Lemonhaters bout to be big mad

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Originally Posted by Cooterpoot

You don't think better pitching helps the defense a lot? I do. I think it helps a ton. Mershon being healthy this year helps too, along with one transfer out.
Geaut's guys never K a lot as a unit. It's always been that way. Recruiting is the reason for the power outage, it's not just HRs. We aren't getting extra base hits. Far too often we're two strike hitting and beating our chests and too many ground balls. We've got a grind it out approach that's not all bad, but you need the players to do that.

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I do think pitching helps defense a lot. But it's not all pitching. We got rid of Forsythe and Alford. And upgraded there with players Lemonis recruited. Hines has improved also. That's not because of Parker. Catching is better too. Hitting isn't perfect but it's also not that bad. Not enough to where it's consistently costing us games. Recruiting isn't the issue there- it's injuries this year.

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Originally Posted by Santiago

I respect your posts, but are you really saying our hitting would be better if a player wasn't struggling at the plate?
We would also hit more home runs if the balls traveled a little further also.

Why hasn't Lemonis already moved forward with a hitting analyst?
That is our point. He can be incredibly stubborn, Croom like.

But Parker is a really big reason our pitching is ranked so high in the SEC and why we are winning games. Our defense is better, so ya Lemonis! Our base running has been awful and we lost alot of games this year v. lesser teams when we could not hit anything. We are a good team, but a thin line on going 0-3 on a weekend also.

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No- I'm saying our power would be better without injuries. Which would in turn lead to a more dangerous and therefore better offensive attack.

No one was asking Lemonis to hire an offensive analyst last year. That's not something you just fill midseason. There is a difference between being stubborn and impulsive. Firing your hitting coach in the middle of the season when you are 8th in the league in hitting with some injuries qualifies as impulsive barring a scandal.

Who hired Parker? Why not give Lemonis credit for that? I even said last year a decent PC would make a huge difference if our offensive numbers stayed about the same and look what has happened.

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Originally Posted by Cooterpoot

LOL!!! Lemonis held on to our problem until he had no choice. That's the whole "refuse to adjust" again. Parker absolutely saved his ass. Lemonis didn't build that chamoionship team either. And if middle of the pack in the SEC is good, our standards have fallen hard. The bottom line is Lemonis isn't as bad as the haters claim, nor as good as his blind followers believe. It all comes down to can he get the players. I don't believe he can. I think you see us stuck in the middle of the pack as long as he's here, but, and it's a big but, he's good enough to win if the team catches fire and things fall into place and we catch some breaks. A bad coach can't win regardless.

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I can understand not firing the National Assistant coach of the year one year after he won the award given his track record at the time and knowing how many injuries we had. And was one of the first on the fire Foxhall train in 2022.

Our "standards" are based on how we do in the postseason. And the reality is no matter where we are in the SEC standings currently, how bad you think our players and recruits are, we are right there in line to have a chance to host a regional which is all that is currently known at this point. Regardless if we win the regional host or not we have hit our standard.

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Originally Posted by QuadrupleOption

I don't know why we keep doing this with out coaches, but here goes.

Lemonis gets blame for the pitching in 2022 and 2023 because he's the head coach. Lemonis gets credit for firing the pitching coach and bringing in a better one to fix the issue.

Lemonis gets blame for poor defensive play in 22-23. He gets credit for improved defensive play this season.

Lemonis won the title in year 3. He didn't recruit every player but he recruited a lot of them, because he was the head coach when they signed and so he gets credit. Lemonis gets blame for the poor performance of players he recruited in 22 and 23. He gets credit for the improvement this year.

If we make the NCAA tournament (and we should), he gets credit for that. If he doesn't, he should be (and probably will be) fired.

It's not that hard. Quit making up reasons to not give him credit for righting the course of the program and getting us back on track. I'm not saying the last two years aren't on him, because they are. However I can also give him credit for doing what he had to do to get us back on track.

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Very well said!

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Originally Posted by Cooterpoot

Lemonis issues: Recruiting, slow to adjust, push back at fans which makes enemies

I don't think he's a bad coach per se, I just think he's got a lot of Croom like issues. He'd rather beat his head against a wall than do what everyone can see needs to be done. The recruiting hasnt been up to par at all. We struggle with the portal minus one or two lesser rated guys a year really. The class coming is weak without the draft guys. We hit on one or two kids now instead of several. That's got to be fixed. The rebuild next year is going to make for a lot of back and forth I think. It's a cloud hanging over us a bit. I also think Geaut better find some magic again real soon. Our hitting has to improve.

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He does wear his cap like Croom.*****. Made a great pitching coach hire Sweep bama!

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Originally Posted by Santiago

Parker lost his starting Friday night guy, but was able to recruit a pitcher in the portal that has saved us. Grant hurt, and other hurt.
So does Parker get assistant coach of the year?

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I certainly think he deserves a look. And I would give Schloss or Clown at Kentucky COY- but Lemon deserves a couple of votes if we do indeed host

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Originally Posted by QuadrupleOption

I don't know why we keep doing this with out coaches, but here goes.

Lemonis gets blame for the pitching in 2022 and 2023 because he's the head coach. Lemonis gets credit for firing the pitching coach and bringing in a better one to fix the issue.

Lemonis gets blame for poor defensive play in 22-23. He gets credit for improved defensive play this season.

Lemonis won the title in year 3. He didn't recruit every player but he recruited a lot of them, because he was the head coach when they signed and so he gets credit. Lemonis gets blame for the poor performance of players he recruited in 22 and 23. He gets credit for the improvement this year.

If we make the NCAA tournament (and we should), he gets credit for that. If he doesn't, he should be (and probably will be) fired.

It's not that hard. Quit making up reasons to not give him credit for righting the course of the program and getting us back on track. I'm not saying the last two years aren't on him, because they are. However I can also give him credit for doing what he had to do to get us back on track.

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Baseball post of the year and so accurate!

I have no more rep to give!

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Originally Posted by Coach34

Its nothing resembling Croom. Lemon has a Natty and built this team that has very good pitching. So much so that we have overcome injuries to 3 of our top guys as well as another underperforming. Those of us that know baseball figured we would be pretty good this year.

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This.

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Originally Posted by Coach34

I'm glad it worked and as I said- fine line between aggressive and being stupid. When I was 20 I throw him out 75% of the time. The ball sailed on the catcher and boom- big play for us

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Ah but the reason the throw sailed is because we caught him loafing and forced him to make a rushed throw and most rushed throws are off target. Heck 6 inches more to the left and it's into left field and Hujsak scores. I love the aggressiveness. If you're aggressive on the bases you're gonna create more runs than you lose. Jmo

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Originally Posted by Commercecomet24

Baseball post of the year and so accurate!

I have no more rep to give!

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We have too many fans that assumed that Lemonis wouldn't be able to fix it that can't admit they were wrong.

Now they're stuck in a rock and a hard place. Must be tough seeing us win and not enjoy it for those folks.

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Originally Posted by Commercecomet24

Ah but the reason the throw sailed is because we caught him loafing and forced him to make a rushed throw and most rushed throws are off target. Heck 6 inches more to the left and it's into left field and Hujsak scores. I love the aggressiveness. If you're aggressive on the bases you're gonna create more runs than you lose. Jmo

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Aggressiveness wins. It looks bad when it doesn't work though! But in general it does when you more than it doesn't of done at the right time.

My favorite play of all time- runners first and third delayed double steal. Runner from first takes off and then the catcher has to decide whether to give up the base or throw through. When and if the catcher throws through runner from third takes off hard for home. If he doesn't throw through you've taken yourself out of a double play and put another runner in scoring position. If they throw through it takes two good throws essentially to get the out at home and it rushes the middle infielder taking tne throw with a lot of distractions.

Only time it doesn't work is if you have runners slow as Christmas or the runner on third takes off too soon and gets in a run down but the catcher has to be really heads up to lure the runner into a run down.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

We have too many fans that assumed that Lemonis wouldn't be able to fix it that can't admit they were wrong.

Now they're stuck in a rock and a hard place. Must be tough seeing us win and not enjoy it for those folks.

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This

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Originally Posted by Commercecomet24

Ah but the reason the throw sailed is because we caught him loafing and forced him to make a rushed throw and most rushed throws are off target. Heck 6 inches more to the left and it's into left field and Hujsak scores. I love the aggressiveness. If you're aggressive on the bases you're gonna create more runs than you lose. Jmo

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I love good aggressive baseball. I'm that worked out. It was a huge play in the game

I'm just saying Hugesak is not a MENSA member- like the time he "aggressively" rounded 2nd on a ball to short left-center and the CF'er damn near hosed because of it.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Aggressiveness wins. It looks bad when it doesn't work though! But in general it does when you more than it doesn't of done at the right time.

My favorite play of all time- runners first and third delayed double steal. Runner from first takes off and then the catcher has to decide whether to give up the base or throw through. When and if the catcher throws through runner from third takes off hard for home. If he doesn't throw through you've taken yourself out of a double play and put another runner in scoring position. If they throw through it takes two good throws essentially to get the out at home and it rushes the middle infielder taking tne throw with a lot of distractions.

Only time it doesn't work is if you have runners slow as Christmas or the runner on third takes off too soon and gets in a run down but the catcher has to be really heads up to lure the runner into a run down.

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Yeah i agree. Always loved the first and third situation as a third base coach. Something I used to do a lot of that's been lost with all the exit velo, launch angle, hr craze, is hit and run with runners on first and third. Talk about creating some chaos. The defense has their first and third defend called and the runner takes off and they don't expect a swing and all of a sudden there's all kinds of home for the hitter to just tap a ground ball through. Learned that from Whitey Herzog.

It's funny to read all this.

Nobody was loving Parker on Sunday when he brought in Stevens to pitch. Now he's a ****ing genius

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Originally Posted by Coach34

I love good aggressive baseball. I'm that worked out. It was a huge play in the game

I'm just saying Hugesak is not a MENSA member- like the time he "aggressively" rounded 2nd on a ball to short left-center and the CF'er damn near hosed because of it.

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lol yeah I doubt he's a Mensa member, he's just a baseball player. The play you mentioned there could've been disastrous and the play when he started home from third on a walk and got picked wasn't high intelligence level either. I do love the way the man plays though and his leadership off the field. He plays hard all the time and is a great teammate

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Originally Posted by Coach34

It's funny to read all this.

Nobody was loving Parker on Sunday when he brought in Stevens to pitch. Now he's a ****ing genius

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The board is a mercurial bunch! Coaches now these players better than any of us and they go with who the feel can get the job done. Parker's been right more than wrong this year.

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Originally Posted by Skydawg1

We're taking 2 at UPIG.

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Please let this happen.

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Originally Posted by Commercecomet24

Yeah i agree. Always loved the first and third situation as a third base coach. Something I used to do a lot of that's been lost with all the exit velo, launch angle, hr craze, is hit and run with runners on first and third. Talk about creating some chaos. The defense has their first and third defend called and the runner takes off and they don't expect a swing and all of a sudden there's all kinds of home for the hitter to just tap a ground ball through. Learned that from Whitey Herzog.

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I met Whitey a couple of years ago. He had this cane that looked like a baseball bat. I told him it looked cool.

He told me- "Well I couldn't hit shit with it so I figured I'd get some use out of it". LOL. And RIP.

But yeah I love home runs and I'm the biggest Babe Ruth and Mark McGwire fan out there. But small ball and chaos is fun too. I hope MLB gets back to some of that along with the home runs. That's why I liked Tony LaRussa so much and Cohen too- you had a little bit of everything.

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Originally Posted by Commercecomet24

The board is a mercurial bunch! Coaches now these players better than any of us and they go with who the feel can get the job done. Parker's been right more than wrong this year.

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And it's not like he had a lot of known commodities to work with. The most known got hurt right before SEC play.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

I met Whitey a couple of years ago. He had this cane that looked like a baseball bat. I told him it looked cool.

He told me- "Well I couldn't hit shit with it so I figured I'd get some use out of it". LOL. And RIP.

But yeah I love home runs and I'm the biggest Babe Ruth and Mark McGwire fan out there. But small ball and chaos is fun too. I hope MLB gets back to some of that along with the home runs. That's why I liked Tony LaRussa so much and Cohen too- you had a little bit of everything.

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My HS coach was good friends with Whitey, they knew each other from the minors and Whitey used to come visit with us every January when we're getting ready for the season. He told me one time, when in doubt, run!, lol! I loved the guy and he's the one I patterned my aggressive baserunning in coaching. He always took time to answer our questions from a bunch of dumb teenagers. RIP to the White Rat! The running game is so much fun for the players and the fans, it keeps everyone on their toes and keeps defenses and pitchers unsettled. I guarantee if someone brought back Whitey Balll other teams wouldn't know what to do! Pitchers don't know how to hold runners anymore and that 3 time throw over thing would get em in trouble too. I would love to see someone bring that style back.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

And it's not like he had a lot of known commodities to work with. The most known got hurt right before SEC play.

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Exactly.