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Rivalry Week in Review
Starting the week we knew McPherson was out and we had a USM team coming in that had beaten us early in the season and then Ole Miss on the road. Then we find out that Billingsley would be the surprise starter against USM that had everyone a little worried. Well, what happens? MSU comes out and run rules the imposters from Hattiesburg 12-0 pitching a guy that had mostly struggled all year and mostly freshmen and shut them out. I don't know if y'all have seen Christian Ostrander's postgame for that game but he looks like what I would envision Robert E Lee looked like after Gettysburg. Complete shock and awe and just absolutely decimated.
Speaking of Gettysburg- then we have to go to Ole Miss. We decide to pitch Chuck Foster who had struggled all year against Ole Miss here Hunter Elliott. And Foster absolutely steps up and it sounds like he wasn't 100% to start the year anyway. But he goes toe to toe with Elliott and we grind him out of the game and get a lead. Then Ben Davis gives up a home run and it looks like it might all go for naught. But then Chone James stepped up and Ole Miss's RF slipped down and we got the win. Tyler Pitzer picked Davis up and got the win. At that point, I knew we had a good chance to sweep.
Then Saturday comes and Tico was off which apparently means five innings of shutout baseball and 9 strike outs. Jacob Parker stepped up and launched a ball out of the yard along with Frei and freshman Maddox Miller steps up and gives us two solid innings and we win again- 6-1. Just a solid all around win.
Finally came the coup de grace- the Sunday game three which started with MSU hitting 3 home runs off of a guy who hadn't allowed any all year I think. And yeah- he probably wasn't 100% but he pitched pretty well. Ace Reese, Milewski, Jacob Parker again who hit one to their porta potty (classy) in right field, and then you had Andrew Raymond getting into the act as well. Stone was a little amped up I could tell but he gave us 5 innings and only allowed one run which I will take any Sunday. But then the best thing to me was Ben Davis coming in after he got knocked around and was wild on Friday- he comes back today and just blows their ass away in the 7th and then gets their most dangerous hitter out with the bases loaded to get out of a jam he made. That's stepping up and being a DAWG. And then Dane Burns did his job when we asked him to.
You have to give the coaches a lot of credit. Justin Parker has been developing our staff and it seems like when they have a bad game they come back a lot of times like Ben Davis did. Davis and Sweeney have had their struggles and their ERA's are in the 5's. But then you look at guys like Jack Gleason, Dane Burns, Tyler Pitzer, and Maddux Webb- all have ERA's under 2.00. Then what he did with Billingsley and Foster this week plus Bauer coming back after three weeks in the lab. It has been really good to see. And I don't think these guys have hit their ceiling yet except for maybe Tico and that's because he just dominates every time out. There is still room to grow and get better.
And then Kevin McMullen- we are sitting guys that are hitting .400 on the bench in some cases. And no one is complaining or questioning it because there is no reason to because the lineup 1-9 is killing it no matter who we put out there. We talk about Ace Reese struggling- he hits a bomb in his first at bat today and I think he had 3-4 hits this series. I'd have to look but I wouldn't be surprised if he ended up at like .250 for this series. Everyone who we regularly start is hitting over .300 except for Milewski and he's at .241 I think it was right now with 5 bombs. He's good day against Grambling and a hot weekend away from hitting .300 himself. And you have to talk about Jacob Parker. He looks like the next great MSU player. Unreal power but he's having mostly productive at bats and I think someone said he is hitting SEC pitching better than OOC pitching. We don't have too many baserunning mistakes although yeah- I don't think Noah Sulllivan should ever try stealing again especially on a 0-2 count. The biggest thing is I want to see Ryder Woodson improve defensively at SS and Andrew Raymond do a better job of keeping balls in front of him. But that's all I got as far as complaints. Blue blood problems.
I hope this keeps up and we have a special season because the first half has been pretty fun overall.
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Mileweski has 4 singles, 0 doubles, 0 triples, 5 homers.
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Damn fine segway between the first and second paragraphs. Bravo sir!
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the only thing this team is missing...as far as starting 9...is elite defense at short. that's it. parker is so impressive. his swing is sweet and easy. and he noticeably shortens up with two strikes just to put the ball in play, see friday night to tie the game.
from a pitching standpoint there's lots to like about the weekend...pitzer, miller, foster, tico, stone battling his mechanics and not being as sharp...and even davis showing the stuff but still being frustrating as hell.
the greatest part of the weekend tho is how we really embarassed them...or they embarassed themselves. dropping pop ups, getting picked between the first baseman's legs, falling down on the game winning triple friday. loved every minute of it.
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Right now, Parker looks night and day from 3 weeks ago even. His at bats lately have been much better with alot less swing and miss. I'm sure he will still have some freshmen at-bats at times but I never expected him to do more than play mid week games against SWAC teams. A very worrisome pitching staff (mostly bullpen) 2 weeks ago is showing much improvement; hopefully they keep progressing.
Have yall seen the polls this morning? Southern is in the top 10 after we run ruled them and they haven't dominated their weekends the last two weeks; I don't think they are as good as they thought they were. Right now it looks like 5 or 6 elite teams and then a bunch of teams jockying. I hate to say it, but keep an eye on florida to make a move.
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Originally Posted by
somebodyshotmypaw
Mileweski has 4 singles, 0 doubles, 0 triples, 5 homers.
Our own Dave Kingman 2.0, but a really good catcher to boot. Hail Kong! Hail State!
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Great recap and assessment Todd ... The weekend felt special but so has the entire season so far. It sure is fun again.
OXFORD, Miss. (WTVA) - Ole Miss campus police ask students to behave at future baseball games following a recent incident.
The university said students were reportedly throwing rocks at Georgia baseball players during last weekend's series.
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Psst, Chone James is legit with the bat, he just needs an everyday position.
406 batting average and he has the clutch gene.
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Good write-up Todd.
One thing we need to examine is Stall. Doing a very good job at 1st buttttt is struggling at the plate some. The .351 BA is a little misleading. He is 8-34 in SEC play (.235) which is not awful, however that does include his 4 for 5 vs Candy. Take out that one game and in the other 8 he is 4/29- .138. I'm not saying we need to trash him- but it does tell me Cornholio needs some starts mixed in.
Walk like the King or walk like you don't care who the King is
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Originally Posted by
Coach34
Good write-up Todd.
One thing we need to examine is Stall. Doing a very good job at 1st buttttt is struggling at the plate some. The .351 BA is a little misleading. He is 8-34 in SEC play (.235) which is not awful, however that does include his 4 for 5 vs Candy. Take out that one game and in the other 8 he is 4/29- .138. I'm not saying we need to trash him- but it does tell me Cornholio needs some starts mixed in.
I think this is where you follow Crash Davis' advice - "Don't $@<k with a winning streak." The lineup has gelled and we have rolled off 8 straight wins and are looking for more with 9 upcoming home games. It's chance to put some cushion between us and the rest of the SEC.
"After dealing with Ole Miss for over a year," he said, "I've learned to expect their leadership to do and say things that the leadership at other Division I schools would never consider doing and to justify their actions by reminding themselves that "We're Ole Miss.""
- Tom Mars, Esq. 4.9.18
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Additionally, who wouldn't be ecstatic with this line of production from a position we were worried about 3 weeks into the season:
.327 AVG, 28 RS, 4 2B, 7 HR, 28 RBI, .579 SLUG
That's the collective output of our 3 catchers
- Milewski .243 Avg, 10 RS, 0 2B, 5 HR, 10 RBI, .649 Slg
- Raymond .342 Avg, 5 RS, 3 2B, 1 HR, 6 RBI, .500 Slg
- James .406 Avg, 13 RS, 1 2B,1 HR, 12 RBI, .594 Slg
That's 3 good pieces that Oak can mix-and-match with during the course of a game, and now that Milewski is finally healthy, I could see us pushing for 20 homers collectively primarily from the backstop position by season's end.
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Originally Posted by
Coach34
Good write-up Todd.
One thing we need to examine is Stall. Doing a very good job at 1st buttttt is struggling at the plate some. The .351 BA is a little misleading. He is 8-34 in SEC play (.235) which is not awful, however that does include his 4 for 5 vs Candy. Take out that one game and in the other 8 he is 4/29- .138. I'm not saying we need to trash him- but it does tell me Cornholio needs some starts mixed in.
Definitely could rotate Bevis in against LH pitching. Stallman has actually been really good defensively at 1st also.
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