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This scout will be a little different simply because on the UT side of things there's been no change since the last scout.
Most folks, like me, are unfamiliar with Grand Canyon Baseball for good reason, this will be their second season as a D1 team. In their first season in D1 they won 30 games, losing 23.
This is going to be a test. The head coach, Andy Stankiewicz, is a very good coach. Check out his bio here...GRAND CANYON UNIVERSITY - 2015 Baseball Coaching Staff
To make matters worse his two assistants, Nathan Choate and Gregg Wallis have been assistants to Coach Serrano. Wallis probably sounds familiar because in addition to being at UC Irvine and Cal State Fullerton, he came to Tennessee as a Volunteer Assistant and eventually Director of Baseball Operations.
In other words, they know what we do from the inside out.
On the baseball front, this team can hit. The team BA is .317, but that doesn't tell the whole story. They have 7 guys that are hitting over .300, two of them over .400. They have a couple of others over .400 that I'm not counting because of their number of at bats...they can hit.
They average 7.6 runs per game. They've played good competition. Their RPI is a very respectable 57 and their SOS is at 85. If one were to base how good a team is solely on RPI, this is the best team we will have faced to date.
They put up 30 runs on (7-2) Bradley...yeah in one game. Who/What is Bradley? Their RPI is 8 and SOS is 45...still not impressed?
Two days later they shut out UNLV winning 7-0. I know, I know... UNLV isn't very good this year. Neither is Kansas and GCU split a two game series with them, combined they put up 17 runs in that series.
On the other side of things, they are giving up 4.8 runs per game, the team ERA 3.32, they only have two pitchers with an ERA 4+.
Their best pitcher is Jr. LHP Andrew Naderer (3-0), 2.50 ERA. He was first team all WAC last season, ...his 9-3 record led the squad, while he also sported a 3.26 ERA (36 ER in 99.1 IP) in 14 games (13 starts). I reckon we will see him on Friday. He was just voted WAC pitcher of the week...
Saturday: Sr. RHP Coley Bruns, (1-0), 4.40 ERA
Sunday: Jr. RHP Cameron Brendel (2-1), 3.44 ERA
Nice, brief video on the pitching staff at GCU...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDGxt4f-ags
In the video they list Jorge Perez (Sr. RHP) as the closer, but he's not recorded any stats thus far...I can confirm he's making the trip.
This is a very veteran staff that's pitched a lot of innings.
They have yet to play in any cold weather, only away games were in Cali, maybe the weather might work to our advantage,
What once was just "another" pre-SEC series has turned into a very important series indeed. Every Eastern team in the SEC has at least 8 wins and we've only played 8 games. Should we sweep this series it would only put us at 7-4.
I've been listening to a lot of sports talk radio and it seems the natives are getting restless, can't imagine what it would turn into should we lose this series.
That's not the worst case scenario though...having any of these games canceled would be. We need every pitch, every at bat, every inning we can get because UF is just a week away.
GBO!!!
Most folks, like me, are unfamiliar with Grand Canyon Baseball for good reason, this will be their second season as a D1 team. In their first season in D1 they won 30 games, losing 23.
This is going to be a test. The head coach, Andy Stankiewicz, is a very good coach. Check out his bio here...GRAND CANYON UNIVERSITY - 2015 Baseball Coaching Staff
To make matters worse his two assistants, Nathan Choate and Gregg Wallis have been assistants to Coach Serrano. Wallis probably sounds familiar because in addition to being at UC Irvine and Cal State Fullerton, he came to Tennessee as a Volunteer Assistant and eventually Director of Baseball Operations.
In other words, they know what we do from the inside out.
On the baseball front, this team can hit. The team BA is .317, but that doesn't tell the whole story. They have 7 guys that are hitting over .300, two of them over .400. They have a couple of others over .400 that I'm not counting because of their number of at bats...they can hit.
They average 7.6 runs per game. They've played good competition. Their RPI is a very respectable 57 and their SOS is at 85. If one were to base how good a team is solely on RPI, this is the best team we will have faced to date.
They put up 30 runs on (7-2) Bradley...yeah in one game. Who/What is Bradley? Their RPI is 8 and SOS is 45...still not impressed?
Two days later they shut out UNLV winning 7-0. I know, I know... UNLV isn't very good this year. Neither is Kansas and GCU split a two game series with them, combined they put up 17 runs in that series.
On the other side of things, they are giving up 4.8 runs per game, the team ERA 3.32, they only have two pitchers with an ERA 4+.
Their best pitcher is Jr. LHP Andrew Naderer (3-0), 2.50 ERA. He was first team all WAC last season, ...his 9-3 record led the squad, while he also sported a 3.26 ERA (36 ER in 99.1 IP) in 14 games (13 starts). I reckon we will see him on Friday. He was just voted WAC pitcher of the week...
Naderer went the distance in a 2-1 win over UW-Milwaukee on Friday, allowing just one run on three hits with nine strikeouts in a seven-inning complete game.
Saturday: Sr. RHP Coley Bruns, (1-0), 4.40 ERA
Sunday: Jr. RHP Cameron Brendel (2-1), 3.44 ERA
Nice, brief video on the pitching staff at GCU...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDGxt4f-ags
In the video they list Jorge Perez (Sr. RHP) as the closer, but he's not recorded any stats thus far...I can confirm he's making the trip.
This is a very veteran staff that's pitched a lot of innings.
They have yet to play in any cold weather, only away games were in Cali, maybe the weather might work to our advantage,
What once was just "another" pre-SEC series has turned into a very important series indeed. Every Eastern team in the SEC has at least 8 wins and we've only played 8 games. Should we sweep this series it would only put us at 7-4.
I've been listening to a lot of sports talk radio and it seems the natives are getting restless, can't imagine what it would turn into should we lose this series.
That's not the worst case scenario though...having any of these games canceled would be. We need every pitch, every at bat, every inning we can get because UF is just a week away.
GBO!!!