PHOTO COURTESY UTRGV ATHLETICS
Karina Rodriguez | THE RIDER
Junior multidisciplinary studies major EJ Taylor is a member of the UTRGV’s Baseball Team. Taylor started his athletic collegiate career at UTRGV during the 2020 season. Before 2020, he played with Northern Oklahoma College in Enid. He had his career-best 3-for-4 with a run scored during the UTRGV vs. South Dakota State game on Feb. 28.
Q: What is your favorite sports memory?
A: “It’s got to be in 2019, when my junior college won the national championship. That was a big accomplishment for me and my teammates at that time and that was a goal we set out to do. It was just as close to a feeling to being magical.”
Q: What inspired you to start playing baseball?
A: “I played football and baseball growing up. I guess the environment I grew up in, too. I guess you can kind of put it on that and my family. My dad put the baseball bat in my hand when I was around 4 or 5, and I just kept it. It just kept going and it just grew. It just grew on me. I loved it. Ever since then I just continue to play it.”
Q: What is your favorite thing about baseball?
A: “Everything about baseball. I would say because it relates to life. It’s one of the, I think, few sports that relates to life. You are going to fail sometimes, like in life. Baseball is a game of failure. It is all about how you come across it and how you respond to it.”
Q: Who would you say is your sports model?
A: “Well, all sports in general, I would say Lebron James just because he is so consistent in what he does. I mean, he just handles everything, I feel, like in the right way. Baseballwise, I would say Matt Kemp. He is from my hometown and went to the same high school as me. He made it to the biggest stage in baseball, so I feel like that’s a goal. That is like a dream.”
Q: What is your favorite genre of music?
A: “I’m passionate about my music taste. So, I would say definitely hip-hop and rap are my favorite. The reason why that is my favorite is because I feel [that I] can relate to it. A lot of those things they say in raps and in hip-hop about, like, growing up in the city are familiar to me. I feel like they say a lot of things and they put them into metaphors. I like when someone can, like, put how I feel into music on a beat and make words rhyme. I think that is one of the best arts.”
Q: What is your favorite way to start your day?A: “Probably wake up in the morning, pray and then after I pray, I listen to music and kind of just see what I got going on for the day. I usually make, like, the schedule for the day each day. So, I pray usually every morning and put on some music.”
