Thanks to Scott Kushner and Chandler Rome, four candidates for Tulane's baseball job have been identified, with Vanderbilt associate head coach Travis Jewett and UCSB head coach Andrew Checketts joining the Andy Cannizaro and Matt Riser, both of whom interviewed Wednesday.
Here's my assessment of each one:
CANNIZARO
Coaching career: LSU recruiting coordinator and hitting coach the past two years, Yankees scout for five years before then.
Pluses: This Mandeville native was one of the greatest players in Tulane history and loves the university. He's a heck of a recruiter who is ticketed for the big time as a coach after two years as hitting coach for LSU. He's the favored candidate of most Tulane baseball bigwigs. LSU improved dramatically at the plate in his first year, hitting .314 (fourth best in the country) while leading the nation in base hits, ranking third in stolen bases and doubles and seventh in runs. The Tigers also led the SEC in fewest strikeouts, a dramatic difference from what we've seen from Tulane the past two years.
Minuses: Not much coaching experience. With an inexperienced lineup, LSU dipped to .295 at the plate this year but improved markedly in the second half of the season.
RISER
Coaching career: head coach at Southeastern Louisiana the past three years after spending six seasons as an assistant to Jay Artigues there. Never coached any place else.
Pluses: Another Tulane baseball alum (2005-06), Riser knows what it takes to win at Tulane. Southeastern has made two NCAA regionals in his three years as head coach after doing it twice in school history before then. The Lions play aggressively and swept Tulane in home-and-home games this year, earning their first-ever at-large bid to a regional. As a private school, Tulane presents difference challenges than Southeastern, but it's not easy to win in Hammond, and Riser has done it, going 120-63 in three years.
Minuses: He was 29 when he got the Southeastern head coaching job and will be only 32 at the start of next season. He does not have much seasoning or any experience coaching at a private school. Southeastern has been sloppy defensively for the most part and has been outmatched in regional play, getting outscored 42-16 in six games with its lone victories by one run against Bryant and Utah Valley.
JEWETT
Coaching career: Four years as Vandy associate head coach, hitting coach and recruiting coordinator, three years in the same capacity at Arizona State, five years as an assistant at Washington State, three years as an assistant at Washington, three years as third base coach at Gonzaga.
Pluses: He's very experienced and won everywhere he has been, including perennial bottom feeder Washington State, which went to an NCAA regional in 2009 for the first time in almost 20 years. Vanderbilt won a national championship in 2014, hitting .322 in the regional and super regional before stealing a CWS-record 17 stolen bases in seven games in Omaha. Vandy hit .313 in 2013, Jewett's first year, after hitting .268 in 2012. Vanderbilt hit 69 home runs in 2015, its most since the gorilla-ball days of 1998, and led the SEC in doubles and triples.
Minuses: Vanderbilt has plenty of scholarship advantages Tulane does not enjoy, stockpiling major league-caliber talent that is impossible to get for the Green Wave. It's not clear how Jewett would handle the difference. A native of Tacoma, Wash who graduated from Washington State, he spent the rest of his career working on the West Coast.
CHECKETTS
Coaching career: head coach at USCB (Cal-Santa Barbara) the last five years. Spent three years as pitching coach and recruiting coordinator for Oregon, seven years as pitching coach at UC Riverside, coached at Riverside Community College before that.
Pluses: Made the College World Series with UCSB this year despite losing a wealth of talent from 2015. It was the Gauchos' first ever appearance in Omaha, and they did it by stunning Louisville in two straight at Louisville after the Cardinals had lost one home game all year. Last year they were a No. 1 seed, hosting a regional at a minor league facility in California because their own facility was not up to snuff. Despite that minus, he has built a terrific program. His teams' pitching numbers have been outstanding, with UCSB having a 2.45 ERA in 2015 and Oregon ranking among the top five in one of his years there. He has been rated one of the top rising coaches in college baseball for quite some time.
Minuses: His entire career has been spent on the West Coast and at public schools. The Gauchos have been a light hitting team, never hitting better than .289 under his watch. As a player, he spent one year at the school I covered, Florida (1995), before transferring to Oregon State, blowing an opportunity to play for a CWS team in 1996 (I'm joking that this is a minus; there's very little to criticize in his resume').
MY OVERALL ASSESSMENT
All four candidates are capable of winning at Tulane and continuing the success David Pierce brought the past two years. Riser would be last on my list, but that's only because of the quality of the other three candidates. Cannizaro, who if passed over will cause some major consternation from key folks, probably is the biggest risk of the remaining three, but his upside is huge. I love Jewett's record of success everywhere he's been. It reminds me of Pierce's but without the ultimate proof of doing it as a head coach. If he is a good fit for Louisiana, Checketts would be a home run in my view. Yes, recruiting can be more challenging at a private school without a bunch of extra scholarships cloaked in academics or other areas, but Pierce had a similar background.
I don't think Troy Dannen will go wrong with this hire. What do you think?
Here's my assessment of each one:
CANNIZARO
Coaching career: LSU recruiting coordinator and hitting coach the past two years, Yankees scout for five years before then.
Pluses: This Mandeville native was one of the greatest players in Tulane history and loves the university. He's a heck of a recruiter who is ticketed for the big time as a coach after two years as hitting coach for LSU. He's the favored candidate of most Tulane baseball bigwigs. LSU improved dramatically at the plate in his first year, hitting .314 (fourth best in the country) while leading the nation in base hits, ranking third in stolen bases and doubles and seventh in runs. The Tigers also led the SEC in fewest strikeouts, a dramatic difference from what we've seen from Tulane the past two years.
Minuses: Not much coaching experience. With an inexperienced lineup, LSU dipped to .295 at the plate this year but improved markedly in the second half of the season.
RISER
Coaching career: head coach at Southeastern Louisiana the past three years after spending six seasons as an assistant to Jay Artigues there. Never coached any place else.
Pluses: Another Tulane baseball alum (2005-06), Riser knows what it takes to win at Tulane. Southeastern has made two NCAA regionals in his three years as head coach after doing it twice in school history before then. The Lions play aggressively and swept Tulane in home-and-home games this year, earning their first-ever at-large bid to a regional. As a private school, Tulane presents difference challenges than Southeastern, but it's not easy to win in Hammond, and Riser has done it, going 120-63 in three years.
Minuses: He was 29 when he got the Southeastern head coaching job and will be only 32 at the start of next season. He does not have much seasoning or any experience coaching at a private school. Southeastern has been sloppy defensively for the most part and has been outmatched in regional play, getting outscored 42-16 in six games with its lone victories by one run against Bryant and Utah Valley.
JEWETT
Coaching career: Four years as Vandy associate head coach, hitting coach and recruiting coordinator, three years in the same capacity at Arizona State, five years as an assistant at Washington State, three years as an assistant at Washington, three years as third base coach at Gonzaga.
Pluses: He's very experienced and won everywhere he has been, including perennial bottom feeder Washington State, which went to an NCAA regional in 2009 for the first time in almost 20 years. Vanderbilt won a national championship in 2014, hitting .322 in the regional and super regional before stealing a CWS-record 17 stolen bases in seven games in Omaha. Vandy hit .313 in 2013, Jewett's first year, after hitting .268 in 2012. Vanderbilt hit 69 home runs in 2015, its most since the gorilla-ball days of 1998, and led the SEC in doubles and triples.
Minuses: Vanderbilt has plenty of scholarship advantages Tulane does not enjoy, stockpiling major league-caliber talent that is impossible to get for the Green Wave. It's not clear how Jewett would handle the difference. A native of Tacoma, Wash who graduated from Washington State, he spent the rest of his career working on the West Coast.
CHECKETTS
Coaching career: head coach at USCB (Cal-Santa Barbara) the last five years. Spent three years as pitching coach and recruiting coordinator for Oregon, seven years as pitching coach at UC Riverside, coached at Riverside Community College before that.
Pluses: Made the College World Series with UCSB this year despite losing a wealth of talent from 2015. It was the Gauchos' first ever appearance in Omaha, and they did it by stunning Louisville in two straight at Louisville after the Cardinals had lost one home game all year. Last year they were a No. 1 seed, hosting a regional at a minor league facility in California because their own facility was not up to snuff. Despite that minus, he has built a terrific program. His teams' pitching numbers have been outstanding, with UCSB having a 2.45 ERA in 2015 and Oregon ranking among the top five in one of his years there. He has been rated one of the top rising coaches in college baseball for quite some time.
Minuses: His entire career has been spent on the West Coast and at public schools. The Gauchos have been a light hitting team, never hitting better than .289 under his watch. As a player, he spent one year at the school I covered, Florida (1995), before transferring to Oregon State, blowing an opportunity to play for a CWS team in 1996 (I'm joking that this is a minus; there's very little to criticize in his resume').
MY OVERALL ASSESSMENT
All four candidates are capable of winning at Tulane and continuing the success David Pierce brought the past two years. Riser would be last on my list, but that's only because of the quality of the other three candidates. Cannizaro, who if passed over will cause some major consternation from key folks, probably is the biggest risk of the remaining three, but his upside is huge. I love Jewett's record of success everywhere he's been. It reminds me of Pierce's but without the ultimate proof of doing it as a head coach. If he is a good fit for Louisiana, Checketts would be a home run in my view. Yes, recruiting can be more challenging at a private school without a bunch of extra scholarships cloaked in academics or other areas, but Pierce had a similar background.
I don't think Troy Dannen will go wrong with this hire. What do you think?
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