The opening weekend series for the Chattanooga Lookouts has been a homecoming of sorts for the Mobile BayBears’ Zach Houchins.
Houchins spent last fall and winter working in East Ridge. He lived in the Hixson area. He also had a roommate, and she’s the reason he knows anything at all about the Chattanooga area.
“I think he really enjoyed it a lot, but he’s from Wilson, North Carolina,” wife Andie said of Zach’s hometown, which has a population a little less than a third the size of Chattanooga. “He thinks Chattanooga is huge. I think that’s funny.”
The former Andie Johnson was a key contributor as a second baseman on softball teams at Soddy-Daisy High School and Chattanooga State Community College. Her high school graduating year of 2010 was a state-championship season for the Lady Trojans. Two years later she celebrated with her Lady Tigers teammates after winning the junior college national title.
Andie had spent a year at Tennessee Tech not playing softball but then got a chance to play again by following Chattanooga State coach Beth Keylon-Randolph to East Carolina University in Greenville. Zach played at James Hunt High School in Wilson and spent two seasons playing for Louisburg College before signing with ECU’s baseball Pirates.
Zach didn’t even know she was a softball player when they first met in a Monday night class. Zach said they’ve essentially been together since talking after that first class.
“Cute girl,” he said. “She seemed to keep to herself, I don’t know. She had that vibe coming off from her. She seemed like someone who would be loyal, someone I could trust. I hit it spot on.”
The first date was to a restaurant for Mexican food – a favorite cuisine for both.
“I think we knew about a week later it was going to be pretty serious, but I don’t think I knew what I was getting into,” Andie said. “I had no idea about people getting drafted. I thought, ‘What have I gotten myself into?’ It’s been a lot of fun, though. It really has.”
Zach, primarily a prospect at third base, was picked in the 13th round of the 2014 major league draft by the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. One of Zach’s stops that first year as a professional was in Orem, Utah, playing for the Orem Owlz.
The couple had been dating about six months when Andie decided to visit him there. It wasn’t her first trip to Utah. St. George is where Chattanooga State won its national title.
Andie’s parents, Mike and Tammy, had still not met Zach at the time of Andie’s trip. But later that season she had some grandparents who were on a trip out West, and they got to meet him during an Owlz series in Helena, Mont.
Zach has been to the Angels’ spring training in Tempe, Ariz., where he got the chance to interact some with some players on the parent club. He called it “a cool experience to get to see how they go about their business.”
Coming out of this year’s spring training he got the news he was being assigned to Mobile, where he and three teammates recently secured a housing arrangement. Andie will be moving there soon.
“I’m one call away now,” Zach said of his promotion to Class AA. “If I play good enough, I could get that call at any time and go straight to Anaheim. That’s not bad. That gives you incentive.
“I’ve wanted to play major league baseball since I was 3 or 4 years old. Growing up a big Braves fan, I wanted to play for the Braves one day. Now I’m set with an opportunity. It’s not with the Braves, obviously, but that’s all right. It doesn’t matter to me. I just want to play.”
Zach had hoped the BayBears’ one trip to Chattanooga would be a little later in the season, but he’s not complaining. He’s just happy to be back in the South and closer to family. The 15 or so in the Houchins and Johnson families cheering him on this weekend at AT&T Field have been hard to miss.
Those strong families are rooted in similar games, with one in baseball and one in softball. And Zach knows he’s fortunate that Andie’s favorite – or at least second-favorite – kind of diamond has three bases, a pitching rubber and a home plate.
“We’ve been to the batting cages a few times at ECU,” Zach said. “That was fun. Not many people get to do that with their wives.”
Contact Kelley Smiddie at ksmiddie@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6653. Follow him on Twitter @KelleySmiddie.