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Hookem2147

Burnt Ends
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Everything posted by Hookem2147

  1. I'd let Chamberlain catch these last 2 games and also give Rodriguez the rest of the weekend off. Those guys have taken a beating. Both can be back in the lineup in Hoover, but deserve a small break.
  2. Weiner turning Grayson Saunier into a serviceable pitcher might be the most underrated storyline of the season
  3. Forgot to say this before the series that OU’s baseball field is a total dump. Might be the worst facility in the SEC. Close race between them and Missouri. Softball being the #2 sport at that school blows my mind. The baseball team literally played for the national title 3 years ago.
  4. The SEC champ is getting the #1 or #2 overall seed at worst regardless of what happens the rest of the way.
  5. Hitting being contagious goes both ways.
  6. Our speciality skill this year is catching elite pitchers coming off one of their worst starts. Happened with Kade Anderson, Root and now Witherspoon. Guys like that rarely have two stinkers in a row.
  7. Kade Bing throws more balls in the dirt than any player in history
  8. Going to be funny when we do all this early swinging in the count to please the “don’t take pitches” crowd and Witherspoon goes 8 innings
  9. The hope is that Mendoza will be able to play the field at some point this weekend. We will see if that is tonight.
  10. We are playing in the Houston tournament the third week of the season. We are supposed to open the season at San Diego in 2026 to return the trip they made here in 2024, although I don't think Schloss is thrilled he inherited that series and may be looking for a way to get out of it.
  11. There could be some strategy involved in just throwing a wildcard against Witherspoon tomorrow in a game you know you are facing an uphill battle in, then lining up Ruger and Luke against their #2 and #3 arms.
  12. The only thing that gives me pause about Saunier is he is still giving up a lot of free passes (7 in his last 8.2 innings across 3 appearances). There really isn’t great options or answers. Ruger’s last two outings have been ass but he has been our guy all year so at some level you have to just trust he will get back on the horse. He has a track record. I am just really against jerking around established guys (Harrison, Volantis, Grubbs, Burns) into different roles this late in the year. I think the bottom line is this is the last week you need a true rotation so pressing the panic button won’t do much. Luke Harrison could be pitching the opening regional game against a dangerous 4 seed or we could be throwing Kade Bing against the SWAC champion.
  13. I really doubt they are bumping Harrison up 2 full days this late in the season. This is the last week of a real rotation anyway then you do whatever you want to set your pitching up for a regional depending on matchups.
  14. My wild ass prediction is Grayson Saunier is going to start the third game this week. Keeps Grubbs in the bullpen and allows Flores to go back to the bullpen, where he has looked more comfortable.
  15. Interesting to look back at A&M last year and how it is sort of a similar ride that we are on: -Started SEC play 15-6 and 39-6 overall, became #1 the same exact week that we became #1 this year -Lost 2 series in a row in May, on the road at LSU and to an awful Ole Miss team -Won their final series of the year at home against Arkansas -2 and BBQ in the SEC tournament -#3 national seed
  16. ARod is playing with one hand and is not any better than Borba defensively. There is no point in DH'ing Tommy Farmer in my mind. His biggest value add at this point is defense.
  17. He came to Texas as a walk on so the fact he has even a starter as a sophomore is a credit to him but yeah, there are a lot of times it doesn’t look pretty. For someone as physically put together as he is, he rarely seems to hit the ball with authority. He is one of the prime examples of guys playing right now who you probably don’t see on most other SEC teams around the top of the standings.
  18. As bad as Gasparino has been at the plate, his defense in CF has remained very good and we saw what it looked like with someone other than him out there on Sunday. My guess is Farmer heads to the bench when Belyeu is back. It would also be nice if Mendoza came back soon so we can slide Rodriguez back to the DH role.
  19. I think the hay is in the barn in terms of regional matchups, regardless of whether we are the #1 overall seed or the #6 overall seed. Of course a potential super regional matchup could improve with a solid finish. You can bet the committee is already finding a way to try to get TCU penciled in as our 2-seed for the storylines. If not them, it will be UTSA or DBU with a team like UTRGV as the 3. I don't think the finish to the season is changing that, considering they always try to regionalize these matchups.
  20. I truly think the taking the first thing has taken on a life of its own. A lot of people are so fixated on it now that it feels like it is happening more than it actually is. As evidenced by the data above, we are not actually taking every first pitch and the opposing team really isn't humming in first pitch strikes at that great of a rate compared to the norm (which I assume is right around 50% or below at the college level). Of course, there will always be outliers (Friday, game 1 against Arkansas, etc) I don't think the offensive approach has anything to do with Flores swinging at balls at his neck level or Gasparino chasing balls in the other batters box. Probably not a coincidence that some of our most successful hitters approach-wise (Mendoza, Rodriguez, Williams) are all new to the program. This is the only approach they've known, whereas the guys from last year's team are trying to move off approaches that had them flying out to CF 3 times a game against 88 MPH fastballs from Baylor and A&M Corpus Christi. No one seemed to have problems with this approach when we were running up pitch counts and scoring runs against LSU and Georgia and Auburn. Just have to get back to that middle ground between aggressive and passive. We had it figured out for a while.
  21. Just did the math for the weekend: Friday- watched first pitch in 37 of 39 plate appearances, strike percentage on those takes: 72% Saturday- watched first pitch on 28 of 36 plate appearances, strike percentage on those takes: 50% Sunday- watched first pitch in 33 of 38 plate appearances, strike percentage on those takes: 42%
  22. My guess is in the postseason Flores will be used as an opener for Grubbs or Saunier.
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