Gm 59: wsu vs isur (mvc tourny - GM 4)

[1972Shocker]

At least they went out with some fight.

Debatable. 11 runs in 4 games. 8 of those in our win over Evansville. Considering we scored a total of 3 runs in the other 3 games is a testament to our pithing staff to have won one of those 3 games.

6 hits and 3 runs in 21 innings today. That won't win many games.

[SHOXAAC]

Debatable. 11 runs in 4 games. 8 of those in our win over Evansville. Considering we scored a total of 3 runs in the other 3 games is a testament to our pithing staff to have won one of those 3 games.

6 hits and 3 runs in 21 innings today. That won't win many games.

Meter!!!

[1972Shocker]

Meter!!!

Yeah, I was thinking about that after making that post. I've got plenty of time to get it in the shop and fixed.

[1972Shocker]

One more Todd Butler radio shows and a couple of more Brent Kemnitz radio shows.

[shoxlax]

Again, my concern is who exactly got coached up this year? Don't get me wrong, the Gene act grew old and tired, but alot of these guys had BAs that plummeted from last year to this and then some. I realize most of it is talent in the first place, but they shouldn't get worse either should they?

Okay my rant is over.

[1972Shocker]

Again, my concern is who exactly got coached up this year? Don't get me wrong, the Gene act grew old and tired, but alot of these guys had BAs that plummeted from last year to this and then some. I realize most of it is talent in the first place, but they shouldn't get worse either should they?

Okay my rant is over.

Some got better. Casey Gillaspie, Dayne Parker, Daniel Kihle. Some backpedaled. Garrett Bayliff, Tyler Baker, Eric Harbutz (Injury?). Some probably never had it: Micah Green, Tanner Dearman, Tanner Kirk, etc. Not sure where Chase Simpson and Zair Koeiman fit it.

Not sure we had any real power arms on the pitching staff.

Your concern is valid but difficult to really reach a conclusion about.

[Veritas]

Again, my concern is who exactly got coached up this year? Don't get me wrong, the Gene act grew old and tired, but alot of these guys had BAs that plummeted from last year to this and then some. I realize most of it is talent in the first place, but they shouldn't get worse either should they?

Okay my rant is over.

I think your assessment is fair. I'm confident that fHCGS would have done much better with this team than what we saw this year with the Butler. However, being as objective as I can regarding this topic, I also believe that the Butler was hired due in part to his excellent recruiting prowess (his HC record certainly isn't much with which to get excited), and we need to see how that turns out and give him 2-3 or perhaps 4 years to get WSU back to a SR. After this year, I expect that climb to be steady and positive, but perhaps painfully slow.

The pressure won't only be on Butler to succeed, but also ADES who made a hell of a gamble. Let's hope that gamble pays off. I'm pulling for all of them to be successful.

Think BK will be back next year?

[ShockTalk]

Again, my concern is who exactly got coached up this year? Don't get me wrong, the Gene act grew old and tired, but alot of these guys had BAs that plummeted from last year to this and then some. I realize most of it is talent in the first place, but they shouldn't get worse either should they?

Okay my rant is over.

One thing we cannot compare to at WSU is a change in head coaches. These were/are Gene's recruits and it would appear there were mixed results with Bayliff being the most mystifying.

That said, it happened in the past where some seniors have had a "down" year comparatively to their other years. Most recent would be Johnny Coy. Some others I think were Magness, Ryan, and Preston.

[pogo]

I think your assessment is fair. I'm confident that fHCGS would have done much better with this team than what we saw this year with the Butler. However, being as objective as I can regarding this topic, I also believe that the Butler was hired due in part to his excellent recruiting prowess (his HC record certainly isn't much with which to get excited), and we need to see how that turns out and give him 2-3 or perhaps 4 years to get WSU back to a SR. After this year, I expect that climb to be steady and positive, but perhaps painfully slow.

The pressure won't only be on Butler to succeed, but also ADES who made a hell of a gamble. Let's hope that gamble pays off. I'm pulling for all of them to be successful.

Think BK will be back next year?

Now that was a measured response and a very reasonable observation as to what could happen. I think BK will be back in that he is still a highly respected pitching coach but as in any asst coaching position you have to produce so I don't think he is an immediate rehire if things don't seem to improve.

[Downtown Shocker Brown]

Does anyone think our pitching wasn't good enough to win 8-10 more games?

[Shocker85]

Does anyone think our pitching wasn't good enough to win 8-10 more games?

The pitching could have fared better with better support from the offense. However, I think the pitching situation was similar to the position player situation, that is, almost the entire staff was returning players. A couple weren't very good which left the staff very, very thin. For example, who wasn't thinking Brummett would be a weekend starter this year?

The evaluation of individual players revolves around ability, improvement and desire. Who can say for sure that any given returning player did or did not buy in to the new coaching staff? The perceived production and/or improvement could be attributed to lack of desire OR lack of skill/ability. Who can tell?

[SB Shock]

I realize most of it is talent in the first place, but they shouldn't get worse either should they?

It not the way it works. Players can have good years, or have bad years or be consistent. Sometime you see guys who have good first years, struggle after that because now there is scouting report on their weaknesses and if they don't get better in their weakness, teams will use their weaknesses against them.

Boyd had did a study on "offensive predictability" as each player year goes by and when you look at it, it is not all that impressive. Full story is at the link below, but here are some relevant.

http://www.boydsworld.com/breadcrumbs/year_to_year_offense.html

Stat R X
SO 0.61 1.01
HR 0.58 1.16
BB 0.56 1.12
SLG 0.47 1.03
OBP 0.40 1.02
AVG 0.28 1.01

The "R" is correlation - closer to 1 the better, X is the % increase that was seen. What you see is if you can't hit D1 curveball, well you probably won't hit a D1 curveball and your strikeouts will continue to increase. If you have power, you likely will get stronger (16% increase from year to year). But metrics like Avg/OBP/Slug - only going to increase slightly on average by +1%/+2%/3%. Of course there are going to be some that beat those marks, but there is going to be those who don't.

[1972Shocker]

Does anyone think our pitching wasn't good enough to win 8-10 more games?

We had very solid starting pitching 3 deep. I think a lot of fans underestimate the loss of Minnis and Peterson in middle relief and as a closer respectively.

We effectively had no closer this year and middle relief was a little inconsistent. Aaron LaBrie certainly was not as good this year as he was last year.

I don't know if our pitching was good enough to win 8-10 more games, but I think we could have won another 6 games if the offense had been stronger.

Clearly out pitching was our strength this year, but you probably could say that was the case with just about every Valley team. There was some decent starting pitching in the league this year. Most teams could throw at least 2 quality starters on the weekend.

[shoxlax]

It not the way it works. Players can have good years, or have bad years or be consistent. Sometime you see guys who have good first years, struggle after that because now there is scouting report on their weaknesses and if they don't get better in their weakness, teams will use their weaknesses against them.

Boyd had did a study on "offensive predictability" as each player year goes by and when you look at it, it is not all that impressive. Full story is at the link below, but here are some relevant.

http://www.boydsworld.com/breadcrumbs/year_to_year_offense.html

Stat R X
SO 0.61 1.01
HR 0.58 1.16
BB 0.56 1.12
SLG 0.47 1.03
OBP 0.40 1.02
AVG 0.28 1.01

The "R" is correlation - closer to 1 the better, X is the % increase that was seen. What you see is if you can't hit D1 curveball, well you probably won't hit a D1 curveball and your strikeouts will continue to increase. If you have power, you likely will get stronger (16% increase from year to year). But metrics like Avg/OBP/Slug - only going to increase slightly on average by +1%/+2%/3%. Of course there are going to be some that beat those marks, but there is going to be those who don't.

While that was enlightening (seriously), it also didn't show the major drop off some of our players experienced as a trend either. I know I'm comparing apples to oranges but the landmark of our great teams were juniors and seniors stepping up after less than stellar starts to their careers and picking up their stats.

The batting averages I've seen on our recruits (save one or two) don't look like instant help either although I know short season HS stats are often skewed.

The good news is out of the 57 pitchers we signed, there is bound to be three or four studs in there that can give us a chance to win.

[WSUwatcher]

actually it has been like 2010's baseball....

Nice try at grinding your customary ax, SB, but no -- 90's basketball was definitely worse than 2010's baseball, and it wasn't close. Shocker baseball played in the NCAA baseball tournament, however unsuccessfully, just last year. Once Eddie Fogler left the building, though, the basketball team didn't sniff NCAA play (or the NIT), and did well ever to squeak over .500. I saw most of that misery firsthand, and I know all too well that barely over .500 at best doesn't compare to barely over .500 at worst.

And speaking of worse, dizzle -- just think: if the Shocks hadn't had the benefit of extra innings, they'd have had three hits in two games. THREE! That goes beyond fitting all the way to frightening. Fall and a new crop of players can't get here soon enough.