Chicken wrangler, Arizona softball prospect Brooke Mannon looks to build off historic early performance

Big Bird and Broken Toe were just a few of the names out of approximately 20 of her chickens over the years that she was able to tell apart from one another. Mannon’s responsibility for the chickens included feeding them, giving them water, and being sure to both let them out every morning and lock them up at night.

When asked if there were any similarities between her chickens' daily routine and when she heads out to the field to pitch, Mannon, who last Friday helped contribute to the first combined perfect game in program history had two words: “free-range.”

Arizona head coach Caitlin Lowe didn’t know about Mannon’s love for chickens during her recruiting process. Interestingly enough, however, having met with other recruits who also have chickens — that along with her sister owning chickens in Colorado — has helped Lowe in knowledge of the animal and how it plays into future recruiting of people who happen to own chickens.

“You’re chicken knowledge, it’s got to be up there for recruiting,” Lowe jokingly said.

Speaking as the Wildcats shift attention from their 5-0 start last week at the Candrea Classic to this week’s Bear Down Fiesta, Mannon said that she was surprised that she was involved in a perfect game, especially because it was her first game throwing. Nonetheless, she was thrilled about the accomplishment.

“I was excited. I was really proud of [Ali Blanchard], too,” Mannon said after the pair didn’t allow a single hit to Lipscomb in an 8-0 UA win on Feb. 9.

With a feat tough to replicate and impossible to trump statistically, Mannon believes success as a team tops trying to match her early-career record book triumph.

“Just keep winning,” Mannon said. “That’s our goal for the season. We’re really trying to be competitive.”

Recording six strikeouts in 5.1 innings last weekend in just her first weekend of collegiate action, Mannon’s play has impressed Lowe, who has seen growth from the frosh pitcher from just the short time she has been in Tucson.

“I think you can see she brings a lot of [velocity] and a lot of intensity when she’s on the mound,” Lowe said Wednesday. “I think more than anything, she’s a real competitor and she just has that walk about her when she takes the field.

“[She’s] gotten bigger, stronger since she’s been here so excited to see her grow throughout her four years here.”

While the Wildcats’ pitching staff was expecting to be seven deep, it’s now down to four — Mannon, Blanchard, sophomore Aissa Silva and transfer Miranda Stoddard; Devyn Netz and Sydney Somerndike both started the season trying to return from injury, while the program announced the day before its season opener last week that freshman Ryan Maddox would be out for the 2024 season after undergoing surgery on her right foot.

Coming to Tucson, Mannon brought a lot of velocity, but knows throwing it as hard as she can sometimes get a pitcher gassed early. Learning under new pitching coach Christian Conrad, Mannon said that she learned more about body positioning during pitches in order to throw harder for a longer duration of time. She noted that the techniques that the two have worked on for the past few months have improved her game.

At West Jefferson High School, Mannon played a number of sports, including volleyball, soccer, basketball and softball. Playing these sports have paid off physically for the Ohio native as it helped her “be an athlete” that can play more than one position on the softball field.

“I can hit. I can run. I can pitch,” Mannon said. “It keeps me on my toes.”

Lowe noted that she was not surprised by Mannon’s success in the circle this early into the season and expects her to adapt her game against stronger opponents this upcoming weekend.

Arizona (5-0) will host Long Beach State in a doubleheader on Thursday to start off the Bear Down Fiesta. The Wildcats are then slated to take on Arkansas and Omaha twice apiece over the weekend.

“For her to want the ball that badly is awesome to see,” Lowe said. “I think it’s just about how she adjusts, adapts to teams who are going to do some different things off of her and I think that’s with all freshmen, you have film after the first week and then you make adjustments and then other people make adjustments. That’s the thing about this weekend, is we play three very good teams.

But we play them all twice, so it’s really about winning the adjustment game there and who’s going to take from game one and carry it onto game two and be better.”