Does anyone know what was the excuse on the postgame show for todays bludgeoning?
Well, Dave Neal did a good job of recapping our excuses for Polk during the broadcast. Namely injuries and "we're young".
We really need to take a long look at how we recruit. In our starting lineup today, we started one player- Tyler Moore- that has been drafted out of high school. The only other player that played in the game today that was drafted out of high school was Forrest Moore, and I'm sure that part of the reason we were able to land him was because his father played football at MSU.
The new coach needs to institute some policies for the players we recruit:
If you're a pitcher, you must have at least 100 K's and an ERA of 1.50 or less. Wins in high school are sometimes the product of having a good high school team, and can be misleading sometimes.
If you are a corner position player (1B, 3B, RF, LF) you must have at least 10 home runs your junior year, and bat at least .400
If you play a position up the middle (SS, 2B, CF) home runs aren't such a big deal, although if you can hit them, by all means we should take them. If you can't, you need to be able to steal at least 15 bags. Again, you need to hit .400 or higher in high school.
If you play catcher, home runs are nice, but not necessarily a deal breaker. Again, must hit .400 or above and be able to throw out at least 30% of all baserunners in HS.
All players must field at least .950 or above.
If a HS player doesn't meet this above criteria, they should be walk-ons, provided that there is space per NCAA rules, and in that case they will be judged in tryouts in the fall.