CLEVELAND – The Mid-American announced its specialty award winners and All-Conference Baseball Teams on Wednesday, with Western Michigan graduate student shortstop Michael Maloney being voted the MAC co-Defensive Player of the Year. WMU tied for the most First Team selections with four, the program's most First Team honorees since 1995. Maloney was joined by center fielder Tanner Mally, starting pitcher Ricky Kidd and relief pitcher Turner Doran on the All-MAC First Team. Additionally, Maloney and Mally were selected to the league's All-Defensive Team.
 
The first player in program history to earn Defensive Player of the Year honors, Maloney has been one of the anchors of a Western Michigan defense which has ranked among the nation's best this season. The Broncos lead the league and rank 24th in NCAA Division I with a .979 fielding percentage, and fielded at a conference-best .982 clip in MAC play, while playing more than half of their games on natural surfaces. Maloney posted a .977 fielding percentage, ranked seventh in the MAC in assists and helped the Brown and Gold turn 21 double plays. In conference action, he upped his fielding percentage to .983, again ranking seventh in assists.
 
Maloney has also been a key cog in Western Michigan's offense this season. The graduate student is hitting .357, the ninth-best mark in the conference, and his team-leading 54 RBIs are tied for sixth-most in the MAC. He's tied for the team lead with six home runs, is second on the Broncos in runs scored (47), hit by pitches (17) and on-base percentage (.460) and third on the team in both hits (66) and walks (20).
 
A Midseason All-American and a semifinalist for the Dick Howser Trophy, Mally has been leading all of NCAA Division I in batting average for more than two months, and wrapped up the regular season owning a .448 mark, the highest average for a Bronco since 1965. He also ranks second nationally in on-base percentage at .559. The junior enters the MAC Tournament atop the MAC and 19th nationally with 82 total hits, four away from tying Western Michigan's single-season record. He is also among the nation's leaders in hit by pitches (22, 24th) and runs per game (1.19, 44th) and has been the 16th-toughest hitter in the country to strike out.
 
Mally was also selected to the All-Defensive Team for the second consecutive season. Another pivotal part of WMU's league-leading defense, he owned a perfect 1.000 fielding percentage in center field and picked up a pair of outfield assists.
 
Kidd turned into an anchor in the Bronco rotation this season, posting an 8-1 record and 4.08 ERA in his team-leading 79.1 innings, the fifth-most in the conference. The right-hander has not lost since Opening Weekend against Pitt, and turned things up a notch in MAC play, going 7-0 and tying for the league lead in wins, ranking second in ERA (2.96) and third in innings pitched (67.0). Western Michigan enters the tournament having won each of his last six starts.
 
Selected to the NCBWA Stopper of the Year Midseason Watch List, Doran earned his spot with a MAC-leading 10 saves, tied for 16th nationally and for the second-most in a single season in WMU program history. His 14 career saves now rank fourth all-time at Western Michigan. The righty owns a 3.00 ERA in his 30.0 innings, and has racked up 31 strikeouts while limiting opponents to a .175 batting average.
 
The fifth-seeded Broncos begin play at the 2026 Mid-American Conference Tournament on Wednesday evening against No. 4 seed NIU. First pitch is scheduled for 6 pm on ESPN+.