Spaceman_Spiff

Flores, wow. This inning is insane

Anyone know what happened to Burke?

Unrelated, but man losing Carlson for the season sucks. Big difference having him in the lineup, he was a key driver of turning outs into walks or hits. Get Daly sucks, but Flores and Belyeu is a rough back of the lineup

After OU I said Morehouse shouldn’t see the mound again this year. Since then, he’s thrown 5.1 and given up 8ER, 11R… Pierce’s pitcher management kills me sometimes

Someone explain to me how we failed to use Tole, Burke, or Shaw…

Is Tole injured? What about Burke??

They do it on two strikes. For easier film review im guessing

Took some time to process the loss this weekend. Painful as it was, I think we can recover and the core of our pitching staff is still good. The last two weekends are a wicked combination of bad luck, mediocre and untimely hitting, questionable usage, and the final straw on a few members of the pitching staff. Here’s how I’d manage the staff going forward. Friday: Gordon, under appreciated for a great if not totally dominant year. Saturday: LBJ, has the stuff and has shown the glimpses to get it done. Sunday: Hurley, Baylor was a dumpster fire but there just isn’t a third starter to keep him sidelined or out of the pen. Tuesday: Sthele, just not good enough. Tracking at less than 5IP and 3+ ER per game. Maybe you hope he can give you 3-4 good innings Sunday and then go to Hurley for 3. But he has a pretty consistent body of work that seems to confirm he’s a 5+ ERA guy on weekends. Morehouse probably needs the Kubicheck treatment. Potentially sit him. Maybe work in low leverage weekday innings or big lead middle inning stuff. But barring something dramatic, I don’t see how you justify another shot with any sort of stakes. The pen actually has several solid arms. Shaw, Tole, Burke can cover quality leverage innings. Lummus, Minchey, and even AD can eat low leverage innings and even stretch when needed. Witt could be a real X-factor. The cracks are definitely showing and we just got punched in the mouth. But Im not ready to write off this team. If they can regroup and if the coaches use the hitters and pitchers we have well to put them in a place to succeed, I still think we can be dangerous.

I know I’m a broken record, but playing Flores at this point in the season is really frustrating. Carlson, Galvan, and JD have way more upside right now.

Sure glad we decided to DH the worst hitter on the team by a mile in the 6 spot

Looks like a depth piece. ~.700 OPS against Ivy competition as a Senior…

Great win. Weird too, because ACU isn’t a pushover. Think this is a Q2 win.

Unreal. Pull him. Has to be his last appearance closing

I think we need to accept Zane is a Tuesday starter, not more

Keep it going Thomas, good stuff

Does seem like Pierce is much more conscious of rotating young guys in this year. Have to think its related to Kash and NIL. Also, still no dice for Carlson. Thomas is improving, but it still surprises me.

I like the 2018 comparison. Deeper top of the lineup, but a much weaker 6-9 that balances to about even right now. If we could get Carlson in there or lift Thomas and O’Dowd a bit it’d be very exciting. Better starters, and deeper pen overall, but missing that shutdown reliever duo we had in McGuire and PJR (man, who saw that coming). Witt and/or better play from 1 or 2 guys on the staff would really elevate this team to a potential contender.

Some data tidbits from looking at the team stats. -On a productivity basis we look like our 2021 team with worse pitching -The separation on our hitters is crazy. 1-5 have wOBAs in the 400s then O’Dowd, Daly, and Thomas are probably putting up bottom 10 worst hitting seasons under Pierce. -Daly’s stats continue to look worse, even than last year. Weirdly he has a very similar statline the last two years to EK in 2021 -Galvan has 9 hits and 4 are HRs. He basically lives TTO -Were giving up half the HR rate we did last year, which is basically all our improvement in pitching (a lot). Not sure if luck or what. Last year’s rate was a very weird outlier -A lot more free passes this year. Sthele the only one keeping the walks under control. Hasn’t 100% played out, but Sthele looks a lot better stat wise than LBJ. Maybe narrows in later innings

I’d probably put in Carlson, and replace Thomas (Powell to 1B) before anything else. Daly is who he is, but the defensive dropoff with another SS is too big to risk. And we’re struggling already defensively. Its not like Daly is the one weak link in our lineup.

Winning 10 in a row and the rest of our opponents solidified their resumes. SEC teams we faced are all T25, and Indiana/CSF/SHSU are Q2.

Tennessee swept to start conference play. Don’t mind that. Makes me feel better dropping the game to Mizzou too.

I’m cautiously optimistic. I get something like a 2017 vibe, with better top-end hitting and more balanced (though maybe not front-line dominant) pitching. Powell unlocks a lot higher ceiling for this squad. This was a very easy stretch, so I don’t think we should be resetting expectations yet. But I think we’re solidly in-play for top half of the Big 12, and if we pick up a 2/3 seed somewhere then Pierce teams are very dangerous in playoff play. Lets let it ride.

Have to think yes. Figure AD puts serious pressure to make a change in the staff and starts assembling a list. Though I think Lemonis would have one more year to turn it around

Flores over Carlson is a bit mystifying frankly. Isn’t Carlson way better defensively? Don’t know how its not Powell at 1B and Carlson at 3B. Freshmen are just not ready this year.

Yeah, your point is where I was thinking. Lots of ways it could have gone down that shift our view, and we’ll never know. Very easily could be attitude, but its not like Pierce hasn’t shown himself to be pretty dogmatic about how he approaches lineup/pitching selection - one way or the other. End of the day, it would make a big difference with him on the team. But we’ve got talent and more on the way. We’ll be fine