Baseball in the last few years

I was just looking at some stats from the previous seasons. A few things I found interesting. Yes, this is very random.

In 2013, Hunter Renfroe hit 16 homers and Wes Rea hit 7 homers. Brett Pirtle was 3rd on the team with only 2 homers. That is an unreal gap. For comparison, our top 5 this year hit 15, 12, 11, 10, and 10. Maybe there was no power in 2013 because of dead bats, but if so, that would just make Renfroe that much more impressive. As a team we only hit 30 homers all year, so Renfroe hit 53.3% of our homers. In 2017, Brent Rooker hit 23 of our 59 homers (39.0%)

In 2013, Ross Mitchell was 13-0 with 1.53 ERA in 94.0 innings.

In 2009, our best ERA on the entire team was 4.15 (Nick Routt). That included all pitchers who made an appearance (even if they only threw 1 inning the entire year). For comparison, we had 11 pitchers with a lower ERA this year (Kole Alford led with an ERA of 0.00 in just 1/3 inning pitched).

In his career, Eric Cerantola threw 49 innings. He walked 33 batters, threw 14 wild pitches, and hit 13 batters.

Speaking of dead bats, in 2014, we hit 16 homers as a team. We only gave up 13 homers all year long. In 2021, we hit 75 homers and allowed 72 homers.

The bats weren't juiced at the time for sure. But it was the ball that was the biggest factor in low numbers.

In his career, Eric Cerantola threw 49 innings. He walked 33 batters, threw 14 wild pitches, and hit 13 batters.

Now those are stats legends are made of. He is the WILD THING! And yet he got drafted!

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Originally Posted by 99jc

In his career, Eric Cerantola threw 49 innings. He walked 33 batters, threw 14 wild pitches, and hit 13 batters.

Now those are stats legends are made of. He is the WILD THING! And yet he got drafted!

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Because he has an insanely high spin rate on a breaking ball and throws 97-98 mph. He is also 6'5" which makes 97-98 look like 100. Most MLB draft like the Oakland Raiders, purely on physical stats. That is also the reason why most high school players drafted don't make it. College baseball weeds out a lot of guys and MLB is mostly made up of college players.

He very well could figure out how to pitch rather than throw and if he does then he has ace type potential.

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Originally Posted by Tbonewannabe

Because he has an insanely high spin rate on a breaking ball and throws 97-98 mph. He is also 6'5" which makes 97-98 look like 100. Most MLB draft like the Oakland Raiders, purely on physical stats. That is also the reason why most high school players drafted don't make it. College baseball weeds out a lot of guys and MLB is mostly made up of college players.

He very well could figure out how to pitch rather than throw and if he does then he has ace type potential.

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MLB will have someone re-build his mechanics. He always appeared very stiff and upright in his motion. College coaches aren't allowed the time to break players down and develop them like that. I wouldn't be shocked to see him in MLB in 3 years.

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Originally Posted by 99jc

In his career, Eric Cerantola threw 49 innings. He walked 33 batters, threw 14 wild pitches, and hit 13 batters.

Now those are stats legends are made of. He is the WILD THING! And yet he got drafted!

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Think of that. In 49 innings he allowed 46 base runners that never even had to swing the bat (33 walks and 13 hit by pitch). Then once a runner was on base, he threw 14 wild pitches. You have no chance of winning like that. I'm hoping the minor leagues can harness the talent.

When Cohen took over in 2009 we were so far behind in recruiting the best way for our program to get to what we wanted it to be was to recruit hard nosed players who were scrappy. Butch was good for us at the time because he can recruit and he can take guys who weren't all world and teach them how to succeed using different arm angles. Lane Burroughs was a great recruiter as well. We just didn't have enough to work with to succeed in the SEC in 2009-2010. Once we had some turnover we were able to get back to a SR, and then win the SEC Tournament in 2012 and then make it to the CWS Finals in 2013. We had a "pat on the back" year in 2014 and then 2015 some of our pitching recruiting caught up to us and the baseball changed. 2015 was just a disaster of a year.

But then things got straightened out by 2016. We brought in the number 2 recruiting class in the country and started to add more and more power arms. That team was built more like a MLB team. The bullpen was average though. 2017 was a good year despite a coaching change and tons of Tommy John which ended up killing us in the end with the SR. CWS run started the next year and culminated with a National Title this year. And Lemonis is just starting to build his program.

I think we're going to add more power arms- remember how everyone in the media was talking about all of the guys that we had throwing 95+ in the preseason and I warned people that we wouldn't see as many of them because they were freshmen. Well, now those guys are going to start to develop into viable SEC pitchers and we're adding more younger players behind them which eventually will stock our staff. Remember- Foxhall built NC State's staff which is full of flamethrowers as well. That's what we are going to look like in a couple of years.

On offense we're already adding longer more projectable guys like Kellum Clark and Kam James. That's going to result in a more powerful lineup and at the same time I think we will be able to still do things in the running game.

The biggest thing is Lemonis has showed that he knows how to manage a team. He's smart enough to know that losing a game to Kent State early in the year may drop us for a short time but by resting our main guys in the bullpen and allowing guys to have a chance to succeed or fail is the only way we can find out who can perform. That's how you put your best team on the field in the postseason. Bednar throwing 125+ against Kent State would not have allowed us to find guys like Parker Stinnett, Preston Johnson, and maybe even Landon Sims. I think he has some more National Titles in him as a coach but we'll see.

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Originally Posted by somebodyshotmypaw

Think of that. In 49 innings he allowed 46 base runners that never even had to swing the bat (33 walks and 13 hit by pitch). Then once a runner was on base, he threw 14 wild pitches. You have no chance of winning like that. I'm hoping the minor leagues can harness the talent.

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Brandon Woodruff was 1-3 with a 6.75 era in 37 innings his last season at MSU. Now he is a MLB Allstar

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Originally Posted by Leeshouldveflanked

Brandon Woodruff was 1-3 with a 6.75 era in 37 innings his last season at MSU. Now he is a MLB Allstar

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I wish I knew enough about baseball to know how these things happen.

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Originally Posted by OLJWales

I wish I knew enough about baseball to know how these things happen.

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I think he had Tommy John surgery either at the end of his freshman year or right before his sophomore year. I think we only had a healthy Woodruff for about the back half of his junior year. I believe he did start and win the SEC tournament championship game if I am remembering correctly.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

When Cohen took over in 2009 we were so far behind in recruiting the best way for our program to get to what we wanted it to be was to recruit hard nosed players who were scrappy. Butch was good for us at the time because he can recruit and he can take guys who weren't all world and teach them how to succeed using different arm angles. Lane Burroughs was a great recruiter as well. We just didn't have enough to work with to succeed in the SEC in 2009-2010. Once we had some turnover we were able to get back to a SR, and then win the SEC Tournament in 2012 and then make it to the CWS Finals in 2013. We had a "pat on the back" year in 2014 and then 2015 some of our pitching recruiting caught up to us and the baseball changed. 2015 was just a disaster of a year.

But then things got straightened out by 2016. We brought in the number 2 recruiting class in the country and started to add more and more power arms. That team was built more like a MLB team. The bullpen was average though. 2017 was a good year despite a coaching change and tons of Tommy John which ended up killing us in the end with the SR. CWS run started the next year and culminated with a National Title this year. And Lemonis is just starting to build his program.

I think we're going to add more power arms- remember how everyone in the media was talking about all of the guys that we had throwing 95+ in the preseason and I warned people that we wouldn't see as many of them because they were freshmen. Well, now those guys are going to start to develop into viable SEC pitchers and we're adding more younger players behind them which eventually will stock our staff. Remember- Foxhall built NC State's staff which is full of flamethrowers as well. That's what we are going to look like in a couple of years.

On offense we're already adding longer more projectable guys like Kellum Clark and Kam James. That's going to result in a more powerful lineup and at the same time I think we will be able to still do things in the running game.

The biggest thing is Lemonis has showed that he knows how to manage a team. He's smart enough to know that losing a game to Kent State early in the year may drop us for a short time but by resting our main guys in the bullpen and allowing guys to have a chance to succeed or fail is the only way we can find out who can perform. That's how you put your best team on the field in the postseason. Bednar throwing 125+ against Kent State would not have allowed us to find guys like Parker Stinnett, Preston Johnson, and maybe even Landon Sims. I think he has some more National Titles in him as a coach but we'll see.

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Good stuff, Todd.

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Originally Posted by Tbonewannabe

I think he had Tommy John surgery either at the end of his freshman year or right before his sophomore year. I think we only had a healthy Woodruff for about the back half of his junior year. I believe he did start and win the SEC tournament championship game if I am remembering correctly.

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Actually it was a hairline fracture in his humerus I believe. Butch saved his career by shutting him down.

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Originally Posted by BeardoMSU

Good stuff, Todd.

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Thanks gif master!