Jack's Mailbag Ep. 46: Answering your latest South Carolina baseball questions

South Carolina’s schedule ramps up in a big way this weekend. Starting Friday, the Gamecocks open SEC play with a three-game series at No. 23 Florida in Gainesville.

With that said, it’s time to answer your questions in my weekly baseball Q&A series, Jack’s Mailbag. We’ll take a look at where things stand heading into conference play and dive into some potential concerns after an ugly loss to The Citadel earlier this week.

If you would like to have a question featured in the next episode, I’ll create a post on The Insiders Forum at the start of every week, and you can ask your question there. Without further ado, let’s get into this week’s questions.

Mbsimmons: Jack, will Will Craddock be the SEC Freshman of the Year?

If he keeps this up, I’d say he’ll have a real shot at being in the running by season’s end. He’s currently hitting .432 with four home runs and 12 RBI, getting on base at a .544 clip and slugging .818, good for a team-leading 1.362 OPS. He’s also been solid in the infield, posting a .983 fielding percentage with just one error. So he’s already off to a great start.

The challenge is that the SEC is loaded with talent across the conference, and there are a lot of standout players. Even someone as impressive as Ethan Petry was in his freshman year didn’t win SEC Freshman of the Year. That makes it hard to say whether Craddock will. For now, I’ll lean no, but again, if he keeps playing as he has, he should at least earn a spot on the SEC All-Freshman Team.

washington cock: Watched most of the Citadel game and we were just an embarrassment. We committed 4 errors, walked 9 batters, our 1st baseman is out of position, as he cannot stretch like a good 1st baseman should to help his fielders, we are slow on the bases, why on earth did LeCroy slide to 1st base, and some of our starters have very questionable arms, such as our catcher and CF. Am I imagining these things?

Yeah, it was just a rough night all around. No doubt about that. You’ll be hard-pressed to win baseball games playing the way South Carolina did on Tuesday at The Citadel. I don’t think you’re imagining what you’re seeing. It’s fair to question what’s currently going on because the Gamecocks are losing games to mid-major opponents that they never did last year. Not once. So that’s an automatic sign of regression.

I’ll stand by what I’ve said before: this is not a bad baseball team. I think it’s better than last year. That said, it does have some real flaws, like most teams. The defense hasn’t been good, which is the biggest issue, but I believe the offense will eventually be fine. It almost has to be, given the number of good hitters on the roster. The pitching has been good this year; I just think Tuesday was an off night. I’m not sure why it was treated as a bullpen game. I understand starting Alex Philpott in his first outing back from injury, but I don’t get why Paul Mainieri didn’t start Connor Chicoli or even Logan Prisco, who pitched very well last week against USC Upstate. Just an interesting decision.

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shmitty: What was your batting average in high school? I hit a smooth .235 with no D1 offers. My coach had me bunt a lot when he wasn’t yelling at me.

I’m not sure what I used to hit. I mostly played travel ball through my junior year before I stopped. I’d say I was a decent hitter, usually putting the ball in play and getting on base. But as far as what my batting average was, I’ve got no clue.

Creed Thoughts: Not really a question for you, but can you ask PM if it’s finally time to be concerned about the defense now that it leads the SEC with 24 errors?

Absolutely. South Carolina has been awful defensively with those 24 errors, as you mentioned. The Gamecocks also have the worst fielding percentage (.963) in the SEC. So it’s definitely concerning from my standpoint. How does Mainieri feel? We’ll eventually find out.

I won’t be at his usual media availability before the Florida series since I’m on the road this week, heading to Gainesville on Friday. I did, however, ask him about this concern earlier in the season, and at the time, he wasn’t too worried. Things have obviously regressed since then, so I can’t imagine he feels as confident about his defense now with a larger sample size. At the very least, it has to be surprising for him to see this many fielding mistakes after some struggles last year.

callahda: When will Paul clean out his office?

I won’t speculate on whether Mainieri will be fired. What I will say is that with South Carolina retaining Lamont Paris in men’s basketball, the focus now shifts to baseball. Mainieri’s buyout, around $4 million, is significantly less than Paris’ $12 million, making it financially easier to move on from his contract. At 68 years old, Mainieri hasn’t shown much progress since last season, and conference play will be the true test of whether things can change and what the next steps might be after that.

Hampton Rhodes: While LeCroy’s bat has been a pleasant surprise, his defense quite frankly sucks. I lost count of the number of stolen bases the Citadel had, and you know our SEC theft opponents are licking their chops. Is there a defensive option here with LeCroy moving to DH or our we just screwed?

This is something that concerns me as well. Overall, LeCroy has swung the bat well during non-conference play, hitting .317 with four home runs, 15 RBIs and a 1.007 OPS. Those are solid numbers, but it will be interesting to see how he performs against tougher competition now that SEC play kicks off this weekend.

Defensively, he’s thrown out five baserunners this season, four more than he had in roughly the same number of games last year, though he was dealing with an injury then. That said, it’s worrisome that teams have already stolen 24 bases against him. For context, last year’s group of catchers threw out only six runners in 71 attempts.

So while LeCroy is on a better pace in terms of throwing runners out, he’s also giving up a large number of stolen bases. His throwdowns have been inconsistent, solid at times, but just OK overall. It’s definitely something to monitor as SEC teams will likely test him on the basepaths.

LeCroy is still performing well offensively and has helped guide the pitching staff to a strong ERA. I don’t expect any changes at catcher; he’s their guy for the long haul.

gacock: How long… how long, Jack… is this *fill in the blank* going to go on!!!

*Inserts shrugging gif*

cocky347: After the Citadel loss, do you still feel good about your O/U prediction for SEC play? I’m already for the season to be over.

I honestly forgot which Jack’s Mailbag I set an over/under for SEC wins in, but I’m still up in the air about how that’s going to play out. Again, I do think there are some winnable series on the upcoming schedule, starting this weekend at Florida. I also think Arkansas is winnable since that series is at home. But overall, I’m not feeling great right now.

My opinion on this team continues to shift back and forth until I actually see them go up against good competition, which they’ll do throughout the 30-game slate.

The Insiders Forum: Discuss South Carolina baseball!