Kip Bouknight knows it all starts with how South Carolina's pitchers handle the noise
There’s a lot of hype surrounding South Carolina’s pitching staff heading into a new year. A guy that knows what that pressure is like is former Gamecock pitcher and 2000 Golden Spikes winner Kip Bouknight.
“That phrase external noise is one thing they need to just really focus on what they can control,” said Bouknight, who is currently an analyst for South Carolina baseball on the SEC Network. “What they can control is just going out and getting guys out. They don’t need to be worried about the spin rates and throwing 96-97 (mph). It seems to be that’s all anyone cares about these days. I think if you’re Mark Kingston you don’t care if they’re rolling it up to home plate.”
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Starting with Will Sanders, Noah Hall, and Jack Mahoney, Bouknight said the message is clear.
“They just need to produce, get outs, work quick, and give their offense a chance to come in and score some runs. “It all starts on Friday,” Bouknight said minutes before Friday’s first pitch. “Will Sanders has the nod and he just needs to do whatever he can to pitch deep into games.”
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While the pitching staff overall should be a bright spot, Bouknight isn’t sold quite yet on the backend.
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“I do think they’re deep enough from a pitching standpoint. But they need to develop roles sooner rather than later. I don’t think we can go into the Clemson series and SEC series and we don’t have a true closer and we don’t know who that is. We need to identify that and give that opportunity to whoever it may be. Let them establish roles and let them know who they are and let them know what they’re expected to do when they get into the ballpark.”
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Closer aside, the other two question marks Bouknight has are two major ones that only time will tell.
“Defense is a question for me as well as offense. You (had) one guy in the starting lineup (on Friday) in (Braylen) Wimmer who batted over .263 (last season), which I think was the team averaged last year. He batted over .300 last year (.312). A lot of unknowns right now and there’s a lot of guys who have come in and hopefully they can help South Carolina.”
