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torre

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Posts posted by torre

  1. 1 hour ago, msudawg said:

     

     

    Now the great unknown. 

    The new head coach that will be named is Indiana's Chris Lemonis.  Who is 137–87–2 in 4 years, Has never made the CWS or Super regionals, Never won a conference title or tournament. His claim to fame is he helped McDonnell take Louisville to the CSW 3 times in 8 years.  

    Our hitting coach Jake Gautreau will stay on though. Unknown who the pitching coach will be...

    if we hire an excellent pitching coach, we can possibly make another run to Omaha based on the talent returning.

     

    Oh. and Go Oregon State. screw van horn and the hogs.  

     

    😊   You once said it was just a matter of Schlossnagle getting on the plane.   😊   j/k,  Respect your comments !

    Why not Gary Henderson ?   Magnificient job from an outsider's view.   Any idea how the player's feel  ?

    Need to watch rooting for Oregon St,  you may get removed from the SEC Frat.    :)

  2. 3 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

    Or Texas.  He looked worn out against Tech, too.

    I thought the same.   The question always arises on how much the draft effects a player's performance and mental concentration.   Van Horn noted in a pregame interview that Singer did not appear to have his normal command and sharp breaking ball against Tech. 

    Checking Florida's stats,  Singer  threw 108 innings  prior to last night.   About average for a Friday night guy (Kingham/100, Knight/Ark/106)

    Forgot to mention in earlier post,   Tech had a great season considering they lost their ace Gingery to tj surgery before the season.   Very few teams could overcome that loss and advance to the final 6 of the CWS.

    • Like 3
  3. Watching the game and checking Florida's roster,   the pitcher (Leftwich) and catcher (Smith) are graduates of TNXL Baseball Academy in Florida,  an interesting/debatable concept to say the least...

     

     

    It doesn’t look much like a high school, located on the back row of an industrial park.

    You have to wind past dumpsters, idling 18-wheelers and look hard for anything that differentiates it from the moving companies, appliance warehouses and furniture manufacturers.

    At the end of the parking lot, a sign leans against a wall — “TNXL Baseball Academy.”

    Welcome to Baseball High School.

    “It’s the best education we can get,” Ryan Dease said.

    It’s a late morning in May, and normally the UCF commit would have been sitting in a biology or history class at Lyman High. But a combination of technology, ambition and entrepreneurship is turning normal on its head.

    Instead of going to Lyman or Dr. Phillips or Edgewater, some of Central Florida’s top baseball players take all their courses online through Florida Virtual School.

    That allows them to show up at TNXL and work for hours on their favorite subject. It also means some of the area’s best talent is no longer available for brick-and-mortar schools.

    Instead of competing in the state playoffs right now, those players are sweating, lifting and swinging away in a big one-room schoolhouse in Altamonte Springs.

    “Baseball is a skill sport,” said TNXL owner Brian Martinez. “If you’re not working on your craft a lot, it’s not benefiting you if you want to play at the next level.”

    The next level is where TNXL gets its name. The academy strips away any pretense that sports are merely extracurricular activities, even on the high-school level.

    They are a means to an end, be it a college scholarship or a professional contract. That also makes TNXL a means to a beginning.

    “A lot of kids go to college and they’re not ready,” said pitcher Jack Leftwich, who’s signed with Florida. “I want to be ready my freshman year and step right in.”

    Martinez came up with the idea three years ago. He had been a coach with the Orlando Scorpions, an elite travel team.

    The Scorpions were basically an offseason program for high schoolers. They’d play all summer and return to the usual academic routine in the fall.

    One day while waiting for players to show up for after-school training, a light bulb went off in Martinez’s head.

    “Man, it’d be really neat if we could get the kids earlier,” he thought.

    That would have been impossible before the internet. Now students can take all their courses online, meaning they can tailor their class schedule around work or other commitments.

    For TNXL students, baseball is basically a full-time job.

    Leftwich has been at it for two years. He played for Winter Park High and the Scorpions, and then Martinez came up with the TNXL concept.

    Enrollment costs vary, but they’re more than $500 a month per student. That’s cheap compared to many private schools, but those schools aren’t solely devoted to manufacturing baseball players.

    “My parents were a little skeptical at first, but they realized baseball is what I want to do,” Leftwich said. “They committed to helping me if I committed to helping myself.”

    He was committed enough to graduate from Virtual School last fall, six months before he would have at Winter Park. TNXL students knock out their daily academic work by mid-morning and head to the warehouse. If they don’t keep up their school work, they can’t participate in TNXL activities.

    “It’s good discipline,” said Dease, a 6-foot-4 pitcher. “It teaches you the next level at college, where you’re not going to have somebody there to baby you.”

    Players get hours of pitching, hitting and training guidance every day. What they don’t get is a chance to display those skills in the traditional high-school setting.

    Athletes who utilize Virtual School or are home-schooled usually play for neighborhood schools (see: Tim Tebow and Nease High). TNXL has its own team, the TNXL Academy Ducks, which plays outside the Florida High School Athletic Association.

    As an independent, it plays fall and spring schedules against junior colleges, Division 2 colleges and high schools. The Ducks went 28-4 in their inaugural 2016 season and finished 30-2 this year.

    Their version of the playoffs was last month’s Perfect Game championship in Emerson, Ga., against 24 other baseball academies. The Ducks went 6-0 and outscored opponents 60-3.

    How would they fare against top prep teams?

    Martinez smiles at the thought, but he can’t really say. The Ducks have had trouble scheduling local schools, many of which have had potential stars siphoned away.

    The rise of TNXL is a touchy subject. Four of the area’s more successful high school coaches declined to comment for this article. Martinez said his baseball enterprise has cost him some friendships.

    “It was controversial. Some guys were very upset with us,” Martinez said. “But I’m not here to please high school coaches. I’m here to get these guys prepared.”

    The numbers say it’s working. Eighteen TNXL students have signed Division I scholarships the past two years.

    Colleges would have pursued most of those players regardless of where they played. But Leftwich said his fastball wouldn’t be as fearsome if he had kept going the traditional route.

    “I’m leaps and bounds ahead of other players,” he said.

    Such testimonials apparently carry weight. TNXL began with 14 students in 2016 and had 27 this year. Martinez thinks he’ll be able to field a varsity and junior varsity team next year.

    “At the beginning we kind of had to go after kids,” he said. “Parents wanted to see if it would be successful.”

    The rub for traditional schools is that there are only so many kids out there with 94-mile-per-hour fastballs. The more they matriculate to TNXL, the harder it will be for neighborhood schools to win titles.

    Martinez played for Dr. Phillips and said he doesn’t want to cause such collateral damage. It is just an unavoidable byproduct of a growing business.

    “I’m just trying to be cutting edge,” he said.

    The basis of the TNXL business model is that, unlike traditional schools, nobody is forced to enroll. Students know what the cutting edge entails and are eager to participate.

    That is how they can complete a full day of academics by mid-morning and head to a warehouse to engage in a not-so-extracurricular activity.

    “We have it all here,” Dease said. “We come in and everyone is smiling and having a good time. It’s the best atmosphere you can have.”

    TNXL Academy does lack a few things traditional high schools can offer. There are no yearbooks to pass around this time of year or class rings to wear. Nobody is asking a classmate to the prom, if there were one.

    And there will be no formal graduation ceremony. What students will leave with is an advanced degree in baseball.

    That’s more than enough to make them true to their school.

    “I have no regrets,” Leftwich said. “In the long run this is the best thing for my career. It was the best choice of my life.”

    http://www.orlandosentinel.com/sports/os-sp-tnxl-baseball-0521-story.html

     

     

  4. On 6/15/2018 at 5:08 PM, RiceOwl said:

    Very happy! UT opens @Rice next year so he’ll get a second shot at them (albeit with lower stakes).

    This is probably correct.   We owe them a weekend visit since they were here in '17.

    '17 was a 4 game series (DH Sat).     

  5. 1 hour ago, Lobo said:

    To be fair, Brandon Belt was not a lethal college hitter.  He is off to a great pro career, but he really wasn't that great of a hitter in college.  But I miss him.  Like my right testicle.  

    Brandon did not star in any Mel Gibson movies,  but not too shabby.    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandon_Belt

    Belt batted .319 with six home runs and a team-high 65 RBI while also pitching in 16 games as a reliever.[3] As a junior, Belt transitioned to first base due to shoulder problems.[1] In 2009, during his junior season, Belt batted .323 in 63 games (76-for-235) with eight home runs, 43 RBI, and 15 stolen bases, while recording a .989 fielding percentage as part of the Texas team that finished as runners-up in the College World Series.[3]

  6. Henley to start.

     

    “It’s not that intimidating,” said UT sophomore pitcher Blair Henley, who’ll start on Tuesday. “Obviously, intimidation comes from winning and every team that wins is intimidating. We’re going to go out there and treat them like any other team. We’ll see how it goes.”

    https://www.hookem.com/story/with-its-season-on-the-line-texas-looks-to-end-florida-reign-in-college-baseball/

     

     

     

     

  7. On ‎6‎/‎16‎/‎2018 at 10:44 AM, Js1 said:

    Perhaps Ericksen was a target and did not interview well in ref to Bohl's tweet.

    Cat is a "must" on the staff imo.   Not only for pitching expertise/recruiting, but  to garner fan support.   As someone who regularly attends games,  fan support has significantly decreased.   The crowds seen on TV are mostly youth teams, their families, and coaches which is great.    But they are there on a one game promotion and not regular fans.

    Clark resigned 23 May.  The opening was not posted until 5 June a delay of 12 days maybe in deference to the WCWS and to show respect to Walton or one of the other coaches.  Hopefully,  candidates were informally contacted/vetted soon after 23 May.     But it does appear the search is not going well though the earliest an announcement could have been made was the 15th (correct ?) 

    Can't wait for the press conference.   "Coach ___ was at the top of our list,  yada, yada, yada"    😊

     

  8. For the Giants' Fans.

     

    LOS ANGELES - Brandon Belt's doctors botched one part of his appendectomy. He wanted to keep his appendix as a souvenir, but they tossed it.

    "Someone messed up on that one," Belt said Friday, two weeks after he was removed from a game at AT&T Park and taken to the hospital for a midnight operation.

    Belt will beat his original three-week prognosis by plenty. Manager Bruce Bochy said the Giants probably will activate him Saturday. They might have done it for Friday night’s series opener against the Dodgers had they not felt the need to bolster the bullpen after it pitched 16 innings in the four games at Miami.

     

    Instead, the Giants promoted reliever Pierce Johnson from Triple-A, giving them 14 pitchers for one game. Evan Longoria, who will see the hand surgeon Saturday, was placed on the disabled list.

     

    Belt was cleared to play earlier this week and got five at-bats Thursday in a minor-league camp game in Scottsdale, Ariz., facing only right-handed pitchers because he did not want a feverous young lefty conking him in the head.

    "I told them a few days I ago I wanted to play this weekend," said Belt, who wanted no part of any minor-league rehab games. "I feel easily good enough to play baseball now. No hesitation."

    Belt finally got to explain what happened June 1, when he started a game against the Phillies at AT&T Park.

    Belt started feeling discomfort the day before, an off day, enough to keep him from going to Game 1 of the NBA Finals in Oakland. When he got to the ballpark the next day he reported a "grabbing" sensation to team doctors, who told him it was in the appendix region.

     

    "They said, "If it gets worse, we'll take you to the hospital,'" Belt said. "It got worse."

     

    Belt struck out in his lone at-bat and was gone after two innings.

    A few hours later, doctors performed the laparoscopic procedure. Belt was still well-medicated at about 4 a.m. when he tweeted a photo of himself lying in a gurney in the hospital hallway before the surgery, which his wife took and sent to him.

    In the background is a whiteboard with the operating-room scheduling, including the names of patients and what surgeries they were having.

    "If I get sued," Belt said, smiling, "you'll know why."

    Briefly: Jeff Samardzija (shoulder tightness) threw 43 pitches, allowed one hit and no walks, and struck out four for Triple-A Sacramento in his first rehab start, at Round Rock, Texas. ... Johnny Cueto (elbow inflammation) threw his second bullpen session. The staff will huddle to decide the next step, possibly throwing to Giants hitters.

    https://www.mysanantonio.com/giants/article/Giants-Brandon-Belt-likely-to-be-activated-12999188.php

  9. 6 minutes ago, Tony Soprano said:

    Seems like a really good guy. Great hire for Rice. I wish him and the Owls well.

    This !

    Key will be hiring the staff.    Impressed with his media interviews at the SR.    He knows and respects the game. 

  10. Words from Gus.    Gus fails to mention he probably would like to see the team take more pitches.  😊   (for you young guys,  Gus' teams were known to take pitches as Augie's were for bunting) 

     

    The diet’s changed.

    He no longer downs a big bowl of Blue Bell homemade vanilla ice cream at night any more. Quit that two or three years back, he guesses. He jokes now that the Texas creamery “probably had to shut down some” as a result of his cutbacks.

    His peanut butter jelly sandwiches remain a daily staple, however, although he’s swapped grape jam for the ubiquitous honey he consumed every day at lunch for decades.

    And he has difficulty walking, too, which explains why he hasn’t been to UFCU Disch-Falk Field since February’s alumni game.

    But Coach Gus still follows Texas baseball.

    Passionately.

    Daily.

    And devoutly.

    That hasn’t changed even though Cliff Gustafson, now 87, has been retired for more than two decades as the once winningest baseball coach in Division I history with 1,466 wins. The late Augie Garrido, who died at age 79 in March, topped Gus’ win total with 1,975 victories, and Florida State’s Mike Martin broke that mark even though the Seminoles coach has yet to capture a win on the final day of a season.

    So how intense was Texas’ 5-2 win over Tennessee Tech on Monday to clinch the NCAA super regional?

    “It was tense for me,” Gus said from his South Austin home that he shares with his wife, Ann.

    He phoned Texas coach David Pierce after the game, and the two had a nice chat. “It’s good to have him still be part of the program,” Pierce said.

    “I just told him how proud I was of him and the team and the great job they did hanging in there,” Gus said. “I told him how nervous I was, and he said, ‘You weren’t as nervous as I was.’ After they lost that first game, I didn’t think there was any way we’d beat Tennessee Tech even one game, let alone two. Holding them to one home run, that’s pretty miraculous, I tell you.”

    Gus loves watching Kody Clemens batter pitchers and remembers the time Kody’s father, Roger, pitched the national championship game for Texas in 1983. To this day, he can recall thinking about pulling Clemens in the last three innings but left him in.

    Gus went out in the ninth to lift him, but “before I got to the mound, he said, ‘I ain’t coming out. I got ‘em.”

    And he did. Gus sees the same unbending will in Kody that he saw in Roger.

    “It’s unreal how he’s hit,” Gus said of Kody, the Texas second baseman and Golden Spikes Award finalist. “It really is amazing, especially since he only hit five home runs last year. I never would have guessed he would hit 24 this year. He’s pretty strong.”

    He doesn’t see enough offense from Clemens’ teammates, however, and worries that will be the Longhorns’ Achilles heel at this year’s College World Series where Texas opens with powerful Arkansas on Sunday afternoon.

    “They’re playing pretty good, but they still can’t hit,” Gus said. “Can they win it all? No, but I’m rooting for them. I’ve seen some of these other teams play on TV. It’s just like men playing against boys.”

    He always was brutally candid. Gus has his pair of national championships from the 1975 and 1983 seasons with three runner-up finishes. Garrido won five titles, three at Cal State Fullerton and two at Texas after succeeding Gus in 1996. “Not a lot of people know I recommended him for the job,” Gus said.

    They’re the two biggest giants of the game. Oh, Rod Dedeaux could claim 11 CWS titles with USC rosters spilling over with talent. But in these parts, there are no two bigger names than Gus and Garrido.

    They have always been two of my absolute favorite coaches to ever cover. And Gustafson, the slow-walking, slower-talking native Texan who once told me his dream was to be a fast-rasping auctioneer at stock shows, was as different as he could be from Garrido, the glib, mischievous Californian who avoided the shipyards. But they changed college baseball forever.

    Gus still remembers vivid details like the time he stole LSU’s Ben McDonald’s pitches by how he held the ball in his glove before his delivery and the time Texas beat Barry Larkin’s Michigan team. The Cincinnati Reds great almost became a Longhorn before signing with Michigan “on a full hockey scholarship.” Wink, wink.

    Gus still watches every game from his recliner and mentally makes the same strategic moves he did as coach. He loved how effective starter Matteo Bocchi was and jokes that he would have left reliever Parker Joe Robinson in the game an inning longer than he did.

    His mind’s as sharp as it was the first time he caught a glimpse of Rosenblatt Stadium as a rookie college coach at Texas, fresh off seven state championships at South San Antonio High. His time as Bibb Falk’s successor started inauspiciously with three straight Southwest Conference losses. “All by one run,” Gus accurately remembers.

    But that 1968 Longhorns team won the league — one of his 22 SWC crowns — and reached Omaha, the first of a staggering 17 CWS appearances for his teams in 29 seasons. He can still remember telling NCAA officials he wouldn’t keep his team in the assigned dormitory and checked his players into a Holiday Inn. That team finished fifth, but he’d be back often.

    His first title came in his eighth year on the job when a stacked lineup and pitching-rich club in 1975 swept through the CWS. Now Pierce tries to get his first as a head coach at Omaha.

    “This time of the season,” Gus said, “that’s where you need to be.”

     

    https://www.hookem.com/columns/bohls-years-later-coach-gus-still-leans-edge-recliner-every-texas-pitch/

     

    gus1.jpg

     

    • Like 7
  11. 20 minutes ago, spystud13 said:

    This is pretty good. 

     

     

    I was told by a friend that Patrick Marsh,  bullpen catcher '13 grad, also a PE major with honors,  received a 100K bonus for signing with the same company.   Oil was much higher in '13,  don't know if Jake will be as fortunate.   

    Just  searched for Patrick on twitter.    He is still an avid Texas Baseball fan.

    https://twitter.com/pmarsh42?lang=en

  12. If anyone providing recommendations to Del Conte remembers the 2012 Super Regional against Oregon at McCombs,  Mike White will not be the guy.  I'm looking at you Plonsky.

    Not because Oregon won,  but because of White's conduct.   Continuously arguing calls and calling time very excessively to disrupt Blair Luna, calling Luna's pitches to the batter from 3rd base coaching box,  not controlling his team and staff (an assistant coach and player were ejected from the game for the player throwing a forearm to Mandy Ogle's head and the assistant arguing)  and permitting a very hostile attitude/environment.  Actually,  the umpires lost control the game which was their fault.     Softball is not played that way.  This was game 2 which we lost 5-4 in 8 innings.

    tl;dr    Mike White does not have the ethics or integrity to coach at The University of Texas.

     

     

     

     

  13. Congratulations to Parker.    "Cali Kid" does well.   Met Parker couple of years ago.   He has the personality of an attorney (meant as compliment).    :)

     

    University of Texas rower Shannon Barry and baseball player Parker Joe Robinson have been named recipients of the 2017-18 Dr. Prentice Gautt Postgraduate Scholarships, the Big 12 Conference office announced Thursday.

     

    Criteria for these awards include a cumulative grade point average of 3.2 on a 4.0 scale, participation in at least two years of intercollegiate athletics at the scholar-athlete's respective institution and completion of athletics' eligibility. The scholar-athletes also must graduate from their respective member institutions within 15 months of their selection as postgraduate scholarship recipients and are expected to enroll in graduate/professional schools within two years of graduation. Three faculty representatives, one senior woman administrator and one director of athletics form the selection panel for the awards

    Robinson plans to attend Marymount University for graduate school and pursue a law degree starting in Fall 2018. He earned his bachelor's degree in Sport Management with a Business Foundations Certificate in May.

    https://texassports.com/news/2018/6/7/baseball-barry-robinson-earn-big-12-dr-prentice-gautt-postgraduate-scholarships.aspx

    • Like 1
  14. I joked in an earlier thread the maybe Show would transfer to Texas due to her lack of PT in the SR against Florida.   This is reminiscent of the Rachel Fox transfer. 

    And also as someone astutely stated in an earlier thread, it is important to select a coach soon due to transfers and recruiting.

     

     

     

  15. Congrats to all the draftees thus far,  especially  Josh Sawyer.

    What tenacity to battle thru those injuries !   He is bright, young man (finance major) who could easily have pursued a professional career outside of baseball.

    Henley may stay depending on his personal thoughts.   He was drafted in the 22nd round from high school.

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