Tony Vitello comments on injury questions regarding pitcher AJ Russell
HOOVER, Ala. — Tennessee right-handed pitcher AJ Russell was making his second appearance back from lengthy injury in Sunday’s Southeastern Conference Baseball Tournament championship game against LSU – a game Tennessee won 4-3 over the Tigers – when the ESPN broadcast showed athletic trainer Jeff Wood checking on Russell in the Tennessee dugout after the first inning.
“I don’t know what the broadcast showed but Woody and him were going to sync up, regardless, how do you feel and where are you at with everything,” the coach said to the media when asked about it in the postgame press conference.
The sophomore, who started the ballgame, wasn’t scheduled to pitch more than one or maybe two innings, anyway. Russell surrendered a towering 471 foot home run off the bat of Jared Jones in the first inning as the Tigers took an early 1-0 lead.
“I think he was wanting to press the issue and throw a certain amount of pitches or probably go until maybe he’s in a jam,” Vitello continued on Russell. “We kind of knew all long, we wanted him to start the game. Give us a little bit of calmness because we know how he competes and he’ll throw strikes, and he did that. Obviously he gives up the home run but a lot of people have done that to Mr. Jones. It’s kind of the cost of doing business, throwing strikes trite interest.”
Russell faced five batters, hit a batter and struck out two over 22 pitches during a scoreless relief appearance on Wednesday against Vanderbilt in the tournament. It was his first outing in 60 days after coming back from his second lengthy injury of the season.
Top 10
- 1
Elko pokes at Kiffin
A&M coach jokes over kick times
- 2
Dan Lanning
Oregon coach getting NFL buzz
- 3Trending
UK upsets Duke
Mark Pope leads Kentucky to first Champions Classic win since 2019
- 4Hot
5-star flip
Ole Miss flips Alabama WR commit Caleb Cunningham
- 5
Second CFP Top 25
Newest CFP rankings are out
“I think the big difference was I could breathe a little bit. The first two batters I think I was pretty anxious coming into it, in general, because I hadn’t been on the mound in a while,” Russell said on Wednesday on settling down after a rocky start to his outing. “And then once I could breathe, settling down, just realizing that I hit spots and all that kind of thing, trust Cal behind the plate that good things would come from that.”
It was his first action since leaving the top of the ninth inning in a game against Ole Miss on March 23, spanning a total of 60 days. It was the second lengthy absence of the season for the pitcher, as he also missed a total of 30 days earlier in the campaign as well.
Prior to his latest return, Russell had made just four appearances on the injury-plagued season with three starts over a total of 12.1 innings.
The righty pitched extremely well in the season-opener against No. 21 Texas Tech at Globe Life Field and it was also the first weekend start of his career as well. Russell went on to strike out 10 batters over 4.1 innings pitched where he allowed two runs off three hits in Opening Day start.
