Thad Ellis ’82 was one of the best baseball players ever to have set foot on the diamond at Washington and Lee.
Ellis was a four-year starter in the outfield and one of just four players in program history to serve as a team captain for three seasons.
Ellis played in 92 career games as a centerfielder, recording a .954 fielding percentage with eight outfield assists. At the plate, he finished with a .307 batting average, 60 runs, 41 RBI, 26 stolen bases, eight doubles, four triples and two home runs.
It was apparent from the very start that Ellis would be a mainstay for the Generals. He led the team in four major statistical categories during his rookie season, including batting average (.328), which garnered him the team’s Tommy Baker Hitting Award. He also claimed the Cap’n Dick Smith Baseball Award as the player who contributed the most to the program.
Ellis’ sophomore year would turn out to be the best of his four seasons, as he once again claimed the Tommy Baker Hitting Award. He led the team with 24 hits and batted a career-best .393 that earned him First Team All-ODAC honors, the first General ever to earn that distinction. Following the season, he pulled off another program first, being named to the American Baseball Coaches Association (ABCA) All-America Third Team. After the completion of his collegiate season, Ellis played with the Waynesboro Generals in the Shenandoah Valley Summer Baseball League.
As a junior, Ellis’ batting average slipped to .264 due to a wrist injury, but he continued to rank among the team’s most productive players, walking 18 times and knocking in 13 runs while scoring 20 more himself. He was also the team’s toughest player to strike out, doing so just four times in 72 at-bats. In the field, he had a team-best .967 fielding percentage with two outfield assists, as the Generals won 10 games, the most in his four seasons. In the summer that followed, Ellis recorded yet another program first, participating in the prestigious Cape Cod League with the Orleans Cardinals.
During his senior campaign, the Generals played an aggressive schedule and were in the hunt for an ODAC playoff bid to the very last day of the season. Ellis batted .269 and recorded career-bests in hits (25), runs (22) and RBI (17) en route to earning Second Team All-ODAC honors.
In the years that followed his playing career, Ellis has remained a loyal alumnus and ambassador for the W&L baseball program.
