updated SEC RPI- State climbs 3 spots this week to #27
- Thread starter Coach34
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In the weird RPI world, I'm not sure.
Just look at this past weekend. We go 1-2 at #10 RPI Upig and the Bears sweep RPI #150 KY at home.
We passed the Bears in the RPI.
So if we make Hoover or miss and slip into a regional as #9 SEC with on a 30 or so RPI, not playing KY helps us.
But if we miss Hoover by a game (or two) and don't make a regional then yes, we wish we had played KY.
We need to survive this weekend and then go 8-4 or 7-5 after the schedule flips in our favor.
What we can't have is 2nd half rainouts.
Interestingly, while we played the top half of the conference, UM played the bottom half (6, 8, 10, 11 12 SEC RPI rankings)
To quote Jim Ross, for the Bears, business is about to pick up.
Just look at this past weekend. We go 1-2 at #10 RPI Upig and the Bears sweep RPI #150 KY at home.
We passed the Bears in the RPI.
So if we make Hoover or miss and slip into a regional as #9 SEC with on a 30 or so RPI, not playing KY helps us.
But if we miss Hoover by a game (or two) and don't make a regional then yes, we wish we had played KY.
We need to survive this weekend and then go 8-4 or 7-5 after the schedule flips in our favor.
What we can't have is 2nd half rainouts.
Interestingly, while we played the top half of the conference, UM played the bottom half (6, 8, 10, 11 12 SEC RPI rankings)
To quote Jim Ross, for the Bears, business is about to pick up.
Ole Miss has had the easy part of their schedule. It is going to get tough here on out. They might lose a lot of games the next four weeks or so but they could still pass us in the RPI even if we win.After SC our schedule we will hit our easy half. Tenn, LSU, Ole Miss are all win-able weekends. I will add Alabama to that list. They don't seem to be as strong as they did a few weeks ago. Heck we could finish as high2nd in the West. With Tenn and KY being so bad, if we finish fourth we will get into the SEC tourney. If that happens we will go to a regional.
Not playing UK might actually turn out to be a big break for us. Let's be honest- there is a chance that we could have lost a game to UK, especially if it is on the road, and that would have REALLY hurt. Not playing UK means that we could actually win less games and get in a regional than if we had them on the schedule. Memphis and UAB being better than they typically are is also going to help us out as well.
What is important for us right now is to try to take at least one from South Carolina this weekend, if we beat Ole Miss on Tuesday that would help, and then try to win as many of the series that we have remaining as we can. We also can not afford to lose to Valley, and we really need to beat South Alabama on the road. I think if we get hot, we can possibly get a two seed, especially if we win the Gov. Cup, beat Memphis on the road, and beat South Alabama on the road. If we could somehow win the series against South Carolina, that would be HUGE.
What is important for us right now is to try to take at least one from South Carolina this weekend, if we beat Ole Miss on Tuesday that would help, and then try to win as many of the series that we have remaining as we can. We also can not afford to lose to Valley, and we really need to beat South Alabama on the road. I think if we get hot, we can possibly get a two seed, especially if we win the Gov. Cup, beat Memphis on the road, and beat South Alabama on the road. If we could somehow win the series against South Carolina, that would be HUGE.
After rediculous come from ahead to lose games, I'd say all is fair in criticism.
After rediculous losses where you left 10 runners in scoring position and scored 1 to 3 runs and lost by 1 to 3 runs while garnering a whopping 5 to 7 hits for the game, while you opponent squeeks a few pop flys over the fence to take the series, I'd say all is fair in criticism.
And after 1win in a key road 3 game series, it is also fair to see the positives.
But just as someone suggests that we must take the season as a whole to determine whether there has been signficant improve, moderate improvement, slight improvement, no improvement, or digression, I don't think it is a fair assumption that one Sunday win translates to making hotel reservations in Hoover, Al. or scouting out possible Regional sites for rooms.
Winning is winning, but how the game is played in consistency usually gives an indication of how much more success is possible. It is possible that MSU could go on a nice win streak, or just split the rest of the way and show great improvement. We will see.
After rediculous losses where you left 10 runners in scoring position and scored 1 to 3 runs and lost by 1 to 3 runs while garnering a whopping 5 to 7 hits for the game, while you opponent squeeks a few pop flys over the fence to take the series, I'd say all is fair in criticism.
And after 1win in a key road 3 game series, it is also fair to see the positives.
But just as someone suggests that we must take the season as a whole to determine whether there has been signficant improve, moderate improvement, slight improvement, no improvement, or digression, I don't think it is a fair assumption that one Sunday win translates to making hotel reservations in Hoover, Al. or scouting out possible Regional sites for rooms.
Winning is winning, but how the game is played in consistency usually gives an indication of how much more success is possible. It is possible that MSU could go on a nice win streak, or just split the rest of the way and show great improvement. We will see.
some teams would have six road series and five home series. I'm not sure how you fix that, unless you have one neutral site series every year.
we are competing against teams that have more talent than we do, and are holding our own. We have freshmen that are as good if not better right now than our seniors. I don't see any reason why we shouldn't get better.
Some of those close games, you could make a strong arguement that they wouldn't have been that close in the first place if our talent was better to start with. But, it is what it is.
Some of those close games, you could make a strong arguement that they wouldn't have been that close in the first place if our talent was better to start with. But, it is what it is.
Not disagreeing with you on talent level at this point.
I have consistently stated THIS season that my concern is how did we get into a situation where we have either seniors or freshmen? I understand that Cohen was hired after the first class of freshmen who would be juniors this year were signed.
And he ran most of them off.
BUT....in Cohen's FIRST recruiting class, the only ones who are contributing are pitchers. No fielders or hitters....except Frost, if you count what he does as contributing.
This season isn't done, but based on lack of consistency, how can we believe that these seniors will come around and all of a sudden become good enough hitters to lead us into post season play? And if they don't, how can we expect next season to keep from regressing what with a bunch of sophmores, redshirt freshmenand freshmen playing, because we have not developedbalance thru the classes this year?
I have consistently stated THIS season that my concern is how did we get into a situation where we have either seniors or freshmen? I understand that Cohen was hired after the first class of freshmen who would be juniors this year were signed.
And he ran most of them off.
BUT....in Cohen's FIRST recruiting class, the only ones who are contributing are pitchers. No fielders or hitters....except Frost, if you count what he does as contributing.
This season isn't done, but based on lack of consistency, how can we believe that these seniors will come around and all of a sudden become good enough hitters to lead us into post season play? And if they don't, how can we expect next season to keep from regressing what with a bunch of sophmores, redshirt freshmenand freshmen playing, because we have not developedbalance thru the classes this year?
are the sophomores of this year. The guys that are juniors were all Polk recruits signed before Cohen got the job. Can't fault Cohen too much for lack of position players in his first class given our woeful pitching. We had some really bad luck in that some of the guys we signed that we were counting on to be big time contributors for us on the mound haven't panned out (CC Watson, Ben Bracewell, Luke Bole, Corey Collins - JC, Michael Dixon -JC, Jared Miller) but we still have Stratton, Girodo and Graveman contributing from that class on the mound. We did sign several JUCO position players that are full time position players that year in Ogden, Vickerson and Shepherd. In hindsight though it might have been better jsut to bite the bullet and sign freshmen position players that would have had longer to play and be part of the program. But the lack of quality JR. and SR position players on this current team (that weren't signed by Cohen as JUCOs) is strictly on Polk and his terrible recruiting his last 2 years here.
in Cohen's first class, the only position players we signed were Ethan Bright and Kolby Byrd, neither of whom are with us anymore. Then you have Frost, who was an invited walk-on, and the rest were pitchers.
What's going to happen is we're going to have a sophomore laden team next year, but we'll have a junior laden pitching staff. We'll have to hope that a couple of freshmen come through as well.
What's going to happen is we're going to have a sophomore laden team next year, but we'll have a junior laden pitching staff. We'll have to hope that a couple of freshmen come through as well.
If we think we have to win with pitching and defense this year, averaging just under 6 runs per game and just over 8 hits per game, then next year, we could very well have to win with pitching that allows us to get by with under 5 runs per game. And that is difficult in any league, let alone the SEC. Soooooo.......if we don't make it to a Regional this year, then it would make sense to at least question whether we will make it next year either.
And that.....is where a "HOT Seat" must come into play if that were to happen. This is year 3. Year 1 was a pass because Cohen had to take the field with Conner Powers and the 11 dwarfs. Year 2 has to be somewhat on Cohen because the only talent he put on the field was Polk's Seniors, a couple or 3Juco transfersand his freshmen pitchers.
Year 3 is ALL on Cohen, because HE missed on most of his true first class except for the pitchers. Year 4 will be a full team of Cohen signees....and we will get to use the.....Well, we are young excuse again. He couldn't afford to miss on a single position player last year and he missed on nearly ALL of them. He did have a great 2nd year class and the 3rd year class looks good on paper.
But everybody else in this league is recruiting great classes too. That is the problem. We need about 7 schools to stop caring about baseball like Kentucky has.</p>
And that.....is where a "HOT Seat" must come into play if that were to happen. This is year 3. Year 1 was a pass because Cohen had to take the field with Conner Powers and the 11 dwarfs. Year 2 has to be somewhat on Cohen because the only talent he put on the field was Polk's Seniors, a couple or 3Juco transfersand his freshmen pitchers.
Year 3 is ALL on Cohen, because HE missed on most of his true first class except for the pitchers. Year 4 will be a full team of Cohen signees....and we will get to use the.....Well, we are young excuse again. He couldn't afford to miss on a single position player last year and he missed on nearly ALL of them. He did have a great 2nd year class and the 3rd year class looks good on paper.
But everybody else in this league is recruiting great classes too. That is the problem. We need about 7 schools to stop caring about baseball like Kentucky has.</p>
You can say that Cohen is on the hot seat, but the fact of the matter is as of now, we are projected to go to one, and on top of that, that's also going through the most difficult part of our SEC schedule.
Also, I wouldn't be surprised if we are better next year on offense. CT, Norris, Frazier, Taylor Stark- all have gotten a lot of valuable experience and have performed pretty well for freshmen. They will build on this season and should get better. We're really missing Wes Rea as well. IF he can come back healthy, he could help us out a lot in terms of power. Renfroe and Henderson need to adjust, but they will both go play somewhere this summer and get some valuable experience, and they should also be better as well. Brandon Woodruff could possibly help us out on offense as well.
13 wins has been the magic number as far as getting into the SEC Tournament. We have six as of this moment. So, if we can win 7 out of our next 15, which amounts to winning two series and going one and three in the other three, which we are capable of, we should make the SEC Tournament if the trend holds. Even if we don't, I think at least nine teams will make it.
But we'll see.
Also, I wouldn't be surprised if we are better next year on offense. CT, Norris, Frazier, Taylor Stark- all have gotten a lot of valuable experience and have performed pretty well for freshmen. They will build on this season and should get better. We're really missing Wes Rea as well. IF he can come back healthy, he could help us out a lot in terms of power. Renfroe and Henderson need to adjust, but they will both go play somewhere this summer and get some valuable experience, and they should also be better as well. Brandon Woodruff could possibly help us out on offense as well.
13 wins has been the magic number as far as getting into the SEC Tournament. We have six as of this moment. So, if we can win 7 out of our next 15, which amounts to winning two series and going one and three in the other three, which we are capable of, we should make the SEC Tournament if the trend holds. Even if we don't, I think at least nine teams will make it.
But we'll see.
until you realize that MSU scored 1 or 0 runs in 7 of 15 games, 3 or less in 8 of 15 games, and 5 or less in 11 of 15 games. Add to that the fact that MSU gave up 4 runs in four games and 3 runs in one game.....and lost all 5 of them.jackstefano said:
The hitting is down across college baseball. That is obvious. There are 8 SEC teams with 14 overallosses or more, 36 games into a 56 game season. I acknowledge that competition is fierce. I would just like to see a little more "roar" out of our hitters. At some point, coaching has to kick in and get more out of the guys they send on the field.
Maybe they will get kick-started soon.
of having 1 team not playing a 3 game series against #2 Florida and another not playing a 3 game series agaisnt #1 Kentucky. That could be the difference between being a 4-5 seed in the SEC tournament and missing it altogether. You could give schools the option to play 1 series home away neutral or 2 home 1 away if they wanted to have a more balanced schedule. With series like MSU-UM, Bama-Auburn, UGA-UF, UT-Vandy that would be very workable.