Editor’s note: Every other week, Nevada Sports Net will spotlight a local athlete as part of our “Legendary Athletes” series, which is presented in partnership with Legends Bay Casino. Today’s featured athlete is Nevada Wolf Pack alum TJ Friedl, who just finished his sixth season in Major League Baseball with the Cincinnati Reds.

In 2021, TJ Friedl made his Major League Baseball debut.

In 2023, Friedl became the first Nevada baseball alum to receive an MVP vote.

And in 2025, Friedl was one of the best players on a team that reached the postseason, ranking second among Cincinnati Reds position players in WAR.

But all of those feats were only possible because of 2015. And during that 2015 season, Friedl took a total of zero at-bats playing for the Nevada Wolf Pack.

Friedl was originally a walk-on at Nevada thanks to a tip Wolf Pack head coach Jay Johnson received from ex-Nevada coaches Gary Powers and Buddy Gouldsmith. The Pleasanton, Calif., native was mostly used as a pinch runner during his true freshman season in 2014, taking only 38 at-bats and smacking eight hits with an underwhelming .480 OPS. Entering his sophomore season, Johnson told Friedl he’d be redshirting.

The move was both a smack in the face and a wake-up call. Friedl knew Nevada’s outfield was loaded, that 2015 team including two future major-league outfielders in Trenton Brooks and Cal Stevenson in addition to one of the best hitters in school history, Kewby Meyer. That didn’t leave much playing time for Friedl, who knew 2015 would be a make-or-break season even if he wasn’t an active player that year.

“I knew if I wanted to play on this team, I had to get better,” Friedl said. “I didn’t want to leave school. I enjoyed my time in Reno so much that I did not want to go back home. I didn’t want to try and go to community college. I wanted to stay in Reno because I loved the city, I loved that place and I loved the college community that was built around Reno. And I loved my friends.”

So, Friedl went to work with some of those friends with the goal of one day being good enough to play a large role for Nevada. His two main workout buddies were Mark Nowaczewski, who was rehabbing after Tommy John surgery, and Cooper Powell, who also was getting the redshirt treatment.

“We were in the gym every day working out, getting better,” Friedl said. “We were there in the dugout with the team, and I took a lot of pride in coming back the next year when Jay left and TJ Bruce came in. But that fall, I felt confident in all the work I put in. So, when TJ Bruce came in that fall, for me, it’s, like, ‘Hey, let me show him what I can do. Let me show him what I’m capable of.’ And he had enough confidence in me to put me on scholarship for the first time in my collegiate career.”

As a redshirt sophomore in 2016, Friedl saw the hard work pay off. The center fielder hit .401 with 21 extra-base hits, 13 steals and a 1.057 OPS, mixing some pop with a great batting eye (he walked 32 times against just 26 strikeouts). As Nevada prepared for the Mountain West Tournament that season, Friedl got a glimpse into his future, one that was coming faster than he knew.

Friedl’s roommates that year — Brooks, Novacheski, Powell and Evan McMahon — were busy filling out draft questionnaires from MLB scouts that season. Friedl hadn’t been sent a single one. Per MLB rules, players were only eligible for the draft after three college seasons. Since Friedl redshirted a year and was listed as a sophomore, he assumed he wasn’t draft eligible yet. But right before the conference tournament that year, Friedl got a call from an unknown number.

“I never talked to a scout ever, I never did a questionnaire, I never did any of that and then I get a call from a random number and I answered it,” Friedl said. “He was, like, ‘Hey, I know the draft’s coming up. What would you say to us drafting you this year?’ And I literally told this guy, ‘Oh, that’d be sweet, but I’m not draft eligible.’ So, here I am telling this MLB scout that I can’t be drafted. And he’s, like, ‘Yeah, you can. You can be drafted.'”

Still, the draft came and went and Friedl’s name didn’t get called, with few MLB teams knowing he was eligible. A couple of weeks after the draft, Friedl was invited to Team USA camp, making that 24-player college roster via tryouts, which earned him a trip to Chinese Taipei, Japan and Cuba. His play in those trials opened the eyes of MLB scouts, which dove deeper into Friedl’s draft eligibility. A bidding war ensued with Friedl talking to all 30 MLB teams and signing a $735,000 deal with the Reds, the largest undrafted free-agent deal ever for a U.S. player.

That signing bonus has paid off for the Reds with Friedl becoming one of the team’s best players. The 30-year-old had a breakout 2023 season, hitting .279 with 18 homers, 27 steals and a .819 OPS to earn an MVP vote. After an injury-plagued 2024 limited him to 85 games, Friedl rebounded in 2025 by playing a career-best 152 contests, hitting .261 with 14 dingers, 12 steals and a .742 OPS. The season was capped with the Reds making the playoffs on the last day of the regular season where it faced the eventual World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers in the wildcard round, falling 2-0.

Friedl said appearing in his first postseason game — he led off in both contests — was a special experience.

“It was fantastic,” Friedl said. “You go through 162 games and that’s what you play for. You play to pop champagne and the clubhouse celebration. That was my first time getting to experience that at the big-league level. It’s definitely a feeling that I’m gonna be chasing for the rest of my career. A lot of us in our clubhouse and our team, we haven’t gotten to experience the playoffs. A lot of us came up through the Reds organization and are young.

“Now that we’ve had that feeling, we’ve had the taste, we unfortunately went to the playoffs and lost the first two games and didn’t get a lot of experience in the playoffs, but it’s something that you’re gonna strive toward year over year. Now you know what it feels like, you get to play in that playoff atmosphere and that’s something that we’re gonna continue to work toward.”

Friedl is currently enjoying the winter in Las Vegas, where he, his wife and two kids spend the offseason. Friedl still hangs out with many of his Wolf Pack teammates, some of whom also live in Las Vegas. Friedl is using the next few weeks to recharge for the long season ahead as Cincinnati looks to build upon last year’s success.

“For me, it’s a lot about being present,” Friedl said of enjoying family time. “That’s kinda a big word for me that I’ve held myself accountable to for the past couple offseasons is cherishing my time to get to be at home with the kids, feeding our son late at night, burping him at 3 a.m., all the stuff that my wife does during the season. She’s Wonder Woman for everything that she does during the season to allow me to have the freedom and the peace of mind to go play every day. I take pride in coming home in the offseason and being the one to do that.”

Friedl met his wife, Dressa, at Nevada when both were attending school. He followed a friend to a suicide prevention booth on campus, which is where she was sitting. Things blossomed from there with the two building a life together over the last 10 years. And it was 10 years ago when Friedl was told by Nevada he wasn’t quite good enough to play on that team and would be redshirting. Hard work earned him not only a spot on the Wolf Pack but a spot in the big leagues.

“When we first started dating was the fall of 2015 when I was first told I was redshirting,” Friedl said. “I was gonna be a finance major in Reno and go off and do something in business. Pretty frequently, we take a step back and look at the life that we built together and kinda look where we are. She asks me or I ask her, ‘Did you ever think we’d be here in 2015 when we were college kids and didn’t know what was ahead of us?’ And it’s emotional for me and her because if you asked me in 2015 when I was told to redshirt, at that point I was, like, ‘Hey, I’m gonna work hard to make the team and stuff,’ but I didn’t know what the future held. It was just an incredible blessing for me, and I’m so grateful for every opportunity.”

You can watch the full interview with TJ Friedl below.