10 things i wish Cohen would get..

[preachermatt83]

1) Woody just isn't as good as we thought. he cannot get it done.. STOP TRYING!
2) Derrick Armstrong has earned the right to be a starter...
3) Collins is HEAD AND SHOULDERS above any catcher we have
4) You better get your lineup settled bc this one just ain't cutting it
5) GET WES OUT OF THE 3 HOLE!!
6) If the team is struggling at the plate and you have a runner on 3rd with no outs then do something to get him home... something, anything!!
7) Garner should be an every day guy
8) Robson should never see the field unless it is as a pinch runner in the 9th. PERIOD
9)Tell Wes to stop watching strike 3
10) everything is not Ok, we just got embarrassed twice!

[msstate7]

I would like to see Armstrong start tomorrow. I also wouldn't mind Cohen sitting rea tomorrow (just game or 2)

[Todd4State]

1) Woodruff just doesn't need to be the ace right now. I'd be pretty surprised if he starts Friday against Georgia. In fact, it will likely be Bracewell. I'm not surprised that we lost his start. He doesn't need to be matched up against another teams number one or number two right now. I still think he will turn it around before long, but the question is when? When a player is essentially rehabbing, you don't put them in high leverage situations.

2) Armstrong has played well and should be in the rotation in the OF.

3) Collins is our best catcher but we simply can not catch him everyday. He will wear down- and especially with him being a freshman. Once SEC play starts, he will catch twice.

4) Actually, I'd say the lineup is pretty settled. I would play Cody Brown less though. He has improved but he is still a redshirt freshman.

5) And who else would you suggest hitting in the three hole? Wes is our best all around hitter. Detz struggling hurts him.

6) I agree with that but I always have to laugh when we try to make something happen and then it doesn't work and our fans then start to question our base running and talk about how we should have just done nothing. But general rule of baseball- when you are behind you need base runners, and you do not risk getting people thrown out or running yourself out of an inning. So, when we are down it is going to shut down our running game for the most part- which means it is imperative that we pitch well.

7) I agree but we have people that insist that we play Detz even though he is struggling mightily save for South Alabama.

8) Robson has had a rough year.

9) Much easier said than done. He has to protect the plate if it's close.

10) Everything is not OK, but we'll fix it. We pitched a lot of young guys like Sexton and inexperienced guys like Laster- and I think all of them took their lumps today. This was our first road game of the year, and it was/is a tough road test. Our fans want to watch us play tough and interesting name teams like Arizona and Oregon- and we are doing that and I am OK with that in baseball because unlike football the games are weighted. But we are going to lose some of those interesting games at times because we use the pre-SEC OOC games to figure things out and we play four a lot of weekends which is going to thin our staff out. We still have two more, and I feel good about Fitts. He needs to be a stopper tomorrow. I'm more disappointed about game one simply because Lindgren and Cox didn't come through. Game two, like I said I expected us to lose because of the pitching match-up. Long term, this will help us in SEC play- but for the moment we need to try to win tomorrow and then hope that Dakota and the bullpen pitch well Sunday.

[MarketingBully01]

1) Woodruff just doesn't need to be the ace right now. I'd be pretty surprised if he starts Friday against Georgia. In fact, it will likely be Bracewell. I'm not surprised that we lost his start. He doesn't need to be matched up against another teams number one or number two right now. I still think he will turn it around before long, but the question is when? When a player is essentially rehabbing, you don't put them in high leverage situations.

2) Armstrong has played well and should be in the rotation in the OF.

3) Collins is our best catcher but we simply can not catch him everyday. He will wear down- and especially with him being a freshman. Once SEC play starts, he will catch twice.

4) Actually, I'd say the lineup is pretty settled. I would play Cody Brown less though. He has improved but he is still a redshirt freshman.

5) And who else would you suggest hitting in the three hole? Wes is our best all around hitter. Detz struggling hurts him.

6) I agree with that but I always have to laugh when we try to make something happen and then it doesn't work and our fans then start to question our base running and talk about how we should have just done nothing. But general rule of baseball- when you are behind you need base runners, and you do not risk getting people thrown out or running yourself out of an inning. So, when we are down it is going to shut down our running game for the most part- which means it is imperative that we pitch well.

7) I agree but we have people that insist that we play Detz even though he is struggling mightily save for South Alabama.

8) Robson has had a rough year.

9) Much easier said than done. He has to protect the plate if it's close.

10) Everything is not OK, but we'll fix it. We pitched a lot of young guys like Sexton and inexperienced guys like Laster- and I think all of them took their lumps today. This was our first road game of the year, and it was/is a tough road test. Our fans want to watch us play tough and interesting name teams like Arizona and Oregon- and we are doing that and I am OK with that in baseball because unlike football the games are weighted. But we are going to lose some of those interesting games at times because we use the pre-SEC OOC games to figure things out and we play four a lot of weekends which is going to thin our staff out. We still have two more, and I feel good about Fitts. He needs to be a stopper tomorrow. I'm more disappointed about game one simply because Lindgren and Cox didn't come through. Game two, like I said I expected us to lose because of the pitching match-up. Long term, this will help us in SEC play- but for the moment we need to try to win tomorrow and then hope that Dakota and the bullpen pitch well Sunday.

Todd I agree with your synopsis here. It will be interesting to see how this season plays out. These type of losses and the HC split will end up hurting us in my opinion. I don't think the UCSB loss hurts at all because they are a regional team. I don't think Arizona is a regional team however. I think it might come down to a role reversal of last year with us and possibly an Arkansas or another SEC team where we might have a better SEC record and they have a better OOC record but better RPI to get the hosting spot. We aren't a super regional team and I don't think Cohen put our best foot forward with the lineups he used today. Henderson had a terrible day yesterday. Vickerson needs to play left field and not DH. And once again Detz is not a third baseman. He just isn't. We need to play Humphreys and deal with our lumps so he can be the bad ass of the future. Shit, if you start Humphreys and Garner at 3rd and DH all of a sudden you have 1/3 of the lineup with power. Some of Cohen's decisions just don't make sense. When he was doing this last year, Renfroe bailed him out by just tearing it up early in the season. We don't have that this year so we are struggling mightily. I think Humphreys is our next Renfroe. Cohen allowed Renfroe to take his lumps early. Why isn't he letting Humphreys? Just doesn't make sense to me.

[MarketingBully01]

I will add this as well. Woodruff had righted the ship and was cruising striking out the first two batters of the inning and at that point the game was 3-1. The third batter of the inning hit the ball ONE FOOT away from Detz a routine ball mind you that he couldn't come up with. It wasn't a bullet it was around medium range that IMO an average third baseman would have gotten. For whatever reason, he olayed at it and it went as a hit. He does that at least 1-2 times a game. He has the worst range of any third baseman I have ever seen. If you are going to play the guy, please put him in the DH spot. His range is that of an 87 year old. Of course, they score 3 that inning and break the game wide open. Rant off.

[Will James]

You don't hit your best all around hitter 3rd Todd...

[Drugdog]

Did we not see Cohen do this last year as well? Correct me if I'm wrong but we did not have a set lineup until late last year.

[Goat Holder]

Why not?

[Goat Holder]

Renfroe did not play as a true freshman. He had a few at bats, and just hacked. So your statement about him taking lumps early is not true. Humphreys and Renfroe aren't really all that similar to me.

[Will James]

Why not?

http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/200...your-lineup-by

http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/201...-shouldnt-they

The Third Spot

The old-school book says to put your best high-average hitter here. The lead-off hitter should already be in scoring position and a hit drives him in. Wham, bam, thank you ma'am.
The Book says the #3 hitter comes to the plate with, on average, fewer runners on base than the #4 or #5 hitters. So why focus on putting a guy who can knock in runs in the #3 spot, when the two spots after him can benefit from it more? Surprisingly, because he comes to bat so often with two outs and no runners on base, the #3 hitter isn't nearly as important as we think. This is a spot to fill after more important spots are taken care of.

[Todd4State]

http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/200...your-lineup-by

http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/201...-shouldnt-they

The Third Spot

The old-school book says to put your best high-average hitter here. The lead-off hitter should already be in scoring position and a hit drives him in. Wham, bam, thank you ma'am.
The Book says the #3 hitter comes to the plate with, on average, fewer runners on base than the #4 or #5 hitters. So why focus on putting a guy who can knock in runs in the #3 spot, when the two spots after him can benefit from it more? Surprisingly, because he comes to bat so often with two outs and no runners on base, the #3 hitter isn't nearly as important as we think. This is a spot to fill after more important spots are taken care of.

I don't agree with this. I want my best hitter to come up as many times to the plate as possible. Not my "fifth best hitter". Sorry.

You also need to understand that we are not an Earl Weaver ball team in anyway shape or form nor are we a MLB team with 4-5 power guys that we can use throughout the lineup.

In other words- what you are suggesting we do would be like Croom trying to run a NFL offense with 2 star recruits.

[Goat Holder]

Agreed. This college ball, and its easier to play the simple percentages. WJ is thinkin' too much.

[maroonmania]

10) Our fans want to watch us play tough and interesting name teams like Arizona and Oregon- and we are doing that and I am OK with that in baseball because unlike football the games are weighted. But we are going to lose some of those interesting games at times because we use the pre-SEC OOC games to figure things out and we play four a lot of weekends which is going to thin our staff out.

I don't think anyone is in a total tizzy over the fact we lost the games its the fact we got a mud hole stomped in us for 2 straight games. If they had been hard fought tough losses nobody would be happy but people wouldn't be totally panicking either. The first game REALLY hurt because Bracewell and Lindgren have probably been our 2 most effective pitchers this season and UCSB knocked them around pretty good. Nobody is all that surprised that Woody got hit hard.

[Will James]

If you want Rea up with the most people on base you hit him 4th. That's 100% fact. Has nothing to do with "an MLB offense".

[maroonmania]

I would prefer to bat Rea 4th or maybe even 5th right now. First, his average is falling and he is striking out a lot. Secondly, by having him higher in the order when he gets on base in front of other hitters he clogs the bases. It basically takes a double to score Rea from 2nd base even with 2 outs.

[messageboardsuperhero]

Todd I agree with your synopsis here. It will be interesting to see how this season plays out. These type of losses and the HC split will end up hurting us in my opinion. I don't think the UCSB loss hurts at all because they are a regional team. I don't think Arizona is a regional team however. I think it might come down to a role reversal of last year with us and possibly an Arkansas or another SEC team where we might have a better SEC record and they have a better OOC record but better RPI to get the hosting spot. We aren't a super regional team and I don't think Cohen put our best foot forward with the lineups he used today. Henderson had a terrible day yesterday. Vickerson needs to play left field and not DH. And once again Detz is not a third baseman. He just isn't. We need to play Humphreys and deal with our lumps so he can be the bad ass of the future. Shit, if you start Humphreys and Garner at 3rd and DH all of a sudden you have 1/3 of the lineup with power. Some of Cohen's decisions just don't make sense. When he was doing this last year, Renfroe bailed him out by just tearing it up early in the season. We don't have that this year so we are struggling mightily. I think Humphreys is our next Renfroe. Cohen allowed Renfroe to take his lumps early. Why isn't he letting Humphreys? Just doesn't make sense to me.

While I agree with most of your post and think that Humphreys needs more PT, this statement about Cohen letting Renfroe take his lumps early just isn't true. Renfroe only had 26 ABs as a freshman, and only 15 ABs in SEC play.

In fact, Humphreys already has more starts this season than Renfroe had in his entire freshman year. Cohen has been letting Humphreys "take his lumps" much more than he did for Renfroe at this point.

[Intramural All-American]

You don't hit your best all around hitter 3rd Todd...

Tell that to half the teams in the Major Leagues. Your philosophy is just that, a philosophy. It doesn't make it a fact. The fact that you claim to be smarter than many MLB managers makes you look dumb.

However, this team is different than last year's team. Last year you argued that Renfroe should hit 4th rather than 3rd because he was our best hitter. I totally disagreed. This year, however, Wes is not our best all-around hitter. He is our best power hitter and I would be fine with having him in the 4 hole and Pirtle in the 3.

[slickdawg]

1) Woody just isn't as good as we thought. he cannot get it done.. STOP TRYING!
2) Derrick Armstrong has earned the right to be a starter...
3) Collins is HEAD AND SHOULDERS above any catcher we have
4) You better get your lineup settled bc this one just ain't cutting it
5)GET WES OUT OF THE 3 HOLE!!
6) If the team is struggling at the plate and you have a runner on 3rd with no outs then do something to get him home... something, anything!!
7) Garner should be an every day guy
8) Robson should never see the field unless it is as a pinch runner in the 9th. PERIOD
9)Tell Wes to stop watching strike 3
10) everything is not Ok, we just got embarrassed twice!

Can't argue with any of this, but the highlighted ones really stick out to me.

[slickdawg]

Since it take us 30 games to find our groove, we need to tour the SWAC for our pre-conference schedule. All of these losses are going to kill us come regional time. We've pretty much screwed ourselves out of any chance of being a national seed.

[Coach34]

You're not going to catch Collins both games of a DH
I thought everybody already knew Detz was a terrible 3rd baseman? I've been saying that for a year
Woody does need to slide back in the rotation- but he still needs to start.
Armstrong needs to play period
Any line-up with Seth Heck batting 5th is not very good

If your expectation was Omaha or Bust for this team then your expectations were unrealistic. Our expectation should always be- Host, Super, and then see what happens. We should always expect to be one of the 16 best baseball teams each season. We'll get some things fixed- but Cohen is going to have to start hurting some feelings and benching some older players. Starting with Detz