Top of the 9th: *Jones flies out (1 out) *Edward strikes out (2 outs) *Cunningham singles (batting .118 this season) *Ross strikes out (3 outs) LSU 4-7-1 ARK 4-5-0 Headed to the bottom of the 9th...
Bottom of the 9th: *Double *Error (Runners at the corners) *Intentional Walk (Bases loaded) *Sacrifice fly (Run scores) LSU 4-7-2 ARK 5-6-0 FINAL
The guy who hit the SAC fly was saved from a strike out the previous pitch. LSU can't blame the officials but it still seemed they were one-sided.
It looks like we may be going another season without hosting a regional. :dis: The #1 ranked team in attendance (by far) will probably have to play in another high school park like the one last year at UCLA.
You can't blame the umps when your team is bad. It's time to face it. This team isn't even average. We got lucky that CSF made more errors in a weekend than they had so far in the season and ended up sweeping them. It looks like we will be trying for the same situation as we were last year: fighting for an SECT spot and a regional bid.
It's tough to stomach but it's one or two playa in several games and we are sitting with only 4 loses right now. I think it will come around...it has to.
Then tell me where I am wrong in this evaluation of this team: Good-to-great starting pitching. It is further on the good side because McCune (1.80 ERA) has been nothing short of incredible, but Alsup (3.27 ERA) and Gausman (4.60 ERA) have been Jekyll-Hyde guys all season. .960 Fielding %. 48 errors in 32. That is downright bad. 13 games with 2 or more errors. (6-7 in those games) Average hitting. After today, LSU has dropped under .300 BA as a team. Freshmen batters looking like freshmen. Jones may still be hitting at .318 on the season, but those are terribly inflated. He is 9-44 in SEC for a .205 mark. Ross showed it today when he botched a rundown. Gausman got rocked early against Ole Miss and UGA. The only exception has been McCune. He has been crazy good. Poor relief pitching. We all know Ott isn't what he used to be. Berry was looking great until last night, and he could rebound. But as of right now, we have no idea who to look at when we are leading by 1 in the ninth inning. Nola and Hanover are not who they were last season. 17 errors between the two of them. Yes, Hanover was not a 3B, so I can give him a pass, but his hitting has been underwhelming (.040 points lower than last season). On the other hand, Nola has only gotten better at the plate each season, but he has 11 errors in the field. Timely hitting: BAD! LSU's record after 6 innings when trailing: 1-8 after 7 innings when trailing: 1-6 after 6 innings when trailing: 0-6 Most importantly: This team isn't confident they can win games. They are 1-10 in games when they score between 0-5 runs. LSU is 1-5 in 1-run SEC games. It is very hard to look at this team's talent and say they are average or worse, but they are. Just because there are a few GREAT pieces to this team (Mahtook, McCune, Nola at the plate, Rhymes, Gausman half the time, J. Jones against OOC teams), you have to remember this is a TEAM sport, and the team as a whole isn't good right now. Can they improve? Sure, I expect them to, but realistically, we can optimistically hope to finish 15-15 in conference and win the SECT to grab a 2-seed in a regional.
Anyone think Gausman should have pitched 9th inning in game 2?.......Manieri seems to pull the plug on starters and head for closers that are just bad.
I mean it might have helped, but Maneiri had no reason to believe Berry would perform like that. Now after he allowed two baserunners, he should have yanked him.
