Will our hitting really be that much better next year?

[o_riverdawg]

I know the players will be a year older, but they will still be the same players for the most part. The season is almost over, so the young excuse should be dying down. But they are hitting worse now than they were earlier in the year. They have even struggled hitting Alcorn State and MVSU pitching. Will they really improve that much over the off season?

 

[Coach34]

because they are getting tired and not used to playing this much.

We wont go from worst to first in hitting- but you will definitely a move to the middle of the pack next season.

And while we lose Stratton- I think the pitching staff will be deeper and better overall- we just wont be dominate on Friday nights

 

[engie]

Explain to me what happened here.

Chris Stratton
(fr) 5-3 5.29ERA 78.1ip 84h 76k 42bb .280baa (he was our 3rd best pitcher by ERA)
(so) 5-7 5.21ERA 76ip 83h 76k 27bb .278baa (he was our 10th best pitcher by ERA)
(jr) 9-0 2.19ERA 82.1ip 61h 101k 17bb .207baa (he is our 5th best pitcher by ERA)

It's mental with alot of young guys. The ones that come in and excel as FR are mostly the true-fire early round pro prospects that probably "should" have gone in the draft out of highschool. State hasn't had a real one in a long time. CT Bradford was as good as Jeff Rea, and combined they were as good of FR years as we've had recently on the field.

Of our starting team tonight, only 3-4 of them were mentally prepared to be starters this season. That part can not be overstated. The people trying to dismiss this are the same ones that were calling Stratton and Reed busts after their FR/SO years(and also calling for Butch Thompson to be fired). Sometimes you've got to play guys that aren't ready, and doing so hurts their development(slows it down by hurting their confidence). We will have AT LEAST 10 position players that are "SEC ready" to start next year...

I'll stick with my guns on this one. Bookmark it.

Currently, we are at .252 77doubles 18hr .699OPS
Next season at this time(same # of games), we will be around .285 95doubles 30hr .810OPS

Our team ERA is 2.82. It'll be under 3 next year.

 

[KurtRambis4]

*

 

[Todd4State]

with our struggles. Like CT Bradford- the dude could barely swing a bat, and obviously how are you supposed to hit a baseball with one arm? And Daryl Norris is playing on one leg- and when that happens, it's hard to drive the ball because power comes from your legs.

Rea spent all of last year rehabbing and he has had shoulder problems this year- so it's some of both with him.

I am hopeful that the JUCO second baseman we are getting from California, Adam Detz, can close our revolving door at second base of Frost/Britton/Casey. That's a big hole in our lineup.

Renfroe has made a lot of strides- but he still has a long way to go.

Frazier has been good and Porter and Slauter have been pretty solid.

Brownlee has also been hurt throughout his entire career.

 

[maroonmania]

how healthy we can stay. Daryl Norris, CT Bradford, Demarcus Henderson and Wes Rea can all be significantly better in our offense next year if they can get healthy. I believe Norris and Henderson can get healthy. I do have some concern about Bradford getting his shoulder back right and I'm really starting to fear that Rea will always have problems with his right arm nerve damage. He got that injury in HS and even redshirted last year and the problem still came back. We should also expect some significant improvement from Britton, Casey and Fullerton on the offensive side since they were adjusting to SEC ball this year. I am starting to fear that Renfroe won't ever live up to his hype. He's at the end of his second year now and he still is not the hitter we thought he would be especially in the power department. We should at least be a respectable offensive club next year and will need to be because when you remove Stratton from our staff we won't have a true ace starting pitcher next year.