Corbin comments after the game.

tatedog

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Probably reading waaay too much into this but just wondering if the thought crossed anyone else's mind. He seemed over the top complimentary of us and our program for a guy who just had his gut ripped out. I've never heard anyone criticize Corbin for post game comments or actions and from all accounts he's an all around good guy, which is interesting considering he is such good friends with Sully who we can't stand. Anyway did anyone read this as "interest" or am I over thinking this? I'm thinking back to the way Mainieiri gushed over us and then came to find out he was politicking for the job behind the scenes in 2000.
 

Mjoelner

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There was a post on another board by someone who said he knew some of the players and that a player told him, "We already have our coach. He's from the SEC and he has already won his regional." This post was made before we won our regional. At the time that post was made, only Vandy and UPig had won their regionals. The poster went on to say that the player may not know or may have been full of **** but that is what the player told him.
 

Shmuley

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You are not the only one who heard something more in those comments than typical coach-speak. More than likely just wishful thinking, but still good to hear.
 
Jan 23, 2018
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May be an unpopular thought but I saw two things last night that really makes me unexcited about Corbin.
1. 3-0 fake bunt multiple at bats
2. Putting on a bunt after the batter got to 0-2
 

patdog

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3. Leaving a pitcher who obviously didn't have anything in to give up 2 runs and load the bases in the 11th. One of the 2 outs he did get was a wild pitch that would have put Mangum on base if 1st wasn't already occupied by his earlier walk.
 
Jan 23, 2018
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That may be a valid point. I’m not familiar with their personnel, so I don’t know well enough to say if that was a poor decision or just a really poor outing. My guess would be a little bit of both.
 

WutheringDawg

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May be an unpopular thought but I saw two things last night that really makes me unexcited about Corbin.
1. 3-0 fake bunt multiple at bats
2. Putting on a bunt after the batter got to 0-2

The fake but thing is whatever.

Also- Skelton bunted successfully with two strikes in the 8th inning of Friday night's game. Mangum scored the runner in the next at bat. To me, the count doesn't matter on a sac if you trust the guy.
 

HueFreeze

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4. he pitched to Mangum after the 7th inning ...i wouldn't throw a strike any near mangum with a dude on 2nd or 3rd unless the bases are loaded.
 

8dog

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Wheres that guy whose dad is a body language reader when you really need him?
 
Jan 23, 2018
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I don’t mind bunting with 2 strikes if your bunting the entire at bat. To swing away 0-0 and 0-1 and then put the bunt on 0-2 is a little different. Maybe he does it all the time and it works, but I’ve only seen it once. And it’s 0 for 1.
 

olblue.sixpack

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May be an unpopular thought but I saw two things last night that really makes me unexcited about Corbin.
1. 3-0 fake bunt multiple at bats
2. Putting on a bunt after the batter got to 0-2

As regards to #2, the hitter in question couldn't throw it up and hit it right now so it kind of made sense.
 

HueFreeze

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one step further. Henderson took time after his interview to talk about corbin. He brought corbin up at the end on his own.

Also go look at Jake leave the table he pokes Henderson and nods.
Jake is the Man, no joke. He surpassed Dak as most iconic athlete to ever walk through the drill field.

I know Dak is football and football is king, but if Jake was a qb he would be a MEGASTAR he is a legend today.
 
Sep 8, 2008
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There is a reason bunting is rarely done with 2 strikes. The fact that a foul ball on strike 3 is an out changes the percentages dramatically. It's a very poor percentage play that happened to work out for us.
 

Drebin

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Aug 22, 2012
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one step further. Henderson took time after his interview to talk about corbin. He brought corbin up at the end on his own.

Also go look at Jake leave the table he pokes Henderson and nods.
Jake is the Man, no joke. He surpassed Dak as most iconic athlete to ever walk through the drill field.

I know Dak is football and football is king, but if Jake was a qb he would be a MEGASTAR he is a legend today.

Come on, now. I love Mangum as much as the next guy, but he's not even the most iconic baseball player to play in the last 5 years, let alone be the most iconic athlete to ever walk the drill field. He's got a ways to go to pass Rooker (a rare triple crown winner) or Renfroe (led his team to the CWS final).
 

Drebin

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There is a reason bunting is rarely done with 2 strikes. The fact that a foul ball on strike 3 is an out changes the percentages dramatically. It's a very poor percentage play that happened to work out for us.

It's rarely done except in key sacrifice situations, where it's done all the time. Both times we saw it this weekend, that was the case.
 

johnson86-1

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Come on, now. I love Mangum as much as the next guy, but he's not even the most iconic baseball player to play in the last 5 years, let alone be the most iconic athlete to ever walk the drill field. He's got a ways to go to pass Rooker (a rare triple crown winner) or Renfroe (led his team to the CWS final).

Iconic is not the same as the best. Jake has played at a very high level for three years. He bust onto the scene by having the highest SEC batting average as a true freshman, has come up big in big moments, and has done a little bit of everything, including pitching.

Certainly Rooker's last year was incredible and on a different level than what Jake has done, but even last year, I would argue that Jake was just as much the face of MSU baseball as Rooker.

I would make a similar argument for Renfroe. As good as everyone knew he was and was going to be, I don't remember his production really matching the hype until his last year. Maybe that's just a failure of memory on my part, but I think what Mangum has done for three years, and the fact that he's coming back for a fourth, just makes him more front and center in people's mind w/r/t MSU baseball than REnfroe and Rooker were, even when they were the man the last year each of them were at MSU.
 

Drebin

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Aug 22, 2012
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So in other words, it's arbitrary.

You can make all of those arguments, but they are stupid arguments.

We can have this conversation next year after he is the SEC hits leader, and maybe you can make a more compelling argument. But even then, it's a stupid one.
 

Fogdog

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Oct 6, 2014
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Oh yeah, Corbin sucks as a coach.** Dude, just take a glance at his record...plus he's about to have his 3rd #1 ranked recruiting class in the last four years. Let that sink in.

We would be incredibly fortunate to get him. Incredibly fortunate.
 
Sep 8, 2008
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I'm sure I read a study that proved the percentages...even of a successful sacrifice become much more favorable to "swinging away" once you get to 2 strikes. Keep in mind, bunts are typically intended to go close to the foul line, not straight back to the pitcher, thus making a foul more likely. Since a 2-strike bunt foul is an out, and a bunt up the middle is more likely to get the lead runner out, it should be, and I believe is very rare and for good reason.

Even for sacrifice situations, bunting with 2-strikes is a lower-percentage move than swinging away for all but perhaps the most pathetic batters. And if you're on your 3rd bunt attempt, chances are you're not doing a good job of it anyway, making a successful sacrifice even less likely.
 
Sep 8, 2008
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My position is it is hard to tell just how good Corbin really is. He may well be a great coach period. Then again he may just be a pretty damn good one who is fortunate to be at the school with the greatest recruting advantage in the country.

You can't not look at the circumstances in order to make a truly informed decision. While most private schools with high cost-of-attendance are at a disadvantage vs public schools with lower cost-of-attendance, Vandy is perhaps the very best example of how a private school can instead have a tremendous advantage. At Vandy, all students pay only what they can afford. The school pays for the rest with an endowment.

I'm not talking about student loans that can leave the student and/or his parents taking on massive loans they have to repay. No, at Vandy they simply look at what you can afford to pay without loans, then they grant the rest. Students who go there graduate without school debt. As it turns out, Corbin's success at Vandy correlates pretty tightly with the advent of rules changes that restrict public schools in terms of scholarship limits and how they are allocated. He has done particularly well since the school agreed to pay full cost-of-attendance to any who need it.

The net effect for Corbin is that he has no real limits on scholarships. While he does have the same limit on "baseball scholarships", there is no limit whatsoever on how much money they can give to any and all players they want. They just can't be "athletic" or baseball scholarships. As a privately-funded institution they do not have to answer to any state or federal regulations regarding financial aid. They don't even have to report what they are doing.

So, while we can't say he's definitively not a great coach, we can't really say he would be if he didn't have an enormous recruiting advantage. Taking Corbin, assuming he would leave Vandy, would be a gamble for us and him.
 

Fogdog

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Points well taken, Blacklist. I work at Vanderbilt and your post is generally accurate with regard to the scholarship landscape. That is an advantage, no doubt. But, Corbin also has disadvantages that mitigate that recruiting advantage. First, it's Vanderbilt....no one gives a damn about sports here. Just look at Hawkins Field. Corbin can't generate revenue...hell, he can't even get anyone's attention in the administration here. The result is sub-par facilities across the board. I mean, where would you want to play if you were an 18-year old kid? Hawkins or DNF? Second, Vanderbilt has become damn near impossible to get into, and they don't throw away the admissions criteria when they're looking at athletes like some schools do. So, whether they qualify for aid or not, Corbin has to find with players who are smart as hell, which drastically limits his recruiting base. Third, he still has to recruit against a group of elite private schools nationwide who have similar phenotypes (Duke, Stanford, Rice, ect.), all with very good baseball programs. In short, a coach actually has to overcome a lot to be successful here, which explains why there's very little success here. Yet, Corbin's been good since he set foot on campus. Given all of this, it's a miracle he took them to two consecutive finals and won them a natty.
 

johnson86-1

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So in other words, it's arbitrary.

You can make all of those arguments, but they are stupid arguments.

We can have this conversation next year after he is the SEC hits leader, and maybe you can make a more compelling argument. But even then, it's a stupid one.

it is stupid if you don't understand the definition of iconic. If you understand the definition of iconic, it makes sense. It is subjective (not arbitrary), so reasonable people can disagree.
 

bulldogcountry1

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Jun 4, 2007
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I definitely found it interesting how complementary Corbin was of us. It went well beyond the regular coach speak. Maybe you can chalk that up to him being genuinely impressed after a lengendary regional. I admit I have never been real high on Corbin, mainly because it just seemed like an improbable scenario. After enduring those three games, I don't see a lot of reasons why anyone would want to stay there. Can we pay him enough? I saw something recently that said he earned well over $2 mil in 2016. That's pretty steep.
 
Sep 8, 2008
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Fog, thanks for the reasonable measured response. You make some good points. But to answer your question, as much as I'm maroon thru & thru, if I was a college baseball player given the choice of a free Vandy education (and the connections that go with it) vs playing at the new Dudy Noble, I'd take Vandy every day and twice on Sunday.

Yes, their field is an abomination, but baseball is fun even on the worst sandlot. And it's not as if Corbin is having trouble finding highly-rated kids that can get into Vandy. Look at his class ratings. If the academic standard were such a barrier, he wouldn't have the highly-rated classes he seems to have every year.
 
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RocketDawg

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I definitely found it interesting how complementary Corbin was of us. It went well beyond the regular coach speak. Maybe you can chalk that up to him being genuinely impressed after a lengendary regional. I admit I have never been real high on Corbin, mainly because it just seemed like an improbable scenario. After enduring those three games, I don't see a lot of reasons why anyone would want to stay there. Can we pay him enough? I saw something recently that said he earned well over $2 mil in 2016. That's pretty steep.

That sounds like a good reason to stay anywhere. I doubt we'd go that high. Didn't Cohen make about $700K when he coached?
 

RocketDawg

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Points well taken, Blacklist. I work at Vanderbilt and your post is generally accurate with regard to the scholarship landscape. That is an advantage, no doubt. But, Corbin also has disadvantages that mitigate that recruiting advantage. First, it's Vanderbilt....no one gives a damn about sports here. Just look at Hawkins Field. Corbin can't generate revenue...hell, he can't even get anyone's attention in the administration here. The result is sub-par facilities across the board. I mean, where would you want to play if you were an 18-year old kid? Hawkins or DNF? Second, Vanderbilt has become damn near impossible to get into, and they don't throw away the admissions criteria when they're looking at athletes like some schools do. So, whether they qualify for aid or not, Corbin has to find with players who are smart as hell, which drastically limits his recruiting base. Third, he still has to recruit against a group of elite private schools nationwide who have similar phenotypes (Duke, Stanford, Rice, ect.), all with very good baseball programs. In short, a coach actually has to overcome a lot to be successful here, which explains why there's very little success here. Yet, Corbin's been good since he set foot on campus. Given all of this, it's a miracle he took them to two consecutive finals and won them a natty.

And I hope they NEVER decrease those standards.

Didn't at one time Vanderbilt send (some) athletes, particularly football and basketball, to one of the other schools in Nashville? Tulane had, and I guess still does, Tulane College for athletes.
 

Drebin

Heisman
Aug 22, 2012
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it is stupid if you don't understand the definition of iconic. If you understand the definition of iconic, it makes sense. It is subjective (not arbitrary), so reasonable people can disagree.

I understand the definition of iconic. He wasn't simply called iconic. He was called the most iconic athlete to ever walk the drill field. Said he surpassed Dak. Surely reasonable people can see the absurdity of that statement.

He's had no 30 for 30 made about his career. He's no Burke Masters. He's going to his first CWS. He hasn't been drafted in the top 20 rounds. His story his still being written. I love the kid - he's all Dawg and is one of my favorite all time players. But there's still a lot to be done. Let's do some damage at the CWS, have a great next year, become the all time SEC hits leader, and go back to Omaha, and then we can have this discussion again.
 

johnson86-1

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I understand the definition of iconic. He wasn't simply called iconic. He was called the most iconic athlete to ever walk the drill field. Said he surpassed Dak. Surely reasonable people can see the absurdity of that statement.
That is probably the reason nobody defended those comments.

He's had no 30 for 30 made about his career.
I may have missed it, but what 30 for 30 was made about Renfroe or Rooker? Granted Rooker is probably the most likely to be featured in an SEC storied type feature, so that is a good argument for him.

He's no Burke Masters. He's going to his first CWS. He hasn't been drafted in the top 20 rounds. His story his still being written. I love the kid - he's all Dawg and is one of my favorite all time players. But there's still a lot to be done. Let's do some damage at the CWS, have a great next year, become the all time SEC hits leader, and go back to Omaha, and then we can have this discussion again.

None of which are requirements to be the most iconic baseball player in the last five years. If you went around to SEC baseball fans and asked them which player from the last five years comes to mind when they think of MSU baseball, I suspect a plurality would say Mangum. Obviously some recency bias plays into that, but some of it is that they have seen him year after year and he has been a pain in the *** for most fan bases. I suspect Rooker would be next (partly because of recency bias and partly because of the triple crown), and I would not be surprised if Holder gets more mentions than Renfroe, because like mangum, they would have just seen him more consistently. I think in four or five years, people will still remember Mangum more provided none of the other three blow up in MLB. Maybe I'm completely wrong and winning the triple crown put Rooker on SEC baseball fans' radar even when their team is not playing MSU. But I think even now Mangum is one of those players that other fan bases think have had seven years of eligibility and are ready for him to be gone.
 

HueFreeze

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Aug 22, 2012
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most of these points, but I am not saying Dak has come down any. I am just saying the leadership qualities, the "upmh" this guy displays. You just don't doubt in any situation.

Th15 team. shouldn't have even been close to omaha, but from moment one even before the firing Jake tweeted hey we ain't done yet and they still aren't done yet.
The leadership he carries that team and the motivation he gives those players. I mean we blew a 3 run lead with our best relief pitcher and we still fought back to win ...you don't see that often

i know stats, height, weight but i am just talking about "it"
I don't want to take away from any baseball greats or any great athletes, but i am just saying as the whole package... Mangum hit another level winning that super regional
 

patdog

Heisman
May 28, 2007
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Statistics show that bunting a runner over to 2nd base is a losing proposition. There may be exceptions, like if you've got a .200 hitter at the plate, but in general, you're better off swinging away.

Link
 

Drebin

Heisman
Aug 22, 2012
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I think we are mostly agreeing.

Regarding the 30 for 30 comment...I'm not saying you have to have a feature to be considered iconic, but I'm saying others have. The whole point of my argument (and your clear agreement) is that it's silly to call Mangum the most iconic athlete ever to walk the drill field, especially when I can turn on the TV and watch the Thunder and Lightning documentary three times a week on the SEC Network.

Ultimately, Rooker's triple crown will be the more significant accomplishment and will warrant the bigger place in history, just because the feat is so significant and so rare. Mangum will hold the hits record and will be remembered for leading the SEC in hitting as a freshman. He will be remembered for all the reasons you mention. My argument was that those things don't make him the most iconic athlete in MSU history. They make him exactly what he is - a great player who deserves his place in history.
 

Drebin

Heisman
Aug 22, 2012
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most of these points, but I am not saying Dak has come down any. I am just saying the leadership qualities, the "upmh" this guy displays. You just don't doubt in any situation.

Th15 team. shouldn't have even been close to omaha, but from moment one even before the firing Jake tweeted hey we ain't done yet and they still aren't done yet.
The leadership he carries that team and the motivation he gives those players. I mean we blew a 3 run lead with our best relief pitcher and we still fought back to win ...you don't see that often

i know stats, height, weight but i am just talking about "it"
I don't want to take away from any baseball greats or any great athletes, but i am just saying as the whole package... Mangum hit another level winning that super regional

If Macnamee doesn't hit that walkoff in Tallahassee, your entire argument changes. Mangum has been great and has provided clutch moments, but he's hardly been the only player that willed this team to Omaha through his leadership. Macnamee alone hit two walkoffs. Others have provided timely hits. Cole Gordon pitched over his head in the SR. There are a lot of guys who have stepped up.
 

BiscuitEater

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Probably reading waaay too much into this but just wondering ..

I just don't think Corbin will leave his recruiting & scholarship advantage at Vandy to come to Starkville. He has had the #1 recruiting class in 2 of the past 3 years. And, it looks like most of his current class will enroll, including the #2 HS pitcher in the country.

He has the best recruits/players in the SEC. Beat defensive team in the SEC. Home field advantage that his team is comfortable playing on. Most stolen bases in the SEC. And, he just lost to MSU who had just squeaked into a regional. IDK