Ole Miss shuffling up the weekend rotation after early season SEC skid
After suffering back-to-back sweeps to open up Southeastern Conference play Ole Miss is changing things up with its weekend pitching rotation.
Starting this weekend at Texas A&M the weekend rotation will consist of Jack Dougherty, Xavier Revis and JT Quinn in that order. The move means freshman Grayson Saunier, who had been the Saturday starter the first six weekends of the season, is now moving to the bullpen.
In six starts Saunier allowed 20 runs — 19 earned — off 28 hits while striking out 29 and walking 16 other batters. In 22 innings pitched Saunier’s earned run averaged swelled up to 7.77 on the year and was 22.50 in last weekend’s start against No. 3 Florida where he allowed a season high five runs off six hits in two innings of work.
Ole Miss head coach Mike Bianco revealed the rotation shakeup on Tuesday after the Rebels game against Southern Mississippi in Pearl was called in the fourth inning.
“We got to pitch better,” Bianco said. “We gotta pitch better and Quinn’s pitched well in the middle of the week, he’s pitched well in relief and giving him an opportunity to start. Revis has pitched well the first two conference weekends, so we’re going to move him up to Saturday.”
Quinn will be making his first weekend start and in doing so making his first career SEC start at Ole Miss.
On the season, Quinn has an ERA of 5.48 and in 23 innings has allowed 16 runs — 14 earned — off 19 hits and struck out 27 while walking 13 other batters.
Through six SEC games the Ole Miss pitching staff has an ERA of 8.70 and giving up 9.1 runs per game in SEC play. Bringing in Quinn to replace Saunier takes away the latter’s 12.79 ERA in conference play.
After two solid outings in his first two SEC starts Rivas has the lowest ERA in conference play among Ole Miss starting pitchers with a 4.22.
“It’s less (trying to shake some life into the rotation),” Bianco said. “It’s not just juggle it, shake it up and throw it out there. Hopefully there’s a little more mindfulness to it than that. It’s really that Quinn’s pitched better and deserves the opportunity and certainly Xavier’s pitched well on the weekend and move him up with that.”
Saunier is expected to see relief time out of the bullpen and would have gotten that started in Tuesday’s game but Bianco noted the freshman was sick with flu-like symptoms. He’s expected to be ready to go this weekend in College Station.
Ole Miss and Texas A&M kick off the weekend series on Friday at 6 p.m. CT on SEC Network+.
