OF transfer Bryce Clavon on Clemson: 'Felt like I needed to go there from the start'

Clavon had offers in football and baseball out of high school and competed in the USA Baseball PDP league.

Grayson Mann · Staff Writer · Tuesday, June 10 2025

This second chance was a perfect opportunity.

For Bryce Clavon, when it came time to enter the portal, he didn't have to wait long for his journey to become very clear.

Considered to be one of the top players in the class of 2024, Clavon drew interest everywhere, including Clemson. He also shined on the gridiron, drawing interest from Oklahoma, App State, and Indiana. For the multi-sport athlete, a difficult decision on where his future home would be had options in every direction you could imagine.

Soon, it became a race between the Tigers and Bulldogs for the shot at an immensely talented prospect. When it came time for his decision, he chose the latter.

During his freshman campaign, he batted .333 (5-15) with one double, one triple, one homer, and two RBI in 27 career games. His only start of the year came against Alabama, where he assumed duties at second base, hitting his first career home run.

When it was time to enter the portal, it was likely déjà vu, with a plethora of interested schools contacting Clavon to see if he would entertain conversations.

In what was essentially round two for his recruitment, the choice was evident in his mind, as was his mission: find a spot where he could have an instant impact.

Everything seemed to work out perfectly for Clavon's recruitment in the portal, being looped into a phone call with Erik Bakich and Clavon's father.

"They were my second school coming out of high school," Clavon said. "It was between them and Georgia. Clemson came to my football games, having recruited me when I visited there. So it was always on the board. And then it just happened to work out perfect. My dad was on the phone with Coach Bakich and they added me to the call. So it was pretty cool."

Clavon decided to approach this from a different perspective, perhaps realizing that Clemson was the right place for him all along. As his phone was constantly blowing up with calls from other interested schools, he sat down with Bakich to break down the vision of what Clavon can achieve with the Tigers.

The more time he spent on campus grounds, the more he realized everything was coming together at the right time. This second chance at recruitment was his perfect opportunity.

"I kind of knew what I was getting into before the visit," Clavon told TigerNet. "I was very glad when they asked me to come back up. I already talked with a whole bunch of schools that reached out that day, but Clemson stood out specifically and said all the right things. Everything just worked out perfectly. Felt like I just needed to go there from the start, and then just worked out perfectly."

What would make an ideal match between the program and the player is if it brings the Tigers one step closer to Omaha. Clavon understands the responsibility that comes with such a goal, and is ready to put everything he has into achieving it.

He shares Bakich's sentiment that this is a program that deserves to be on college baseball's grandest stage, and now the work will soon begin to help realize that goal.

"That's a big goal," Clavon said. "One of the things that Coach Bakich brought up was how Clemson hasn't been in Omaha since 2010, and that's just a program that deserves, that works hard, that needs to be back in Omaha. So I'll do my best being a great teammate and being a good player to get Clemson back to Omaha."