According to several sources, Tulane, moving from 19 wins to 36 wins, season over season, was the second-best improvement in the NCAA’s Division 1.
Final RPI won’t be calculated until after the College World Series, though it shouldn’t change much. Regardless, through our completed season, Tulane’s RPI improved from 158 to 83. Strength of schedule (SOS) ranked #88 after facing the 35th toughest schedule in 2023. From an RPI standpoint, our late season and post-season performance changed things dramatically. After losing to UNO on May 7th, our RPI stood at 135, not significantly better than last season. But going 10-3 against tougher competition that dropped our SOS from 132 to 88 was key. A great improvement.
On the offensive side, our guys hit .279 as a team with 91 HR’s (1.5 per game). Last year, we hit .251 with 82 HR’s (1.3 per game). Run production was also up from 6.0 per game to 7.3. That ranks us #93 after finishing in 224th place last year.
Pitching also greatly improved, though leaving a great deal to be desired. In 2023, the staff had a 7.08 ERA and struck out 643 (9.3 per 9 innings) while walking or hitting 374 (6.5 per 9 innings). This year’s squad had a 5.37 ERA. Strike outs were down, 511 (8.4 per 9 innings), but so were the free passes- 346 (5.7 per 9 innings). The final game against Oregon State where we handed out 17 BB’s and HBP’s was the low point for our staff.
Defensively, we allowed 371 runs this year, good for 87th place in the runs allowed per game category. In 2023, those numbers were 470 runs and 223rd place.
Oddly, though most consider pitching and defense our major issues, placing 93rd in runs per game and 87th in runs allowed per game puts a different spin on the situation than I expected. Those rankings are really close.
Transfers were certainly a major part of the offense but less so than I had thought. This year’s transfers (Rasmussen, Tuft, Cline, Haas, and Rose) batted .269 as a group while hitting a HR every 25 at bats on average. Returning players (primarily Margot, Shultz, Banks, Linn, and Lombardi) hit .289 with a HR every 22 at bats.
On the pitching side, new transfers accounted for 56% of all the innings thrown by the Wave this season for a 5.69 ERA. Returning pitchers accounted for the other 44% with a 5.01 ERA.
Sadly, none of our incoming freshmen, both position players and pitchers, played even an inning this season. During the years freshmen have been allowed to play varsity ball, that could be an historic first.
A seemingly unassailable axiom in baseball is the importance of getting to the opponents’ bullpen. For us, that seems to have worked as we hit .269 against starters but improved that to .289 against the pen. Starters compiled a 6.15 ERA against us, while relievers gave up 7.65 earned runs per nine innings. Oddly, opponents hit .285 against our starters and only .270 against our relievers. Of course, due to the plethora of “free passes” from our bullpen, opponents had an on-base percentage of .367 against starters and .386 facing our relievers. The ERA’s for our starters and relievers were virtually identical, however, at 5.36 and 5.38 respectively. So, at least based on these numbers, getting to the pen was good for us and not a major factor for our opponents.
One of my favorite statistics is how batters fare based on the count, specifically, how they do with no strikes, one strike, and two strikes. I think two big issues drive the numbers. The first is selectivity. The fewer the strikes, the more selective a batter can be. With no strikes on the hitter, if he doesn’t like a pitch, even if it’s a strike, he needn’t swing. With one strike his selectivity may be reduced somewhat, but with two strikes, he’s got to swing at pitches he might otherwise disregard—even those that may be close to, but out of, the strike zone. It’s also more dangerous to “guess’ with two strikes. The second, and more obvious, issue is the strikeout. With two strikes, a taken strike or a swing-and-miss results in an out. Not so with less than two strikes.
As an example of the first issue, one would expect hitters to be more successful the more selective they can be. They simply hit better pitches. Over the past ten years, Tulane hitters have batted .380, .368. and .328 when putting the ball in play with zero, one and two strikes on them respectively. But, the second issue is key. With two strikes, when you add in the strikeouts, our guys hit only .166 over the past ten years. This year had a slight anomaly and, in fact, a first-time result. When putting the ball in play, we hit .370, .356, and .358 with zero, one, and two strikes. That’s the first time in ten years that the two-strike statistic was better than the success with one strike on the batter. Despite that, we still hit only .189 with two strikes when strikeouts are counted. The only time we exceeded .189 in the past decade was in the Covid-shortened year of 2020 when we hit .201 with two strikes. Comparatively, we were a pretty good two-strike hitting ball club.
My final statistic involves our coach. This year Coach Uhlman increased his record to 58-62 (.483), which still trails each of the past seven head coaches: Abadie (.530), Retif (.626), Brockhof (.640), Jones (.647), Pierce (.623) and Jewett (.528). The good news is that if we can win 40 games next season and lose fewer than 25 games, he will pass both Jewett and Abadie in winning percentage. That probably assumes at least a regional bid. If we can retain our best players and replace some others with better ones, I think that is possible. Here’s hoping.
Roll Wave!!!
Final RPI won’t be calculated until after the College World Series, though it shouldn’t change much. Regardless, through our completed season, Tulane’s RPI improved from 158 to 83. Strength of schedule (SOS) ranked #88 after facing the 35th toughest schedule in 2023. From an RPI standpoint, our late season and post-season performance changed things dramatically. After losing to UNO on May 7th, our RPI stood at 135, not significantly better than last season. But going 10-3 against tougher competition that dropped our SOS from 132 to 88 was key. A great improvement.
On the offensive side, our guys hit .279 as a team with 91 HR’s (1.5 per game). Last year, we hit .251 with 82 HR’s (1.3 per game). Run production was also up from 6.0 per game to 7.3. That ranks us #93 after finishing in 224th place last year.
Pitching also greatly improved, though leaving a great deal to be desired. In 2023, the staff had a 7.08 ERA and struck out 643 (9.3 per 9 innings) while walking or hitting 374 (6.5 per 9 innings). This year’s squad had a 5.37 ERA. Strike outs were down, 511 (8.4 per 9 innings), but so were the free passes- 346 (5.7 per 9 innings). The final game against Oregon State where we handed out 17 BB’s and HBP’s was the low point for our staff.
Defensively, we allowed 371 runs this year, good for 87th place in the runs allowed per game category. In 2023, those numbers were 470 runs and 223rd place.
Oddly, though most consider pitching and defense our major issues, placing 93rd in runs per game and 87th in runs allowed per game puts a different spin on the situation than I expected. Those rankings are really close.
Transfers were certainly a major part of the offense but less so than I had thought. This year’s transfers (Rasmussen, Tuft, Cline, Haas, and Rose) batted .269 as a group while hitting a HR every 25 at bats on average. Returning players (primarily Margot, Shultz, Banks, Linn, and Lombardi) hit .289 with a HR every 22 at bats.
On the pitching side, new transfers accounted for 56% of all the innings thrown by the Wave this season for a 5.69 ERA. Returning pitchers accounted for the other 44% with a 5.01 ERA.
Sadly, none of our incoming freshmen, both position players and pitchers, played even an inning this season. During the years freshmen have been allowed to play varsity ball, that could be an historic first.
A seemingly unassailable axiom in baseball is the importance of getting to the opponents’ bullpen. For us, that seems to have worked as we hit .269 against starters but improved that to .289 against the pen. Starters compiled a 6.15 ERA against us, while relievers gave up 7.65 earned runs per nine innings. Oddly, opponents hit .285 against our starters and only .270 against our relievers. Of course, due to the plethora of “free passes” from our bullpen, opponents had an on-base percentage of .367 against starters and .386 facing our relievers. The ERA’s for our starters and relievers were virtually identical, however, at 5.36 and 5.38 respectively. So, at least based on these numbers, getting to the pen was good for us and not a major factor for our opponents.
One of my favorite statistics is how batters fare based on the count, specifically, how they do with no strikes, one strike, and two strikes. I think two big issues drive the numbers. The first is selectivity. The fewer the strikes, the more selective a batter can be. With no strikes on the hitter, if he doesn’t like a pitch, even if it’s a strike, he needn’t swing. With one strike his selectivity may be reduced somewhat, but with two strikes, he’s got to swing at pitches he might otherwise disregard—even those that may be close to, but out of, the strike zone. It’s also more dangerous to “guess’ with two strikes. The second, and more obvious, issue is the strikeout. With two strikes, a taken strike or a swing-and-miss results in an out. Not so with less than two strikes.
As an example of the first issue, one would expect hitters to be more successful the more selective they can be. They simply hit better pitches. Over the past ten years, Tulane hitters have batted .380, .368. and .328 when putting the ball in play with zero, one and two strikes on them respectively. But, the second issue is key. With two strikes, when you add in the strikeouts, our guys hit only .166 over the past ten years. This year had a slight anomaly and, in fact, a first-time result. When putting the ball in play, we hit .370, .356, and .358 with zero, one, and two strikes. That’s the first time in ten years that the two-strike statistic was better than the success with one strike on the batter. Despite that, we still hit only .189 with two strikes when strikeouts are counted. The only time we exceeded .189 in the past decade was in the Covid-shortened year of 2020 when we hit .201 with two strikes. Comparatively, we were a pretty good two-strike hitting ball club.
My final statistic involves our coach. This year Coach Uhlman increased his record to 58-62 (.483), which still trails each of the past seven head coaches: Abadie (.530), Retif (.626), Brockhof (.640), Jones (.647), Pierce (.623) and Jewett (.528). The good news is that if we can win 40 games next season and lose fewer than 25 games, he will pass both Jewett and Abadie in winning percentage. That probably assumes at least a regional bid. If we can retain our best players and replace some others with better ones, I think that is possible. Here’s hoping.
Roll Wave!!!
Last edited:
