Todd4State
07-04-2021, 11:51 AM
Gentlemen I think we all know that it doesn't get any better than this. All we can do at this point is win more National Titles. Hopefully we will. Here's how difficult it truly is to win one- only 30 schools have won one ALL TIME. I'm including the programs that aren't relevant anymore either like Holy Cross in that total. We all know that Arkansas and Florida State have not even though both of those schools have tremendous programs.
I think we all agree that we knew that we had a really good baseball program for years BUT..... And now that BUT doesn't exist anymore. That's SO huge for MSU not only in baseball but also as a school in general. I'm glad we are all experiencing this while we are alive.
Here's the scary thing. Lemonis doesn't even have his recruits in yet. But they're coming and they're good. And going forward we're going to be able to sell that you can come here and win a National Title as Lemonis alluded during the parade ceremony.
Foxhall is a really good pitching coach and as I have said during the season I'm not 100% sure that his style completely matched all of our pitchers on the team which is mostly due to not have all of our recruits in. See Christian MacLeoud. His style matches well with power arm guys like Landon Sims and Will Bednar. We're going to continue to see more and more of that- remember all the reports about all of our pitchers lighting up radar guns in the 95 MPH range? We didn't necessarily see that during the year because a lot of those guys were just freshmen. They'll grow and develop and we have more arms on the way. It's going to yield a lot of strikeouts- like we saw this year. Hopefully the home runs allowed will go down as we get more guys that can thrive with this style.
Defensively I was impressed with how we improved at the end of the year. To me defense has mostly for a large part been about how much work a player puts into it. Now I'm not saying that taking 200 ground balls a day will turn you into Ozzie Smith but taking as many reps as possible can make you into an at least serviceable defender. Some guys like Kam James have to find a position in college because a lot of them are shortstops in high school because they were the best athlete on the team. And that can be a little bit of an adjustment. The only way guys like Kam and Luke Hancock are able to do what they did is because they worked their tails off with our staff. So, there is no reason to expect a defensive drop off- especially when we have more experienced teams. Also, Kyle Cheesebrough is an elite catcher's coach. This was a weakness under Cohen but Lemonis has improved this spot a great deal- see the improvement that Dustin Skelton made. LoTan is a potential first round pick next year. And a lot of that is because of his defense. He's the best I have seen at MSU at catcher. Completely shuts down the running game and that is huge in college where teams run more.
Gautreau is one of the best hitting coaches in the country. Early in the year he seems to let guys fail so that he can build them up as the season goes along. Hard to argue with the results even if we have to lose a game to Tulane in the process. We're already seeing more power in the lineup- we had five guys hit 10 or more in the lineup. And that number could have been higher had Kellum Clark been healthy all year and Cumbest played regularly early in the year. Lemonis has been recruiting plenty of power guys to come in. Hunter Hines, Aaron Downs, Cole Slater, Trey Higgins, Charlie Keller, and Jay Murdock among others in the next two classes. We'll also continue to be athletic in the middle infield and CF as well. Our offense should continue to be in the top half of the SEC with this staff.
I also liked how aggressive Lemonis was on the bases. Brayland Skinner stealing second against Texas helped us get into the finals much like Dave Roberts helped the Red Sox win in 2004. We took extra bases when we could. We had a key hit and run in the finals on a Luke Hancock single that scored a run from first and helped us get momentum in the finals. We bunt appropriately for the most part. Those baserunning plays are sometimes the difference between winning and losing. I think we will continue to run and do small ball things at about the same pace as we saw this year.
Going forward I want to see MSU continue to compete in major preseason tournaments like the Shrine Classic. I hope we continue the Governor's Cup- I know MSU wants to but Ole Miss may not because of perception. Continue playing USM in Pearl as well. I like playing in Biloxi also. Getting a team like Texas Tech was a great idea and I hope we continue to do that with similar opponents- Tulane seems obvious there right although I would love to play LSU there. Keep playing Memphis at Autozone or schedule a game with Arkansas State there. UAB and Samford at Regions Park in Birmingham. I think we should keep playing Tulane. That was a salty series which was fun. Plus we could do a home/home with them and play some in NOLA. Maybe we'll even do better in the SEC Tournament too. Even if we don't I still have 2005 to tide me over for awhile. I do think that's the next step for our program now that we have a National Title. Have a season where we win a major preseason tournament, the Governor's Cup, the SEC, the SEC Tournament, and then the National Title.
Hail State!
I think we all agree that we knew that we had a really good baseball program for years BUT..... And now that BUT doesn't exist anymore. That's SO huge for MSU not only in baseball but also as a school in general. I'm glad we are all experiencing this while we are alive.
Here's the scary thing. Lemonis doesn't even have his recruits in yet. But they're coming and they're good. And going forward we're going to be able to sell that you can come here and win a National Title as Lemonis alluded during the parade ceremony.
Foxhall is a really good pitching coach and as I have said during the season I'm not 100% sure that his style completely matched all of our pitchers on the team which is mostly due to not have all of our recruits in. See Christian MacLeoud. His style matches well with power arm guys like Landon Sims and Will Bednar. We're going to continue to see more and more of that- remember all the reports about all of our pitchers lighting up radar guns in the 95 MPH range? We didn't necessarily see that during the year because a lot of those guys were just freshmen. They'll grow and develop and we have more arms on the way. It's going to yield a lot of strikeouts- like we saw this year. Hopefully the home runs allowed will go down as we get more guys that can thrive with this style.
Defensively I was impressed with how we improved at the end of the year. To me defense has mostly for a large part been about how much work a player puts into it. Now I'm not saying that taking 200 ground balls a day will turn you into Ozzie Smith but taking as many reps as possible can make you into an at least serviceable defender. Some guys like Kam James have to find a position in college because a lot of them are shortstops in high school because they were the best athlete on the team. And that can be a little bit of an adjustment. The only way guys like Kam and Luke Hancock are able to do what they did is because they worked their tails off with our staff. So, there is no reason to expect a defensive drop off- especially when we have more experienced teams. Also, Kyle Cheesebrough is an elite catcher's coach. This was a weakness under Cohen but Lemonis has improved this spot a great deal- see the improvement that Dustin Skelton made. LoTan is a potential first round pick next year. And a lot of that is because of his defense. He's the best I have seen at MSU at catcher. Completely shuts down the running game and that is huge in college where teams run more.
Gautreau is one of the best hitting coaches in the country. Early in the year he seems to let guys fail so that he can build them up as the season goes along. Hard to argue with the results even if we have to lose a game to Tulane in the process. We're already seeing more power in the lineup- we had five guys hit 10 or more in the lineup. And that number could have been higher had Kellum Clark been healthy all year and Cumbest played regularly early in the year. Lemonis has been recruiting plenty of power guys to come in. Hunter Hines, Aaron Downs, Cole Slater, Trey Higgins, Charlie Keller, and Jay Murdock among others in the next two classes. We'll also continue to be athletic in the middle infield and CF as well. Our offense should continue to be in the top half of the SEC with this staff.
I also liked how aggressive Lemonis was on the bases. Brayland Skinner stealing second against Texas helped us get into the finals much like Dave Roberts helped the Red Sox win in 2004. We took extra bases when we could. We had a key hit and run in the finals on a Luke Hancock single that scored a run from first and helped us get momentum in the finals. We bunt appropriately for the most part. Those baserunning plays are sometimes the difference between winning and losing. I think we will continue to run and do small ball things at about the same pace as we saw this year.
Going forward I want to see MSU continue to compete in major preseason tournaments like the Shrine Classic. I hope we continue the Governor's Cup- I know MSU wants to but Ole Miss may not because of perception. Continue playing USM in Pearl as well. I like playing in Biloxi also. Getting a team like Texas Tech was a great idea and I hope we continue to do that with similar opponents- Tulane seems obvious there right although I would love to play LSU there. Keep playing Memphis at Autozone or schedule a game with Arkansas State there. UAB and Samford at Regions Park in Birmingham. I think we should keep playing Tulane. That was a salty series which was fun. Plus we could do a home/home with them and play some in NOLA. Maybe we'll even do better in the SEC Tournament too. Even if we don't I still have 2005 to tide me over for awhile. I do think that's the next step for our program now that we have a National Title. Have a season where we win a major preseason tournament, the Governor's Cup, the SEC, the SEC Tournament, and then the National Title.
Hail State!