Link Jarrett to get first look at FSU baseball team in game setting during Saturday exhibition
Link Jarrett won’t coach his first official game in a Florida State baseball uniform for another four months. But that doesn’t mean what happens this time of year is unimportant.
The first-year skipper will lead the Seminoles into an exhibition game Saturday against visiting Kennesaw State, and earlier this week he met with the media and talked about what he’s looking to accomplish in his first season at the helm of his alma mater.
He also explained how his new players are adjusting to the way and he and his coaches run a practice.
“Well, the first few days, the tempo with which we operate was new,” said Jarrett, who starred at Florida State in the early 1990s and comes back to Tallahassee after a successful stint at Notre Dame. “And you combine that with new information, new language, new verbiage, new tactics of how you do some of the team fundamentals … it’s a lot.
“As we got to Day 3, I saw them start to really settle. And once we got to Day 4 and 5, I felt like they had a better handle on things.”
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Jarrett said he wasn’t necessarily surprised the tempo was a bit fast for his new team. It’s a roster filled with 39 players he has never coached before, so that’s to be expected as they get used to the way he and his staff communicate and what exactly they expect to accomplish in every practice.
The Seminoles are coming off a disappointing 2022 season in which they were one of the last teams selected for the NCAA Tournament and then were ousted after three games. Meanwhile, Jarrett took his Notre Dame team to the College World Series, beating No. 1 Tennessee in Knoxville to get to Omaha.
The new head coach said it’s difficult with a new team — full of players he’s never coached — to have a firm grasp on what the lineup or rotation will look like by the time the season rolls around in February. He’s getting more of a sense of who can do what, but there are still months to figure out who will be where when the Seminoles take the field for real.
“Now that we’ve gotten into the scrimmages, it’s a little more clear who’s capable of what,” Jarrett said. “I’m not interested in defining roles right now. I’m really not interested in trying to solidify any positions. I just want to feel how they look and sense how they handle different things as they move around. We have infielders who clearly are capable. Now, what suits their skillset and our team to be the most efficient? I don’t know that yet.
“So, I’m working through that. And every one of these days we’re out here as a team, I learn a little bit more.”
So far, he says, he’s learned that he’s got some promising young hitters in the Florida State program from the Class of 2022.
“We have some good freshmen bats,” Jarrett said. “We do. I like what I see out of the young guys. I do. Now, a consistent basis and matching up, when you start to deal with experienced guys out of the bullpen that are matched up, we have some work to do. I do like what I’ve seen out of the guys. I like [DeAmez] Ross. DeAmez has had some good at-bats from the left side. We need to figure out a way to get some left-handed bats into the lineup. I have a concern about that.”
One of the left-handed bats Jarrett expects to have once the season begins is sophomore James Tibbs, who hit .300 with 10 home runs a season ago. But Jarrett said Tibbs is still recovering from an injury he sustained at the end of the season and is still not 100 percent.
“We just need some left-handed bats,” Jarrett reiterated. “I like some of the pieces. I haven’t seen the consistency maybe out of the at-bats that I would like to see. I think it’s coming.”
On the mound, Jarrett said he thought the older guys were ahead of the younger arms on the roster at this point. Which isn’t exactly a stunning development.
“That’s probably natural,” Jarrett said. “But some of the younger arms have to find ways to separate and create secondary pitches that have a chance to be weapons. And I think if you watch some of the scrimmages, that’s what they’re learning right now.”
The Seminoles host Kennesaw State at 1 p.m. at Dick Howser Stadium.
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