Written by Mike Kays

Photo by NickStan Photography

No matter the sport, Haskell’s Brannon Westmoreland is a guy Haymaker fans have become quite familiar with as a star of the show. And it’s not just because at 6-foot-5 he towers above teammates in that regard.
This past fall, his throwing the football netted 1,793 yards of real estate. In basketball, his accuracy at the net resulted in an 18-point per-game average with eight rebounds per contest.
Now it’s spring, and its back to the baseball diamond where last spring, he was 10-0 with 114 strikeouts, an 0.64 ERA and led the Haymakers at the plate with a .458 batting average — on a team that reached the regional finals in Class 2A.
It was between his sophomore and junior years that as many talents as the now-senior had in athletics, baseball became his burning passion.
“I was our team’s No. 1 pitcher my sophomore year and it was then, going into my junior year, that I began to develop some stuff on the mound,” he said. “I was throwing harder, my off-speed pitches were getting better. Up until then I was kind of divided between football and baseball.”

And all the while throwing a football and shooting the basketball, he was throwing and catching the smaller roundball.  Of course, that also came amid practicing the current season’s craft, be it whatever it was.
No wonder the three things Brannon says identifies him are what they are — hard work, discipline and dedication. The work ethic for that, he credits to his parents, Brad and Amy.
“They always push me to be my best and work hard,” he said.
Earlier this school year, Westmoreland signed to further his baseball days at Connors State after finishing his final season as a Haymaker this spring.
But before heading to Warner there’s some unfinished business.
“Getting to the state tournament is something we as a team have been talking about since the start of practice,” Westmoreland said, his team coming off a 25-5 campaign in 2022.  “My freshman year the season was canceled due to COVID, and my sophomore year we were right there (the semifinal round of regionals) and then got to the regional finals last year but lost twice in the finals. We all are focused on getting beyond that this year.”