2007 baseball question...

[missouridawg]

Random, I know... But does anyone know why Corey Kluber of Stetson didn't throw against us in the opening game of the FSU regional that we won?

He was 12-2 with a low ERA that year. He pitched the second game and whirled a 7 inning, no run performance against Bethune Cookman. Stetson was the 3 seed and it makes no sense, looking back now, for him not to get the ball that game.

 

[patdog]

They were saving him for the #1 seed. Then when they lost to us in the 1st game, they wasted him against the #4 seed in the Saturday losers bracket game and lost the 1st game Sunday. I guess their coach was just confident they could beat us with their #2. Our starting pitching was pretty mediocre that year, so that may not have been as big a gamble as it seems. But if you save your ace and lose, the worst thing you could do is to pitch him against the #4 seed. If you make that decision, you've got to stick with it and save him for Sunday if you lose on Friday.

 

[BiscuitEater]

But if you save your ace and lose, the worst thing you could do is to pitch him against the #4 seed. If you make that decision, you've got to stick with it and save him for Sunday if you lose on Friday.

Even worse .. go 0-2 in a regional without ever pitching your ace.

 

[bulldogcountry1]

That 2007 team just got hot at the right time was on the receiving end of a lot of luck in the regionals and being able to host a super. It's what I love about college baseball, though.

 

[msudawg12]

They were saving him for the #1 seed. Then when they lost to us in the 1st game, they wasted him against the #4 seed in the Saturday losers bracket game and lost the 1st game Sunday. I guess their coach was just confident they could beat us with their #2. Our starting pitching was pretty mediocre that year, so that may not have been as big a gamble as it seems. But if you save your ace and lose, the worst thing you could do is to pitch him against the #4 seed. If you make that decision, you've got to stick with it and save him for Sunday if you lose on Friday.

no way in hell any coach drops to the losers bracket and doesnt pitch their ace. Like BE said, you dont go home without throwing your best pitcher. you just deal with the consequences and hope he doesnt have to go deep into that game

 

[Uncle Ruckus]

WTF made you think of this?

 

[stateu1]

Probably because Kluber just led the Indians to the World Series.

 

[patdog]

0-2 is no worse than 3-2. In Stetson's case, they should have pitched him against us. Pitching him on Saturday just guaranteed they couldn't win the regional.

 

[patdog]

Pigott pitched the game of his life on Saturday against FSU. He was a mediocre starter, but that day, he was an All-American.

 

[Uncle Ruckus]

Gotcha. I assume he's a pitcher who did something similar.

 

[missouridawg]

stateu1 is right. What really triggered it was a Britt McHenrs tweet about being in school with Kluner at Stetson and me vaguely remembering playing them in that regional. I wanted to see how we did against him and found that they sat their ace.

 

[engie]

What's the difference between 0-2 and 1-2?

Doesn't matter if a team loses the first game or the second game -- they are statistically really unlikely to win the regional without taking both of those first two games -- especially as a 2 or 3 seed on the road coming out of a loser's bracket. Both those games are pretty even in importance now with how they space out the games. It's not "how can I win today" -- it's "what gives me the best chance to get to 2-0" and then be in position to win the regional in better pitching circumstances than the teams trying to come out of the loser's bracket.

I think there's a lot of situations that justify holding an ace in a 1-4 game as a host. I'm not sure that many of those situations exist in a 2-3 game. There is still an art to playing matchups however.

 

[CoastDawg18]

Pigott pitched the game of his life on Saturday against FSU. He was a mediocre starter, but that day, he was an All-American.

Yea he did...

 

[BiscuitEater]

0-2 is no worse than 3-2. In Stetson's case, they should have pitched him against us. Pitching him on Saturday just guaranteed they couldn't win the regional.

Respectfully disagree. Going 0-2 without pitching your ace .. and the fans start questioning the coaches. Worse yet .. the players understand that their head coach is in idiot.

 

[patdog]

Depends on what your goal is. If your goal is to not finish last, then by all means pitch your ace in the elimination game on Saturday. If your goal is to come through the losers' bracket and win the tournament, you simply can't waste your ace against the #4 seed. All the fans and players already knew the coach was an idiot when he didn't pitch him against us in the opening game.

 

[engie]

Respectfully disagree. Going 0-2 without pitching your ace .. and the fans start questioning the coaches. Worse yet .. the players understand that their head coach is in idiot.

You say going 0-2 without throwing your ace leads to fans questioning the coaches. I say wasting your ace on a Saturday morning loser's bracket game that means nothing most likely against a 4-seed that probably really does not belong there or is a one-ace squad that is going to always throw that guy against the one-seed the night before -- leads to a much more baseball savvy segment of fans questioning those coaches.

"Just win today" has cost teams countless opportunities to actually win tournaments. A very vocal segment of our fanbase is going to ask for Cohen's firing at some point in every single year that he is here, regardless if that season ends in one championship or in playing for another championship. They conveniently forget they previously did this by the time the next year rolls around and they are calling for his firing again. I know this because I'm the guy that reminds them.

 

[MSUDC11]

We got to Omaha with Chad Crosswhite and Justin Pigott as our two best starting pitchers. That still baffles me.

That team wasn't as bad as some people seem to remember, though. Over .500 in SEC play and finished 4th in the league. We were going to host until we dropped a home series to a bad Alabama team in the final weekend and then went 0-2 in Hoover. Therefore we had to go on the road.

That team could hit. Jeffrey Rea, Brandon Turner (before he injured his hamstring 27 times), Ed Easley, Mitch Moreland, Brian LaNinfa, Connor Powers. We were hot garbage for three years after this team, though.

 

[engie]

Exactly. You throw your ace in a 2-3 game almost every time IMO. If you make the long-play gamble there by holding him and lose you've got to play it all the way out. You only ever throw the ace in game 2 of a regional on the road if you are playing the host. Regardless of which bracket you are in. You throw your midweek guy against the 4-seed with the burned ace. Making a regional final actually does mean something, with an almost 50/50 chance to finish in the top 25 overall, so I could see throwing your ace in the 2/3 loser's bracket rematch. Personally -- once a team is in that spot -- I wouldn't fault a coach for saving their ace again there and going #3 starter vs #3 starter in the rematch. With the chance to go ace vs host's #3 to push the series to a winner-take-all on Monday.

In the above scenario -- the "dumbest" thing that coach would have done -- would have been saving the ace in the first game. Pitching that ace in game two against a 4 seed after a first game loss would have been dumber. It does not correct or alleviate the initial mistake -- it compounds it. That's a quicker way to lose a team by showing your own freak out in the face of a little adversity -- instead of having a game plan, telling the team the plan, and sticking with it.

 

[KurtRambis4]

Exactly.

I think many people forget how well that team could hit.

 

[patdog]

If you make the long-play gamble there by holding him and lose you've got to play it all the way out.

Yep. He made the decision to save his ace for FSU on Thursday. Then he panicked when he lost that first game and got the worst possible outcome of all.