CORINTH -- The Denton Outlaws will do anything to reclaim the Texas Collegiate League championship -- even yoga.

The Outlaws took part in a week-long yoga seminar provided by Radius Yoga LLC last week at Lake Dallas High School, and the benefits of the program won over several Outlaws, even though they don’t look too manly doing it.

“My first impression from hearing yoga was ‘I don’t know if I really want to do this,’ because I didn’t think it would benefit me,” said Denton shortstop Thomas Field. “But after I went through it, it helped out a lot. It helped out with my flexibility and my hips, and it just helped me to relax.”

The Outlaws did 90 minutes of yoga for four days last week at the instruction of Dana Edison, who founded Radius Yoga. Edison has worked with athletes in all four major sports, and she wrote a book based on her program, Yoga Is Not One Size Fits All.

“Yoga is great for you but you shouldn’t do yoga for the sake of yoga,” Edison said. “You should do yoga for whatever you need and whatever is going on in your body.”

For baseball players, the benefits of yoga come from shoulder balance, flexibility and injury prevention. Outlaws head coach Derek Matlock has seen the benefits of yoga in his athletes from the Outlaws, as well as high school football players he’s coached and from his days coaching at Texas Christian University.

“It helps with shoulder stability and flexibility,” Matlock said. “It just makes you a better athlete. There’s no way around it. They did it last year and the kids really liked it so that’s why we did it again. It works a lot of things that are real beneficial to baseball. The core is huge -- your abs, obliques are big. It does a real good job helping with all of that.”

While some Outlaws were iffy going into it, outfielder Jose Hernandez, who is second on the Outlaws in hitting, was eager to reap the benefits of yoga.

“I was really excited because I’m real tight in my muscles and I heard it’s really good for any athlete,” Hernandez said. “I was open-minded to it. I was excited. It’s a good experience. It’s something I’ll continue to do as an athlete. It’s something that’s good for a human’s body, especially for an athlete. It can help prevent injury.”

Edison launched Radius Yoga after becoming dissatisfied with her corporate marketing job, but her experience in marketing helped her business take off. Edison said she enjoys working with the Outlaws because they don’t have the same preconceptions as pro athletes do.

“What’s nice about the Outlaws versus the pro guys I work with, the Outlaws are more open to different things,” Edison said. “They don’t have a whole host of injuries behind them so I’m not working around somebody’s bad shoulder because they haven’t experienced that yet. Hopefully, they’ll do this stuff, and they won’t experience that.”

Outlaws first in runs, last in ERA

A quick glance at the TCL leaderboard sums up why the Outlaws have gotten off to a 4-4 start -- Denton is first in the league in runs scored and dead last in earned run average.

“That’s kind of how it was last year,” Matlock said. “We had the best hitting team. Our pitching, we haven’t put our best guys on the mound yet, so our pitching will get better every week.”

The Outlaws got a boost to their pitching staff on Monday when TCU’s Tyler Lockwood joined the team and made his first start. Denton is waiting on Rice right-hander Mike Ojala, who is still playing with the Owls in the College World Series.

Matlock not worried about Posey

University of Texas lefthander Alex Posey’s Outlaws debut went well for three innings in Thursday’s loss to Wichita Falls, but then took a drastic turn for the worst.

Posey gave up four hits to open the fourth inning, which resulted in Denton’s small lead turning into a huge deficit. He was yanked, and Antwonie Hubbard gave up a three-run home run to put the game out of reach for the Outlaws.

Still, Matlock said he isn’t worried about Posey since he has a great deal of talent and is coming off a year with Texas where he didn’t see a lot of action.

“I think he’ll be fine,” Matlock said. “He’s coming off not getting to pitch much. The more some of those guys pitch, the better they’ll get. You just can’t fall too far out of the race while you’re waiting for them to get in shape and get going.”

Draft picks staying put for now

The three remaining Outlaws who were taken in the Major League Baseball draft last week are currently still with the team.

Tyler Ladendorf, Jameson Maj and Jordan Rodgers were all selected, but have not left the Outlaws.

“So far, they’re all staying with us,” Matlock said. “Knock on wood.”

Ladendorft was drafted in the 34^th round by the San Francisco Giants. Maj was taken in the 45^th round by the St. Louis Cardinals. Rodgers was taken in the 49^th round by the Chicago Cubs.

JEFF ANDREWS can be reached at 940-566-6873. His e-mail address is jandrews@dentonrc.com.