a bi-monthly blog for the NJCU athletics website, NJCUGothicKnights.com.
The one-time $1,000 scholarship is named in honor of Peter Weiss, the long-time nationally renowned political editor and columnist for the “The Jersey Journal” who passed away in September 2003 at the age of 60. He spent a nearly 30-year career chronicling the misdeeds of Hudson County's most crooked public servants.
The scholarship, which has been given annually for the last six years to one or two freshmen winners, is selected in conjunction with recommendations from English/Journalism faculty members Dr. Bruce Chadwick and Dr. James Broderick.
“I had a great time writing for the paper this semester and it was an honor to be awarded the scholarship,” said Steinberger. “I am excited to continue writing next year and to continue to grow as a writer. Hopefully this is just the start of things to come. I love playing baseball, but I know that once I hang up the spikes, writing will be my main focus.”
The scholarship is established by family and friends to commemorate Weiss’s work in journalism. Awarded to NJCU students who have shown an interest and expertise in journalism as a career, the winner must also possess a cumulative 2.4 grade point average, and have participated in the school newspaper or any other campus medium.
Chadwick, who was involved in the establishment of the scholarship, said: “At any given time there are four or five previous winners of this scholarship walking around campus and most are working for the school paper. This was the intention of the scholarship, so it has worked out exactly as we had planned in the beginning.”
Steinberger, who has a 3.500 GPA, was named the New Jersey Athletic Conference Rookie Player of the Week for week four of the season on March 15, and also earned New Jersey Collegiate Baseball Association (NJCBA) Division II/III Rookie of the Week accolades that week.
On the baseball diamond, Steinberger hit .301 with 43 hits in 143 at bats and a team-best 36 RBIs. He also led the Knights with 13 extra-base hits—seven doubles, two triples and four homeruns—while scoring 26 runs. He walked 10 times and was hit by four pitches for a .354 on-base percentage amd had a .462 slugging rate. He had four sacrifice flies and one steal. Defensively, he was the most consistent full-time player for the Knights, posting a .983 fielding percentage with only five errors in 287 chances.
In addition to leading the club in RBIs, extra base hits and sacrifice flies, Steinberger shared the team lead with nine multi-RBI contests, including two games with four ribbies. He had 13 multiple hit games and an eight-game hitting streak. He was second on the team in homers, triples and fielding percentage, third in doubles and total bases (66), fourth in runs, and fifth in hits. He started 24 of 40 games at first base, with 10 games in right field, five in left and one as designated hitter. Steinberger batted in every spot in the lineup except leadoff, second and cleanup. As a first baseman, he has his best fielding percentage—a .988 rate with only three errors in 258 chances.
Among the NJAC leaders thru May 4, Steinberger ranks fourth in chances (287) and putouts (262), fifth in sac flies, eighth in runners advances (18), 10th in two-out RBIs (15), 12th in RBIs and 16th in RBIs per game (0.90). He had eight two-out RBIs in NJAC play, which was ninth in the league.
On the 2009 spring trip at the Central Florida College Invitational, Steinberger hit two homeruns in a loss to St. John Fisher on March 11 and later that night had four RBIs, including an eighth-inning RBI sac fly that helped the Knights rally from a 10-3 deficit for an 11-10 upset of nationally-ranked Curry College. He had four RBIs in NJCU’s season-ending 18-18 tie at Centenary College on April 27.
—www.njcugothicknights.com—
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