The Preachers Prediction

for the remainder of the Baseball season.. I know most of us are very upset with the weekends results but if we could somehow come up with a way to just get a few hits this is how I see the remainder of the season going.

Southern Miss- Pearl, MS - W

Alcorn State- Home- W

Ole Miss - Pearl, MS - L

Jacksonville State- home - W

SEC SERIES:

Ole Miss- Home- W - 2-1

Missouri* Away W- 2-1

Texas A&M* Home W- 2-1

Auburn * Away W- 2-1

Tennessee * home -W- 2-1

Alabama * Away - L- 1-2



SEC RECORD- 17-13

OVERALL RECORD- 34-21

As over-dramatic as so many of us tend to be the truth is 5 years ago we would have loved to have been in this position. Last year we just so happen to get hot at just the right time and we had two things we do not have this year, a true leadoff hitter and a true power hitter. We should all be thankful that we are where we are now. We actually have expectations. We stand in a decent position to atleast have an argument to host a regional and we all know that in post season play we never know what will happen. will I still fuss and complain about Cohen's decision making and our lack of hitting in the heat of a game thread? Sure, but once we sit back and look at it rationally we must come to the conclusion we are in good shape as a program. Anyway that is the "Preacher's Position"... Amen!

Amen to that.

i think a lot of GREAT baseball managers tend to overthink things. i think cohen is a very very good manager, possibly a great manager before it's all said and done. however, he's overthinking the lineup. we need 1 or 2 lineups (if we want a righty/lefty lineup) that we play 90% of the time, especially for sec games, and let guys get in a rhythm. right now i think we've been too all over the place, and no one has been able to settle in.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by dawgs

i think a lot of GREAT baseball managers tend to overthink things. i think cohen is a very very good manager, possibly a great manager before it's all said and done. however, he's overthinking the lineup. we need 1 or 2 lineups (if we want a righty/lefty lineup) that we play 90% of the time, especially for sec games, and let guys get in a rhythm. right now i think we've been too all over the place, and no one has been able to settle in.

---

I think it's very apparent that he prefers experience. I think he also trusts the input of his players- which is not a totally bad thing. And more often than not experience does win out.

If anything, he needs to make some changes. He has been basically set on the same guys since SEC play has started. So, I don't think it's an issue of too many people coming in and out. I think it's the opposite actually.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Todd4State

I think it's very apparent that he prefers experience. I think he also trusts the input of his players- which is not a totally bad thing. And more often than not experience does win out.

If anything, he needs to make some changes. He has been basically set on the same guys since SEC play has started. So, I don't think it's an issue of too many people coming in and out. I think it's the opposite actually.

---

granted i don't live where i can follow msu baseball game to game anymore, but it just seems like we often have a guy get a couple of base hits in a game, then the next game he gets sat down. though looking at the stats, it appears the lineup shuffling has lessened in the conference games. maybe it's more my frustration when i see collins bat isn't starting every other game. detz, pirtle, vickerson, rea, heck, and armstrong have started at least 11 of 12 conference games.

maybe, if it's possible, it's a bit of both. cohen can be slow to commit to the younger guys, so he's always shuffling them in and out of the lineup, while sticking with the upper classmen through their struggles. and when he does play the young guys that are raking, he sticks then at the bottom of the lineup because he doesn't trust them to produce in a run producing spot (i know heck can field, but why does he keep batting in the top 5 in the order????). it also has to do with moving guys around in the lineup every game.

Your final regular season record of 34-21 is what we were two years ago, and I think this team is a lot like that team in terms of lack of power hitting and relying almost entirely on pitching and defense. I think your assessment is accurate, and hopefully conservative...I think we've got a shot to sweep A&M and Tennessee. We've really yet to get into the part of our schedule that is supposed to be easier than last year other than UGA. Mizzou, A&M and UT aren't on the same level as us in my opinion despite our lack of offense.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by preachermatt83

for the remainder of the Baseball season.. I know most of us are very upset with the weekends results but if we could somehow come up with a way to just get a few hits this is how I see the remainder of the season going.

Southern Miss- Pearl, MS - W

Alcorn State- Home- W

Ole Miss - Pearl, MS - L

Jacksonville State- home - W

SEC SERIES:

Ole Miss- Home- W - 2-1

Missouri* Away W- 2-1

Texas A&M* Home W- 2-1

Auburn * Away W- 2-1

Tennessee * home -W- 2-1

Alabama * Away - L- 1-2



SEC RECORD- 17-13

OVERALL RECORD- 34-21

As over-dramatic as so many of us tend to be the truth is 5 years ago we would have loved to have been in this position. Last year we just so happen to get hot at just the right time and we had two things we do not have this year, a true leadoff hitter and a true power hitter. We should all be thankful that we are where we are now. We actually have expectations. We stand in a decent position to atleast have an argument to host a regional and we all know that in post season play we never know what will happen. will I still fuss and complain about Cohen's decision making and our lack of hitting in the heat of a game thread? Sure, but once we sit back and look at it rationally we must come to the conclusion we are in good shape as a program. Anyway that is the "Preacher's Position"... Amen!

---

I am on an eternal mission to overcome this perception of us being only a mediocre team that got hot late last year.

We won 51 games (I believe the same amount we won in '85) against the 2nd toughest schedule in the ENTIRE COUNTRY.
We finished the year with an RPI of 8 and were the third best SEC team, no matter what the conference record says (because of the ridiculously unbalanced schedule we were dealt compared to Arkansas and USCe). The only two SEC teams that were better than us were two of the better teams in the entire history of the conference.
We comfortably earned the right to host a regional, and given a good bounce or two in the early SEC schedule, we would have been right in the thick of the national seed conversation.
We won what was by far the most difficult regional RPI-wise.
We went on the road and swept a national seed to get to Omaha, who had only lost 3-4 home games all year to that point. I'd go so far as to say that our road to Omaha was tougher than anyone's, outside of maybe Louisville.
We then beat the #3 national seed twice in Omaha, and beat another regional host team there as well.
I don't know the exact number, but I'd estimate that about 50% (if not more) of the players on the roster in 2013 have been or will be drafted at some point.

Did we get hot at the right time? Of course, but ANYONE in the entire country who plays for the national title is going to get hot in the postseason- if they weren't hot, they wouldn't have made it that far. And honestly the only real "break" that I can remember us catching the entire postseason was when Louisville eliminated Vandy in their Super Regional, thus keeping them out of our bracket in Omaha.

I don't know where this idea of us being just a "hot team" last year came from, but the fact is- we were really ****ing good. We were easily one of the 10-12 best teams in the country, if you factor in everything that happened throughout the course of that season, IMO.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by messageboardsuperhero

Did we get hot at the right time? Of course, but ANYONE in the entire country who plays for the national title is going to get hot in the postseason- if they weren't hot, they wouldn't have made it that far. And honestly the only real "break" that I can remember us catching the entire postseason was when Louisville eliminated Vandy in their Super Regional, thus keeping them out of our bracket in Omaha.

I don't know where this idea of us being just a "hot team" last year came from, but the fact is- we were really ****ing good. We were easily one of the 10-12 best teams in the country, if you factor in everything that happened throughout the course of that season, IMO.

---

'hero pretty much nailed this one. That conference schedule we were dealt was ridiculous. Only lost 2 the entire ooc schedule. You're especially right on "getting hot". All 8 teams every year in Omaha are hot.

Every Heck out seems to be a very hard line drive. I'd bat him 2 or 3

To add- what we did was similar to a 3 seed making the title game in the NCAA basketball tournament. Would anyone have considered it a lucky hot streak/fluke if Duke or Syracuse had played for the national title this year? Hell no.

I'd expect UM people to try and downplay what our team accomplished last year- but not our own fans...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Will James

Every Heck out seems to be a very hard line drive. I'd bat him 2 or 3

---

I agree. Heck is a damn line drive machine. The fact that he is batting .184 in conference play is amazing to me.

ETA: Heck's BABIP is .162. He's hitting everything on a line, and has 10 BB/HBPs to only 2 Ks in a limited 38 ABs in conference play- fantastic approach, but the luck dragon has a terrible sense of humor.

happen is that you'll see a guy or two get off to a tough start. They'll get benched and we won't see anything from them except in spots here and there. Sometime it takes a little repetition to get into a comfort zone and you have to work your way out of it. Hard to do that on the bench. Then when those guys do get to play they know if they don't perform they'll go back to the bench and it puts a ton of pressure on them.

Under Cohen, we always play our best baseball leading into the postseason. Why don't we all just wait to see how it plays out? It's still fully possible that Cohen knows that guys like Collins and Humphreys will probably be relied on more later in the year to provide some pop but that he wants to give the more experienced guys every opportunity first; or it's possible that he knows some things we don't.

Either way, the main thing we need to do is not put ourselves in horrible position going into a regional. A regional host would be just fine to give us the same shot we had last year. If we continue to sputter and end up as a 2 seed in a regional somewhere, then that's not great, but we can still go on a run, as we saw a few years ago.

I think we'll end up with an SEC record over .500, and if we go on a run in the SEC Tournament, could definitely still end up hosting a regional. It would have been great to get a national seed, but that looks to be out of the picture now - but that doesn't mean we still can't host a SR.