Striking a lot of guys out can be overrated. Getting guys to hit easy nibblers to the infield can be just as effective.Ross Mitchell just goes out there and gets outs. He defies statistics and then gets the win. A lot of that is because while he may give up contact, it’s usually not quality contact and is easily fielded by our defense, which is pretty athletic and very good.
Cohen is a good coach. But it's OK to point out the obvious that he completely mismanaged the end of that ballgame and likely cost us the game. It's happened to every coach who's ever coached the game.It’s really hard to fault Norris for that simply because he should not have been put in that position. Now here is my- “I think John Cohen is a great coach, and I like what he is doing at MSU” preface to what I am about to say- I really do believe that he is a good coach and I am happy overall with what he is done. That said, everybody has a bad day.
In the 8th inning Cohen went straight from Bracewell to Bradford. That's what made it even more befuddling. If he wanted a lefty-lefty matchup, it would have made much more sense to bring in Girodo, who has pitched very well this year, instead of Bradford, who has hardly pitched. Girodo pitched to the last batter in the 9th inning, and struck him out, but had to come out of the game because he was scheduled to lead off the next inning due to the position switching by Bradford and the elimination of the DH.
Calling Ole Miss a non-conference win. Subtle jab, but I like it.If you couple that with the quality non-conference wins that MSU had over Ole Miss, South Alabama, Austin Peay, Memphis, and Rhode Island