I think I’m ‘more’ excited. Gotta like the staff’s ability to keep it in the zone this weekend. The bats will come around.
I’m [More / Less] Excited About This Baseball Team
- Thread starter 57stratdawg
- Start date
Kohler and Mershon would really change this lineup.
We don't like the cold nights. That's all I've gotten so far
My opinion was not changed this weekend. Our hitting & base running was atrocious. This weekend could have been a disaster if Air Force had not booted the ball around defensively. I really like most of what we saw from the new pitchers especially Stephen, Ligon, Schulueke, & Dotson. Dotson looks like a potential star. Defense was a lot better even after Kohler got injured. Hitting could improve as the season progress & it gets warmer. Georgia Southern could be decent, so next weekend might tell us more.
Losing a game to a team we should have run ruled 3 times and is one of the worst programs in ncaa history.
can’t see how anyone would get excited about that.
however I’m willing to give it a few weeks to see if things improve. Mainly to see if the pitching is truly improved or Air Force is simply that bad.
can’t see how anyone would get excited about that.
however I’m willing to give it a few weeks to see if things improve. Mainly to see if the pitching is truly improved or Air Force is simply that bad.
I’d say “more”. Still not very wooly. But we showed what we needed to show this weekend as far as the biggest question mark (pitching). We know the hitting will be fine eventually. Cold weather dampens the bats every year at some point, without fail.
Get the staff ERA to just mediocre - like 6.00 - we’ll comfortably make a regional. Get it to slightly above average like 5.00, might host. We don’t have to be great on the mound. We can’t just be terrible like the worst-in-SEC-history staff that we had last year.
Get the staff ERA to just mediocre - like 6.00 - we’ll comfortably make a regional. Get it to slightly above average like 5.00, might host. We don’t have to be great on the mound. We can’t just be terrible like the worst-in-SEC-history staff that we had last year.
AF isn’t a terrible team but…. We should have won all 3 and had they not made a bunch of errors, easily could have won 2-3 against us.
Air force is one of the worst programs in ncaa history (1 tourney appearance in 55 years). They played just as poorly. They have 1 or 2 players worthy of even being on real program rosters. They are terrible. They came to Starkville for the environment the lounge and as a fun trip for their players that will be defending this country in the coming years…..and to get drummed 3 games. We didn’t make that happen.
I don’t think there’s a chance in hell we make a regional with a 6.00 ERA. With that ERA, we won’t sniff 12 SEC wins… and with the terrible non-conf schedule we have, we’ll need 14 to have a respectable enough RPI to sneak in.
Our ERA is gonna need to be around 5.00 to get enough traction in the league to make the post season.
I'm more excited because now we have different posters willing to raw dog the team at every turn instead of just keeping quiet.
Reminds me of a good story from the 2010 season. I may have shared this before.
We’re going through January intrasquads… Cohen brings Papelbon in to speak to us one day. Paps had to be drunk or high… but left a lasting impression. His best line “if your ERA is above 5, you ain’t ****. Matter of fact, if your ERA is above 5, you 17n suck”.
We kinda just laughed. Because a few days later at pre season kangaroo court… every pitcher had to throw in a fine bc our team ERA the previous season was 6.60. And according to Paps. We all 17n sucked.
He wasn’t wrong.
Same, in that I expect this to be Lemonis’ last year, and team did not do anything to change that trajectory.
Better not sleep walk against Austin Peay, looking at their roster they are more talented than Air Force with quite a few Power 5 transfers. They have a pitcher who beat us in 2022 while at Northern Kentucky.
Better not sleep walk against Austin Peay, looking at their roster they are more talented than Air Force with quite a few Power 5 transfers. They have a pitcher who beat us in 2022 while at Northern Kentucky.
Nice to see them salvage a series against trash competition. Only a sweep would’ve left me more excited.
I'm always excited at the beginning of every season. I was disappointed with the base running and the hitting this weekend. Let's hope that gets corrected. We finally get a good third baseman and he doesn't make it through opening weekend. I did see some encouraging signs from the pitching staff.
You need to recalibrate your expectations for today’s game. In conference play only in 2023, a 5.00 Team ERA would have been good enough for 4th in the SEC. Even overall for all games, SEC teams had a collective 5.09 ERA in 2023. That includes all the nonconference cupcakes.
The days of the dead bats and dead balls are over. You’re not going to have more than 1-2 teams per year with sub-4.00 ERA’s anymore.
Just for clarity, we had a Team ERA in SEC play last year of 9.61. A full 2 runs per game behind #13 Ole Miss. And we still won 8 games. Get the 9.61 down to 6.0 and just keep the hitting the same, we’ll be top half of the league in both hitting and pitching and we’ll have no trouble making the postseason.
Nothing changed this weekend really. We need to get healthy and win games. We won't know much until everyone is available.
Air Force is not great. But you’re putting a little too much hyperbole into this. Last year, they were 140 in the RPI. Right around teams like Memphis, South Alabama, and Louisiana Tech. They are that caliber program. If you want to know how many games a bunch of good MSU teams have lost to the above programs, I’ll tell you - a shít ton.
Regardless, we should have gotten the sweep. But if we had to drop a game, I’m glad it was due to cold bats and not a meltdown where we give up 12 runs because nobody can throw strikes like what happened with VMI last year. We were far from the only SEC team to drop one to an inferior opponent this weekend.
That 140 rpi and the past 2 seasons are their best seasons ever. Meaning that’s the high water mark. Not going to split hairs. They are bad. If you watched them play you’d actually wonder how they are even that high.
Again frustrating thing with this schedule is it’s hard to gauge how good the pitching is. We threw strikes. But I need to see if those are quality strikes. Hopefully well improve
3 games isnt enough to form any definitive opinions, but last year our weaknesses were pitching and defense. This weekend we pitched it well enough to sweep and played solid defense. Also consider that we were missing the entire left side of our infield (Kohler at 3B and Mershon at SS). I'd say that's no small feat to overcome.
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Maybe that is their 2 best seasons ever, but so what? That’s the caliber of program they are right now in 2024. Whatever they did before the past 2-3 years has no bearing at all on their current roster or outlook.
And I too hope those are “quality strikes”. But as far as what we could have asked for this weekend from the pitching staff, I’m not sure we could have reasonably expected anything better (except for those 2 Holcombe AB’s in the 9th yesterday).
Zero SEC teams made post season play with an ERA of 6+ last year. That’s what you said we needed. I disagree, regardless of “today’s game”. I was around in a much larger live ball era than today.
You change the whole argument when specifying conference play. That’s fine. My argument is that our overall ERA needs to be around 5 to make the postseason. That’s the only hope we have of winning 14+ SEC games. We won’t make the post season with 13 SEC wins with our non conference schedule.
Has little to do with the live ball era we’re in. Just the mathematics of our specific situation and schedule. And the shear fact that a 6.00 overall (you didn’t specify conference only), as you stated, won’t get us into regional play.
If we end with an ERA around 5, as I stated, our conference ERA should be around 6. That will give us a chance at a regional. As I posted.
This all assumes we don’t have error machines at short and 3rd like last year. We give up an extra 30-40 unearned runs and our ERA will need to be lower.
Or that’s the high water mark and it will cede back toward the mean. Much more likely I’d say. They certainly don’t have skenes who they had for 1 of those years But again not going to split hairs. Air Force was bad and they played worse. Maybe 1 arm that was of quality and probably another 5-6 balls that should have been fielded or errors that weren’t counted as such.
I’m withholding judgement. I want to see more. Still looks like we lack talent.
and agree too that other teams lost to some questionable opponents. But they’ll have a good opponent to play later on to recoup some of that.., we don’t…
Opening weekend pitching stats compared:
| ERA | Opp. Batting Avg | SO | BB | HBP | IBB | WP | BK | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 (Long Beach State) | 6.33 | .269 | 42 | 11 | 2 | 0 | 4 | 0 |
| 2023 (VMI) | 5.00 | .233 | 36 | 19 | 2 | 0 | 4 | 2 |
| 2024 (Air Force) | 2.33 | .206 | 38 | 9 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 0 |
The conference ERA last year made me curious. We had a 9+ ERA in conference games last year as Perd stated.
Beating a dead horse, but we got run ruled 8 times in conference play. Imagine what that ERA coulda been with 16 more innings from the back end of our bullpen in those blowouts. I guess the opposition woulda been clearing the bench, so maybe not much worse. But still, Foxhall was stealing money.
Beating a dead horse, but we got run ruled 8 times in conference play. Imagine what that ERA coulda been with 16 more innings from the back end of our bullpen in those blowouts. I guess the opposition woulda been clearing the bench, so maybe not much worse. But still, Foxhall was stealing money.
More. Think the pitching has drastically improved. Once he gets roles nailed down for bullpen guys then I think we can really have some consistent wins rolling. Need to see another week or so to get all these arms healthy and get innings to earn spots. Ready to see Simmons out there again. Curious to see who the setup guys will be. Auger, Davis and Schuelke seem solid back end guys. Black was impressive too. Still haven’t seen Kohn, or Loftin either. Think Siary bounced back in his second inning. Bats will come around and we had some bad breaks and some self inflicted issues on the bases that can be corrected easily I think. We really only had Kohler out there for a few innings the whole weekend so im excited to see more of him too.
I don’t think there is much to take away until we play better teams. Air Force isn’t good. Neither is anyone else we play anytime soon.
I'm still in wait and see mode. I think there is some legitimate talent on this team. Especially as all the arms get back. Get Kohler and Mershon back. Nothing would shock me, they could host a regional or they could miss the sec and ncaa tournament.
I'm not ready to say either way, but they're sure are a lot of people ready to hang them out or build them up. The level that we fell to after we won it all will not be resolved overnight. All I saw this weekend was a few steps in the right direction and a few in the wrong. It's too early for people to get out the razor blades. And it's way too early to start booking for Omaha.
I may not be happy with an inning or two here and there. I'll celebrate when we do something great like our win today. I think I may wait until April and we start conference play to let you know how I think we will look. There are still a lot of chess pieces left on the board that can be moved to start making up our minds after three games.
I may not be happy with an inning or two here and there. I'll celebrate when we do something great like our win today. I think I may wait until April and we start conference play to let you know how I think we will look. There are still a lot of chess pieces left on the board that can be moved to start making up our minds after three games.
I feel the same. Mostly unsure. Pitching and defense seems to be improved. Offense was sad most of the weekend. Losing that 2nd game really put a damper on the whole weekend. The offense really played awful that game. If they get a couple sweeps in the books I’ll feel better. Winning cures all
I am excited. When Foxhall told Joel Coleman, “we don’t do a lot to change things in the Fall season”, last year. I was stunned by the ineptitude of that statement. All Fall, Parker has been preaching ‘this is how to get better.’ It showed up this weekend. Hitters will improve. I suspect that base running will be addressed this week. Nay sayers who watch the game on tv, don’t bother me.
I'm still holding out for a few more games to judge. We didn't give up many this weekend but we didn't score many either. Not apples to apples but everyone usually agrees that in football you get better between games 1 and 2 than any time during the season so I'll apply that to week 1 and week 2. Those that said we would be undefeated going into SEC play are stoned and ignorant.
Wait and See. We lose 2 on a NonCon weekend I know where we are. Anything better than that result would have me waiting until 9 SEC conference games before I have any idea where this team is headed
Ok well if you want to talk about overall ERA, 3 SEC teams made the postseason with ERA’s well over 5 - A&M, Auburn, and Arkansas. Auburn finished at 5.76, and 17ing hosted. Florida finished at 4.65, right under 5….and played for the natty. We can certainly win 14-15 games with an overall ERA in the 5-6 range, and an SEC only ERA that is slightly higher.
The bottom line, we gave up over 9.5 runs per game last year in SEC play. We still won 9 games somehow, and took a road series over the eventual national champions due mainly to having a decent line-up. IF we give up a solid 3 fewer runs per game WHILE sustaining the hitting, its hard to argue that’s only going to result in 3-4 more wins. Its all a big IF, however.
Looking at the SEC-only pitching stats from 2022 and 2023 makes me think we followed our first national title with the worst 2-year stretch of pitching in program history.
That's why I'm confident pitching will be improved this year. That's also why I'm confident that even with average pitching we will be a much better team. We didn't forget how to play baseball after 2021. We just forgot how to pitch.
I'm a mix of both. I'm happy/excited to see us pound the zone and walk less guys but our offense against a bad team left a lot to be desired. I'm hoping that will come over time. Need to have several stress free W's in the next games leading up to USM. Man our non con schedule is bad.
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