We won two of three and I, along with most everyone else, would have been happy with that prior to the first pitch on Friday. After winning the first two and having a two run lead going into the 8th inning, however, it’s hard to be too happy after the fact. Last year, when leading after seven, we went 24-3. So, losing this one was very disappointing.
There were some real positives, however. We made only one error, Alemais’ bad throw on Saturday. We made some good plays on cutoffs to throw out a couple of runners and covered bases well. Also, it appeared that our outfielders got good jumps on most balls. Willsey, Alemais, and Hope all cover a lot of ground for their positions and that’s probably as important, if not more so, than our .991 fielding percentage after three games. Of course, that is spectacular.
At bat, Montalbano and Alemais came out of the weekend with batting averages above .360 and each had at least one really clutch hit, with Montalbano’s HR being about as clutch as it can get. I was also impressed with Kaplan and Carthon, not only with their .300+ batting averages but what appeared to me to be much more confidence against left handers. Last year, both were virtually certain outs against lefties; not so this year.
I thought Hunter Williams and Jake Rogers hit into a little bit of bad luck, but between them, they’re only 2 for 19 after three games, so I can’t attribute it all to “luck.” Of course Witherspoon, who went 2 for 3 on Sunday, may have taken all of their luck as he got a seeing-eye ground ball single and a misplayed pop up in short right center for his second hit.
Willsey and Hope each got wind-aided HR’s which was clearly good and I thought Willsey had some other good at bats as well. Hope, however, didn’t stand a chance against any pitcher who could throw three straight curves 6” to a foot outside of the plate. He fanned 7 of his 10 at bats this weekend, and generally looked bad doing it. Preseason I thought Rowland had a chance to take the third base job but he looked equally bad at the plate in his one appearance—took two right down the middle and swung at a curve ball in the other batter’s box. Not good.
Neither Grant Brown nor Jarrett DeHart looked good at the plate either. Between them they fanned six times in eight at bats with DeHart striking out in all four of his plate appearances. For a guy with so much hype, he really looked overmatched. I hope that’s just a short term problem.
And, as a team, our sacrifice bunting was woeful. I doubt Coach Pierce will put up with that very long.
All that said, I’ve got to believe the pitching we faced was probably better than what we’ll see game in/game out this year and the .255 we hit as a team this weekend was slightly better that the .253 we hit all last season’s. But we’ll need to do a lot better if we’re to make it to the regionals and beyond.
On the mound, there was both a lot of good news and a lot of bad news. Our starters, Merrill, Massey, and Gibbs, didn’t allow a run in 19.1 innings and only surrendered 10 hits and 8 BB’s. They also struck out 21. I thought France and Colletti also looked good in relief. Colletti was a particular surprise to me. But after that, it was all disappointing. Simms, Ross Massey, Rankin, Bjornfield, Duester, and Yandel all performed badly. Between them they threw only 3.1 innings, allowed 11 hits, 8 earned runs, and six BB’s and gave up two leads in three games. That they struck out six was positive but overwhelmed by all the negatives. I am convinced those six guys (or at least some of them) can pitch better than that. But, results on the field are going to have to improve greatly because I also don’t think we can expect the same kind of performance every week from our three starters. That’s not possible.
Anyway, a 2-1 weekend gave us a series win against what will probably be a pretty good team by season’s end. They have some solid pitching and a “never quit” attitude that will likely serve them well.
Maybe we’ll see them again in the post season.
Roll Wave!!!
