Gator Baseball 2024 OFFICIAL ROSTER/Transfer Tracker/Lineup???

Well now that scrimmages have ended, it's time to talk lineups and batting order one last time before we hear the glorious words Play Ball this Friday. With the info of Evans cracked wrist being out a few more weeks and Cags taking a break this last week for soreness in his arm, a few spots remain to be seen. The batting order by position, as I see it for Friday, should look like.....

CF - Robertson (L)
2B - Kurland (R)
1B/DH - Cags (L) note: I'll put him at 1st but don't be surprised if he is the DH, hope to hear more from Sully after the game about his start Sunday
C/1B - Heyman (R)
SS - Shelton (L)
LF - Shelnut (R)
DH/1B/C - Donay (R) note: I expect he will be in the order somewhere but greatly depends how Cags arm is
RF - Yost (L)
3B - Thomas (R)

Comments: I do think as the season moves along you will see Shelton move up in the order, either replacing Robertson at leadoff or even batting 3rd before Cags. Donay won't be an everyday starter. There's just many other good players that will get looks early. Sully has 3 weeks to experiment before he starts wanting to lock guys in so let's look at the batting numbers each week and see who produces the most. I've read some suggest other names behind Cags instead of Heyman. No so, Heyman remains rock solid behind Cags as many times as Sully has shown in scrimmages. Heyman is always one of our best line drive hitters in practice. If Robertson is going to stay in the leadoff, his success depends on him hitting oppo liners to LCF. He is very good at it in practice and may produce more than enough doubles in the gap. It's when he tries to pull everything, swinging deep, that poor at bats start taking over. Kurland is also very good at going oppo, so it's even more important in practice that Robertson gets on. Sully had Kurland working harder than any other batter going oppo and has put a high priority someone be on first to open the door for Kurland to take advantage of it. Plus he rarely strikes out. Lastly, don't forget about Thomas contributing out of the 9 hole. He has the same fire that Halter use to show at 3rd. He doesn't have the arm Halter did but I expect him to get a few clutch hits that others might not, purely on his desire to make a difference to this team.

 

Guy in center is certainly an option. I guess I've read to many times of Yost getting hits at scrimmages for Sully not to use another left hand hitter in the lineup. Something I didn't think about, it might be up to the starter we face, either a RHP or LHP, on Sully's OF choice.

 

Yep the unknown will be how Robertson and Guy preform at the plate compared to how both of them perform against SEC pitching. We probably won't know who the right choice is until end of March.

 

Someone in the Gator Baseball Media Dept making a nice go of it I'd say....

 

Thanks Ocala, this reads just like what most here have been saying about the middle relievers. It's good to know the quality opinions we get here on GC from so many is accurate as expected.