Baseball vs SC, Fri 4/12, 6:30 pm

Tomorrow and Sunday are pretty much must wins, right?

 

You’re still my hero!

 

Sully in post game:

• Both starters pretty good
• gators struck out 9 times
• Fisher threw too many balls
• Big inning has been a problem all year
• need someone to rise up

 

I did too but didn’t want him to know it

 

It’s not going to happen this year

 

I had an excuse this time ! I finally played decent at the course then drank a lotta Stella.

 

I expected Sully's post game to be a series of BLEEPS.

 

This might have been the least favorable "matchup"/"circumstances" home game in the SEC, particularly in terms of the pitching matchup with the wind blowing out. Jones has given up 1 HR all season. He's given up less than 0.5 HR/9 in his career. He also doesn't walk a lot of people. His runs come predominantly from giving up a cluster of hits, which is exactly how the 2024 Gators don't score. Other than back-to-back doubles, Gator bats had nothing on him -- didn't adapt the HR-or-bust approach enough. On the other side, Neely's pretty much average fly-balls/ground-balls. I looked through the PBP -- 8 opposing hitters put balls in the air and slashed .625/.625/2.000 on them. Both HR to right were wind-aided and maybe the one to left, too; sure didn't get out by much.

If we ignore the last inning debacle -- "other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?" -- being down only 5-3 through 8, with an unfavorable matchup and terrible warning-track-vs-HR luck wasn't bad. If this weren't the fifth loss in a row, it'd be one we could file under "can't win 'em all". And maybe we should -- "you gotta play 'em one day at a time."

 

I fear this team is in deep doo-doo!

 

At least with baseball you won't be fed the nonsense of "we're saving our good plays for Tennessee"

 

Pitching was ok. For the second week in a row Neely gives quality start. Again, Lack of true quality at bats very troubling. The attempt to try to pull everything continues. We see no attempt to bunt, to go oppo, to move runners over, just drop and lift pull head and shoulder out.

 

1012—

Well stated….

 

'Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.....'

 

Our team needs a motivational speaker...

 

Is an ERA over 7 for the game really a quality start?

 

A confluence of factors has contributed to this mediocre year. We pretty much struck out on Portal acquisitions with the exception of Garrison who is the best available behind the plate at the moment. I could sense from scrimmages that Guy and Donay would not be important contributors, Albert is ok within limits. But most importantly, Sully failed to land a quality veteran SP as he did with Waldrep. 2. The regression of Heyman, Kurland, and Shelton (to an extent) and Fisher and Slater among top arms you would have expected to improve and have not. 3. The freshmen pitchers have not gotten it together as one had hoped- especially Peterson- but it may have been different had he built confidence with a few mid weeks starts rather than thrust into the weekend spotlight. McNeilly has come on now and is pitching as we had expected. 4. And then there is the god-awful hitting approach that had dogged us all year as if it's a HR hitting contest rather than hitting it where it's pitched. 5/6 Defense and team speed. We may not make many errors but the range of many of everyday guys is very limited and the left side of infield fail to wave at balls that Rivera and Halter would have reached... team speed is virtually non-existent. Other than that, we're fine. It isn’t happening this year and that happens every now and again.

 

^^^^pretty much sums it up. Roster isn’t where it should be BUT still holding out hope that we can sneak into the post season.

 

Mat—

Our best option at this point is to play hard and get it figured out that it takes EVERYBODY to pull the wagon.

 

Two of the guys that hit dingers off of Neely were not guys that you would expect to hit them. These are guys that you should challenge at the plate. They hit what would normally be lazy fly balls that got blown out by a very strong wind. Bad luck for Neely.