Ben Madison
A 2015 graduate of Bauxite High School, Ben Madison was a multi-sport athlete that excelled in Baseball, Basketball, Football, and Track.
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As a member of the Track team, Madison received All-Conference honors in both his sophomore and junior years.
As a Basketball player, Madison was selected as the Conference player of the year as a Junior. He received All-Conference and All-State honors in both his junior and senior seasons and had 1,426 total career points.
Ben was just as skilled on the football field where he was selected All-Conference and All-State in his junior and senior seasons.
While Madison was a standout in all sports, it was baseball that would become his chosen path to future success. While over the course of his sophomore, junior, and senior seasons at Bauxite, Ben would compile some impressive career stats.
In 57 games played, he had 172 career at bats with 69 hits, 25 doubles, 3 triples, 1 home run, 36 RBI’s, 45 stolen bases, 60 runs scored, and had a career batting average of .401.
Madison was very adept at playing in the field, which is evident by his .834 career fielding percentage, however, pitching would be his true calling. With an 88 MPH fast ball, and 4 different off-speed pitches, he certainly kept opposing batters second guessing what would be thrown their way next. Coach Michael Mattox said that Ben’s knuckleball was one of the best he had seen.
Pitching 95 career innings, he faced 422 batters, allowing only 54 hits, 34 earned runs, 48 walks, and 155 strike outs. His ERA was 2.50, and opponents’ batting average with Ben on the mound was .154.
Madison received All-Conference honors in both his junior and senior seasons and was named an All-State player as a senior. Madison played in both the Central Arkansas All Star game, and in the AAA All Star Game.
Following his graduation from Bauxite, Ben played baseball in 2016 as a freshman at Crowder College in Missouri. While at Crowder Madison appeared in 16 games with 7 starts. He finished the season having pitched 57.2 innings with an ERA of 3.59, recording 75 strikeouts, 34 walks, earning 2 saves, and pitching 2 complete games.
In 2017 Ben returned to the state of Arkansas and played as a sophomore at Central Baptist College in Conway. While playing for CBC He was the American Midwest Conference (or AMC) Newcomer of the Year. He was selected as First-team All-AMC as both a pitcher and outfielder. He finished the season having played in 55 games with a .278 batting average, 21 runs scored, four doubles, two triples, one home run, 10 RBI’s and 8 stolen bases.
Ben also appeared in 15 games on the mound that season, 14 of those as the starting pitcher. He set a CBC school record with 129 strikeouts in a single season which led the AMC and was tied for the best among all other NAIA teams.
He also set a single-game school record for strikeouts with 18 against Lyon College. In a victory over Williams Baptist College, Madison pitched a complete game two-hitter, with 10 strikeouts. He also pitched a no-hitter and struck out 16 batters in a victory over Martin Methodist College. Ben finished the 2017 regular season with a 6-4 record, and an ERA of 3.71 allowing 33 earned runs in 80 innings with 64 hits allowed and 40 walks.
In 2018 Madison played his Junior season at Central Baptist College and continued his history making ways. That year He led the nation and set a new CBC school record of 172 single-season strikeouts, exceeding his own mark of 129 from the previous season.
He finished the 2018 season leading the Mustangs in wins (6), ERA (2.70), and opponent’s batting average (.176). For his efforts that season Ben was named the co-pitcher of the year in the American Midwest Conference, was an AMC first-team selection, was named the NCCAA Central Region pitcher of the year and was an Honorable mention All-American in the NAIA.
In June of 2018 Ben Madison became the first Central Baptist College Mustang to be taken in the Major League Baseball draft. Madison was drafted in the 9th round, as the 256th overall pick, by the San Francisco Giants.
In 2019 there was a ceremony held in Bauxite’s Dawson gym to celebrate and commemorate these many accomplishments by one of the greatest athletes to have ever worn a Bauxite Miner uniform and Ben Madison’s number 23 Baseball jersey was retired.
Return to 2025 Bauxite Hall of Fame Main Page:
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