With several new faces, including the head coach, comprising the Brownwood Lions baseball roster, the 2026 campaign will be a work in progress. By May, however, Chris Bright fully expects his first Brownwood squad to be competing for a playoff spot in District 6-4A.

“I’m a competitor and I don’t want to be staring from the bottom up and looking at the four that are in,” Bright said of his overall goals for 2026. “Anything less than the playoffs for me is going to be disappointing. If we play like we played Friday night (scrimmage against Harker Heights), we’ve got a serious shot at being a threat to anybody in the district. That’s big talk, but I firmly believe that we’re a good team, it’s just going to take some getting used to each other and learning each other and smoothing out some bumps. Once we do that, I think we’re going to be pretty good.”

Bright comes to Brownwood from Brazos – a member of District 24-3A – where he began his tenure in 2020. In 2023, Brazos – which is located in Wallis – was a bi-district champion and area round qualifier, and in both 2024 and 2025 Brazos reached the bi-district round of the playoffs.

Prior to his time at Brazos, Bright coached at Harker Heights High School from 2013-20 where he was the varsity baseball first assistant and head JV coach for multiple seasons.

A graduate of Waco Connally High School, Bright also attended college at the University of the Ozarks from 2002-04, where he also played baseball, before finishing his education at Tarleton State University from 2004-07.

Bright said of his coaching style, “I’m a transformational coach. Transactions don’t get desired results out of kids. I tell them I love them, I want them to know they have someone in their corner. I don’t know every kid’s story, no one knows exactly what kids go through these days, but I want to make sure when a kid goes home every day he knows someone is fighting for him. That doesn’t just stay on the field, that’s from the classroom extended. I wouldn’t say I’m easy going, I’m not afraid to get on them, but before they walk out the door they’re going to know that somebody loves them.”

The Lions are coming off a 13-18 season with a 4-6 district record in 2025 and a first-round playoff exit. Seven of Brownwood’s nine all-district selections from a year ago were lost to graduation. Returning for the Lions are Logan Flores and Robbie Robinson, both coming off injuries sustained during football season, as well as Wyatt Wolf, Daylan Ansons and Harrison Sweeney.

Brownwood hosts its own tournament to open the season this weekend with games against Perryton at 7 p.m. Thursday, Canyon West Plains and Gatesville at 5 and 7 p.m. Friday, and Midland Greenwood at 5 p.m. Saturday at Morris Southall Field.

“I didn’t know these kids from Adam when I first came in,” Bright said. “I hope that we have a little bit of a strength in pitching and defense. We’ve seen some kinks in the armor over the first couple of scrimmages, we’ve thrown strikes OK but not solid, quality strikes. Defensively we’ve made quite a few of the routine defensive plays, had some communication issues on fly balls and where you should be when the ball’s not hit to you, things that are more baseball IQ related.

“I want to see our baseball IQ grow continuously and stack good day on top of good day. I was really encouraged in our scrimmage Friday, we had really competitive at-bats all the way through from the first inning through the 10th inning. That doesn’t always mean a hit, but running up pitch counts and not watching strike threes, things like that.”

Bright is still tweaking the roster at this point in the season.

“Our pitching staff is pretty young,” Bright said. “Harrison Sweeney’s a junior, but hasn’t pitched a lot of varsity. Shaxton Simpson has been up and down with us. He looked sharp in the first scrimmage and not so sharp in the second one, but he was really good on Friday versus Harker Heights. Riggs Gray is a sophomore we haven’t seen much, he’s been in basketball. Same thing with Cannon Calvert, we’ve heard good things about both of those guys. We hope Logan Flores can come back, he was big for Lions last year, if we can get him back and healthy by district maybe he can roll for us and add some depth.”

As for the position players, Bright said, “Third base is still a competition, but that could depend on who wins catching job. Evan Escobar has looked good behind the plate, but Robbie Robinson played a lot last year. If Evan wins the job that puts Robbie at left field or first base, and it may depend on who’s pitching. When Harrison is pitching Robbie will probably be in left field and when he’s not it comes down to who’s hitting better between Robbie and Aviud Gomez. That’ll be the guy that wins the third base job.

“Wyatt Wolf and Levi Pearson can both fit in at center field. Levi can really go get a baseball, but Wyatt could be your everyday right fielder unless he’s pitching. Up the middle is some kind of combination of Calder Damron and Shakton Simpson, and neither one of those guys has seen varsity time. They’re getting better and are looking pretty good and I feel confident either can play shortstop, and the other can play second base.”

The Lions open District 6-4A action March 23 at Stephenville, and by that point Bright hopes all the questions for the 2026 Brownwood squad have been answered, and any naysayers will be proven wrong.

“TexasHighSchoolBaseball.com doesn’t think very highly of us and I think that’s a feather in our cap and gives us a chip on our shoulder,” Bright said. “We can be a good baseball team. We have a long way to go and a lot of growth that’s needed, but we’ve grown a lot in our scrimmages and I expect to take more steps forward. And if we grow every week, grow every game, there’s no reason why this team can’t be a 2, 3, or 4 seed, and if we’re lucky win us a game that puts us in contention to win a district championship.”

***

Brownwood Lions 2026

Varsity Baseball Schedule

F19	Perryton	7 p.m.
F20	Canyon West Plains	5 p.m.
F20	Gatesville	7 p.m.
F21	Midland Greenwood	5 p.m.
F26-28	at Killeen tournament	TBA
M5-7	at Abilene tournament	TBA
M12	at San Angelo Central (DH)	4:30 p.m.
M17	Gatesville	7 p.m.
M21	at Abilene High	Noon
M23	Stephenville *	7 p.m.
M27	at Stephenville *	7 p.m.
M28	Abilene Cooper	1 p.m.
M31	at Graham *	7 p.m.
A3	Graham *	7 p.m.
A7	Brock *	7 p.m.
A10	at Brock *	7 p.m.
A14	Glen Rose *	7 p.m.
A17	at Glen Rose *	7 p.m.
A21	Mineral Wells * 7 p.m.	7 p.m.
A24	at Mineral Wells *	7 p.m.

* District 6-4A Game