Yeah, Tech is probably the best team. Oregon State is retooling a bit. It is hard to say that they will be in complete rebuild, but they lost one of the best pitchers in the country (Bryce Fehmel) and the #1 pick in the MLB draft (Adley Rutschman). They lost a couple other big arms, but I can’t see them being bad with the way Pat Casey had the program rolling.
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Oregon State will be firing on all cylinders by the time they come to Stillwater. They will also be hungry to take the series from us in our new digs, the way we took the series from them last year in Corvallis.
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More sports cliches please
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Sweeping them at their place last year really sent them on a tailspin to end the year. You would think they would be looking for a good bit of revenge. Their new coach is Mitch Canham who I’m pretty sure was their catcher on their title teams. He was a manager in the minor leagues so you would think they would continue to be well-coached. The culture in their program is as good as anywhere in the country.
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To be fair, a tailspin for Oregon State baseball is not the same as a tail spin for most programs. But they did go 0-2 in their own regional which is the first time they’ve ever done that.
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They will be * clears throat to make way for old school pitching lingo rocking and firing by the time they get to Stillwater.
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To counter that, OSU just needs to take it one day at a time. They need each individual to just do their part and, Lord willing, they might win a few games. Make the good plays, not the great plays. Take care of what you can take of and the rest will sort itself out.
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Robbie? Coach Walton? That you?
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I think we will see a different approach at the plate this year. Coach V was very big on the let’er rip Mentality when it came to AB’s and I believe that is a lot of the reason why he isn’t with the team anymore.
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I think our player personnel changing will dictate some of that too. When 1-9 can all go yard, you’ll take a few more strikeouts to put 3 runs up at a time. We don’t have a lineup like that this year. What we have is a bunch of really good baseball players that can swing it and run really well. Our base running the last 2 years was dreadful at times. I think we have the guys to be a little more creative on the base paths like Josh was the first several years of his tenure.
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I agree. It varies year to year depending on the players you have. But man, the last two years they struck out a ton…
It was hard to watch personally. That’s not my style.
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I’m with you, nothing irritates me more than a ton of strikeouts. Get a lead off double, and he stays there because the next 3 strike out…ggrrrrr
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From someone who has spent his entire life playing, watching, coaching competitive baseball last years team was VERY hard for me to watch. Man, is it fun when they’re hitting the ball, but not the rest of the time. Live by long ball and die by the long ball.
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Home run or no run brothaaaaaaaa
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Ready to take us to the woodshed
I hate bunting guys to 3rd base, but I would take that over some of the innings we had like the one you mentioned. It happened more than it should have. Hard to argue with the results though. They were 6 outs away from Omaha last year.
I’m not even saying bunt, ground ball, sac fly, just do something to advance the cause. Always the chance of an error, which you don’t get swinging and missing.
I enjoyed the run last year, but at the same time it sucked knowing our only chance to win was a long ball. Good pitching will kill the long ball.
And that kind of play can’t win in Omaha with the way the park is built. They’ve changed the ball a bit the last few years and it has helped, but you aren’t going to get to Omaha and hit 10 home runs. The entire 8 team field at TD Ameritrade is combining for around 15 home runs total for all games combined.
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D1 Baseball is a paid site with great content…
I’ll share some basic info from their Season Preview of OSU. They rank our beloved Pokes #22 entering the season, 2nd in the Big 12 (behind #7 Texas Tech and slightly ahead of #24 Oklahoma). TCU and Texas were listed in 10 other teams worthy of consideration, but not ranked in the poll.
D1 Grades teams’ units on a 20-80 scouting scale:
50 = average NCAA tourney team
60 = above-average / plus
70 = well above-average / plus-plus
80 = historically strong
Oklahoma State Cowboys
Hitting - 60
Power - 55
Speed - 50
Defense - 55
Starting Pitching - 50
Bullpen - 60
Experience / Intangibles - 50
Based on their pre-season scouting / rankings - D1 expects OSU to easily make the NCAA Tourney, likely as a 2-seed, with an outside shot at hosting a regional.
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