Starting rotation with Tidwell coming back?

[drylo]

Our starters, defense and bullpen will be good enough to give us a chance at Omaha. You also have to have a little luck. Remember the neat part of baseball is that anybody can beat anybody any given day. A good pitcher having a great day, especially in college baseball, can shut down an incredible offense. Our biggest weapon right now is depth. Sewell had a rough outing yesterday but the neat part was Redmond stepped right in and bailed him out. Redmond said it best in his interview yesterday when asked if he was frustrated when Jorel missed the ball. His answer was no because Jorel has already bailed me out this year so the least I could do was return the favor. That is what makes this team special is the depth. If someone is having a bad day, and the starters will at some point and the defense will at some point and the bullpen will at some point, WE have the depth to fill the gap. We can fill any gap at any point. Doesn't make us invincible but will give us a great chance to win. Having Blade as a backup for starters right now is unheard of. Nobody has an upper 90's guy in their bullpen who will be ready to start a game in a few weeks. Nobody has pitch to contact guys in their bullpen with great era's who only threw 1 inning this weekend against the #1 team in the nation. Nobody has 4 guys on their bench hitting close to .400 and 3-6 HR's. Our depth is our biggest asset at this point.

Totally agree. The depth on this team is mind-boggling. Many crazy stats you could throw around, but among them-

1. Our presumptive Friday night starter going into the year hasn’t thrown a pitch yet and we lead the nation in team ERA by a full 0.5 runs and WHIP by 0.17.
2. Of our top 13 hitters (everybody with 20+ ABs), Jordan Beck (Jordan Beck!) is currently last in OPS and SLG%.
3. Of those top 13 hitters, Drew Gilbert (Drew Gilbert!) is last with only 1 HR. (Granted, he’s hitting .469 with 12 extra base hits in 49 at-bats and has drawn 15 walks, so not exactly holding us back offensively, but we have 16 more homers than the next closest team in the country with only 1 HR so far from a guy who hit 10 last year.)

Point being, there is still plenty of untapped potential on this team (from guys who we know can get it done), which is insane.

By the way, I somehow had glossed over the fact that Kirby is yours. He was super gracious to my just-turned-6-year old (who, by the way, loves Kirby’s style — but who doesn’t?) in Omaha last year after the tough UVA loss. We had been up to a game in Knoxville earlier in the year and down to Hoover also, but he had never met any of the guys (other than chatting with Chad Dallas in Hoover, who was also so great to my son), so he was so stoked to get a ball signed by some of them in Omaha. These guys are larger than life to my little kids, and I just appreciate so much their graciousness (even on a bad day).

 

[vol66]

You ever seen such numbers in college baseball? Serious question.

UVA’s numbers are close to around ours, I think it’s a fair comparison statistically. I have only watched a few innings. Maybe if I broke it down to just the conference games, it might look different but the sample size is too small.

I only go back to the end of Raleigh really, but maybe the Helton teams put up numbers like this.

It’s really something however you slice it IMHO.

GBO!!!

 

[txbo]

 

[wmcovol]

This is late January for these guys. It might be -mid late April before we see them start & go 7

 

[Zvols]

My brief research points me towards FSU as the best comparison to our pitching numbers, not necessarily style though. They rack up strikeouts. Not a lot of teams with 3 above average starters.

 

[vol66]

My brief research points me towards FSU as the best comparison to our pitching numbers, not necessarily style though. They rack up strikeouts. Not a lot of teams with 3 above average starters.

Fair.

 

[Sam I Am]

Sewell has not been very good. Tidwell and Halvorsen will fill his spot... If any current starter struggles look to see them replace anyone of needed... Its a great problem to have

True. Great kid. But something is off on both velo and location. Lots of ball up in the zone at 87 mph is batting practice on SEC weekends. Still, he is a solid "go-to" for mid-week games.

 

[drvenner]

No one gets dropped. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Until one of the current starters begin to struggle, you don’t mess with the momentum. Blade and Seth need to be bullpen guys to begin with anyway. In the postseason, when we need at least 4 starters, we will be in good shape.

I agree here. It is good to know that we have dudes this strong who can step in at the first sign of true trouble in a tight game. I can envision the coaches pulling a starter fairly early if the game appears to be in doubt and the starter has struggled some.