Any word on McPherson?

[maroonmania]

6 weeks is better than out indefinitely or the remainder of the year but it's also 6 SEC starts. If that's the case he would come back with two weeks left in league play. Plus, he'd probably be limited upon return. It's not devastating news if true but it's not great news either.

I consider it pretty devastating if you ask me. Maybe not catastrophic but given now we are down to one SEC caliber starter for a large part of what's left in the regular season, its pretty bad. We need a guy or two to step up significantly from what they've been giving so far on the mound. Will be interesting to see if we pull Davis up to be a starter now.

[Coach34]

I consider it pretty devastating if you ask me. Maybe not catastrophic but given now we are down to one SEC caliber starter for a large part of what's left in the regular season, its pretty bad. We need a guy or two to step up significantly from what they've been giving so far on the mound. Will be interesting to see if we pull Davis up to be a starter now.

Wtf? The Duke is an SEC SP and we have other candidates as well that can start. Every SEC team is worried about their 3rd SP every damn weekend. We have just gone from really good depth to guys needing to step up

[Todd4State]

People in the know aren?t out running their mouth. McPherson is being taken care of.

I'm just saying I was surprised because in that industry that is usually what happens.

[Todd4State]

I don?t really like this. State has seen this movie before. Had to move a number 2 to match up against the opposing number 1 and lost several Friday night games and lost several series as well. Stone is a home run machine. Start out Tuesday night guy on Friday and use Johnny whole staff on Tuesday night. Keep TV on the Saturday game. Keep Stone and Pitzer on Sunday.

No, we don't need to get MSU fan message board cute. We need to start Tico on Friday, then Stone who needs to keep the ball down much better than he did today, and then what I would personally do is go Maddox Miller. Foster still could only manage one clean inning today. He looked better sure but I have a feeling that it would be more of the same with him. We just need to keep him in relief for now. What we need is for Stone to start to go deeper in games even if it's one more inning it would be helpful. If we get 2-3 innings out of Miller- that's fine. It is what it is. I think we need to start using Logar more during midweek and probably need to start using Rhodes more out of the bullpen. Even with McPherson getting hurt we still got through this weekend without using Burns and Billingsley.

Theoretical weekend:

Fri- Tico for 7 and then Ben Davis for 2
Sat- Stone for 4 and then Sweeney for 2-3, Gleason for 2 and then Webb closes for 1 inning
Sun- Miller for 2-3 Burns for 1, Rhodes for 1 maybe 2, Foster for 1, Billingsley for 1, Pitzer for 2-3, and then default back to Davis or Gleason based on pitch count with the understanding that they will be shutdown midweek if they pitch twice in a weekend.

Rumor is 3-6 weeks due to a forearm strain.

If that's true, we dodged a bullet.

I'll take that all day.

You know I watched the highlights of the game and I noticed he was throwing 99 MPH fastballs and his breaking balls had a lot more tilt/shape to them. Basically, I think he just overdid it due to the environment.

[SPMT]

Wtf? The Duke is an SEC SP and we have other candidates as well that can start. Every SEC team is worried about their 3rd SP every damn weekend. We have just gone from really good depth to guys needing to step up

No kidding. Folks just go straight to catastrophe.

[Todd4State]

The one saving grace we have is our offense can mash. That's going to help us out a lot. And it looks like Parker is understanding how to use his staff much better than he did last week. Based on what BOC said they had an epiphany.

Vanderbilt can hit. They're 8th in the SEC right now which isn't unreal but it's not bad. And our bullpen shut them down. The only guy they hit was Stone.

Four of our next six SEC opponents are hitting worse than Vanderbilt did right now for context. Like 12th (Tennessee) 13th (LSU) 14th (Ole Miss) and 16th (South Carolina). Then you have Georgia who is 2nd behind us but we play them in Starkville and then Texas is 4th in case you are wondering.

[The Federalist Engineer]

McP will miss:

(1) Ole Miss
(2) Georgia
(3) Tennessee
----- maybe ----
(4) South Carolina
(5) LSU
(6) Texas

Some of those Fridays you would lose with or without McP. But you will lose a minimum of 36 innings in that span, 6 to 7 per weekend. They will need to replaced with a non Team USA and All SEC type player. So it means you are also weaker in the pen because a top bullpen guy is now your starter.

The freakish loss of Kirk really hurts because Foster has gone Cerantola. The most MSU thing to happen is that Rhoads becomes 2016-Pilkington for 6 weeks. Gives BOC three quality innings every Sunday. Logar is forgiven for whatever he did. Or, Burns becomes the stud that MLB and Parker think he is.

[Saltydog]

IMO, move Davis into a starter beginning this weekend. Once McPherson is back use him as the closer. He's going to be limited anyway so just swap the two.

[tcdog70]

What about Sully?

[maroonmania]

Wtf? The Duke is an SEC SP and we have other candidates as well that can start. Every SEC team is worried about their 3rd SP every damn weekend. We have just gone from really good depth to guys needing to step up

Duke is fine as an SEC Sunday starter. Not exactly thrilled to move him up to Saturday. So far he has struggled to get past 4 innings.

[Coursesuper]

IMO, move Davis into a starter beginning this weekend. Once McPherson is back use him as the closer. He's going to be limited anyway so just swap the two.

He's not a starter that would make him an opener. Trying to get one time thru the line up with him and hope for the best, I'm not a fan of that approach. He's much more effective at the backend where he can use that 2 seam and sinker for 6 or 7 outs. Gotta find a way to piece it together to get to him.

[cheewgumm]

Tico
Stone
Davis

The end

[Coach34]

Duke is fine as an SEC Sunday starter. Not exactly thrilled to move him up to Saturday. So far he has struggled to get past 4 innings.

Only 4 SEC SP's out of 16 that started G3 this past weekend for their school went at least 5 innings. Candy's guy was making his 1st SEC start and didnt even get an out.

[Coursesuper]

Duke is fine as an SEC Sunday starter. Not exactly thrilled to move him up to Saturday. So far he has struggled to get past 4 innings.

Duke has great stuff , that change up is just gross. He has problems when he misses his spot with the fastball, his is kinda flat, so if he leaves it in the middle third it can get turned around. He is growing every time out and will get better every outing. Yesterday he got hit hard on FB middle middle, I really think that's what he was asked to do up six. The other miss was FB inside and kid smoked it, but we should have been out of that inning.

[KOdawg1]

Tico
Stone
Davis

The end

Gotta have Davis in the Bullpen.

Tico
Stone
Pitzer or Miller

[Coach34]

And another problem- who do we start tomorrow?

[maroonmania]

Only 4 SEC SP's out of 16 that started G3 this past weekend for their school went at least 5 innings. Candy's guy was making his 1st SEC start and didnt even get an out.

Yea, we only think we have problems. Vandy's pitching staff is a train wreck right now after you get past 2 or 3 guys.

[Lord McBuckethead]

Vandy simply could not get above 92 mph. That is essentially batting practice speeds based on what our dudes have seen from Arkansas. Here is to 30 more games with that type of speed.

[DawgFromOxford]

Time for Sully to start loosening the arm up again. He was serviceable last year. Let him eat a couple of innings during the midweek.

[cheewgumm]

Gotta have Davis in the Bullpen.

Tico
Stone
Pitzer or Miller

I'm torn to be honest. So, I'll be good either way. You may be right here.