SBNation.com User Blog: formerlyanonymous

Unusual Opportunity for Astros Fantasy

formerlyanonymous — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 02:51:06 -0000

So I generally have at least 3 fantasy teams per year. Two are your traditional fantasy games, head-to-head and rotisserie with well thought out draft rankings. The third is generally reserved for some odd ball league, usually the type where you get points for errors and losses, negative points for home runs. I like the challenge of keeping a roster full of players just good enough to start consistently.

This year, I came across a slightly different idea. For the first time in my fantasy playing history, I think I'm going to be able to guarantee that I get the entire Astros team. With Altuve and Veras the only players being drafted in most leagues, by taking them in the first two rounds, there's very little chance that anyone would steal a starter from me.

As bad as that sounds, it's actually pretty awesome from my perspective. I've tried to do this a few different years, but I've never been able to pull it off.

So for those of you with a fantasy slot to spare, maybe you hadn't contemplated this yet, and hopefully I might offer you this fun, and very unusual opportunity.

As bad as that sounds, it's actually pretty awesome from my perspective. I've tried to do this a few different years, but I've never been able to pull it off.

So for those of you with a fantasy slot to spare, maybe you hadn't contemplated this yet, and hopefully I might offer you this fun, and very unusual opportunity.

Baseball Receives Major Gift for New Ballpark

formerlyanonymous — Wed, 19 May 2010 02:38:09 -0000

Baseball Receives Major Gift for New Ballpark

Minnesota has received a sizable donation that will allow them to completely renovate Siebert Field, returning baseball to campus (and outdoors). This is a huge commitment and will be a great recruiting tool for baseball, a sport Minnesota has historically been very good in.

Q&A with Seth Rosin, RHP, Minnesota (2010 Draft)

formerlyanonymous — Fri, 14 May 2010 14:09:52 -0000

Q&A with Seth Rosin, RHP, Minnesota (2010 Draft)

Baseball Beginnings does a pretty solid job of covering a lot of prospects. They recently sat down with Minnesota's Seth Rosin. The Q&A also has a link to his scouting report that graded him out to a "mild prospect."

Are Sportswriters Really Necessary?

formerlyanonymous — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 22:35:08 -0000

Are Sportswriters Really Necessary?

In my keeping up with Michigan baseball, I found that our finale against Iowa made it into Business Week magazine. Apparently, scientists at jNWU have developed robots that take in all the stats and pump out perfectly spelled newspaper articles. SKYNET is certain to follow!

Baseball: Iowa Preview

formerlyanonymous — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 03:42:29 -0000

Baseball: Iowa Preview

Iowa baseball takes on Michigan this weekend. They have a good chance of taking a game, maybe two if they grab the momentum in game one of a double header Friday. With rain predicted Saturday and Sunday, chance at a sweep if everything works in their favor. That said, Michigan is pretty good this year and Iowa's bullpen and hitters aren't what many would call good.

Baseball Loses 17-3 to A&M

formerlyanonymous — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 05:43:01 -0000

I made the trip tonight out to College Station, which like State College, you know when you're there because of the increase in road kill just before the city limits, to watch the baseball team take on the Aggies, and man, was it underwhelming. Penn State lost 17-3, scoring the three runs all in the 9th inning to protect from being shut out. That said, I still think Penn State is an above average team in terms of previous Nittany Lions squads, and some of the young pitching tonight will be really good in the future.

Tonight's Nittany starter was freshman righty John Walter. Walter had excellent command of his fastball and a good change in pace with his curve. I couldn't see his change up from where I was sitting, but it didn't seem like he used it much anyway. Walter has a pretty smooth windup, dropping his arm to his back pocket then bringing it over the top. It seemed like he definite tends to a ground ball pitcher. I think he'll be a regular in the weekend rotation starting next year, becoming Penn State's next ace.

Walter ended up going 4 innings on this night, giving up 4 runs on 5 hits, no walks, and 2 strikeouts. The 4 runs came on a string of 4 hits in a row in the fourth. Scott Arthur lead off with a bunt back toward the third base side of the pitchers mound, and with a bang-bang play at first, the umpire made the wrong call (I can say this objectively as a Michigan baseball fan, not Penn State) - safe. Center fielder Brodie Greene then bunted a perfect ball down the third base line, leaving Penn State no play. DH Joe Patterson then dropped a soft hit single into the left center gap, but Penn State's Deegan was able to hold the runners at bay by making it look like he'd catch the fly ball. When it fell, the runners were only able to advance one base. This was followed up by a blast by Aggie first baseman Caleb Shofner to the right center wall. That double would clear the bases, plating A&M's first 3 runs, with only one truly solid hit. Two ground balls later would see Shofner score to make it 4-0 after 4 innings.

The starter for A&M wasn't having any problems. Wacha fanned 11 Nittany Lion batters in just 6 innings of work, allowing just 4 baserunners. The strikeouts were a mix of good pitching, bad pitch selection, and bad umpiring. I kept a tally on missed strike calls, and A&M had 4 really bad strike calls go in their favor in the early innings-all of them well below the knees. This strike zone forced the batters into swinging at a couple extra bad pitches, complicating their hitting woes. To make it worse, the umpire blew 3 strike calls for the Nittany Lions, including one where the entire stadium went silent awaiting the strike three call. It definitely seemed like some home cooking, but then again, every game I've watched this season (about 20 or so) has included some very bad umpiring, especially with the low ball.

After Walter exited, Ryan Ignas entered for the Nittany Lions. Ignas is a side arm righty, and from my seat at the visitors bullpen, he had good control of his fastball but not much on his off speed. That continued on the field. He had a quick 1-2-3 inning aided by a well timed pitch out and caught stealing in the 5th, but with two outs in the sixth, his defense let him down. After giving up a single and stolen base, Ignas induced a pop fly and struck out a batter. A single for Kenny Jackson later would plate one run, but things fell apart after Nittany Lion shortstop Luis Montesinos made his first error of the game. The next pitch, with two runners on, would clear the left field fence by a mile. Three unearned runs crossed the plate. The next batter fouled out immediately to end the inning, and Ignas's night.

So after 6, Penn State was down 8-0, and the game was basically over. David Lutz, a submarine throwing lefty, came in for Penn State in the bottom of the inning, but he was rocked pretty solidly. He gave up a single, hit a batter, gave up a home run of the railroad tracks beyond the right field fence to start the inning. Another Montesinos error, this time on a ground ball through his legs, kept the inning going. Three more singles would lead to another couple runs.

In the bottom of the 8th, hard throwing righty Drew Irsfeld came in and had about as much success as his predecessors. Steranka tried to ole one at third and it got by him, followed by a double off the left field wall, and another home run for the Aggies gave them a 17-0 lead going into the final inning.

Then, and only then, did Penn State wake up on offense. First baseman Joey DeBernardis lead off the innings with a dribbler up the middle. Eramo, who hit a double off the wall in his previous at bat, was pitched around (although probably not on purpose). Then Montesinos attempted to make up for one of his errors by knocking in a run with a single to center. Replacement second baseman Elliot Searer then hit a liner into right for another single.

17-2! We've got a comeback going! But, Steve Snyder was having a bad day. With the hat trick of 3 Ks already, and hoping to avoid the golden sombrero, Snyder one uped himself and grounded into a double play. But in his defense, he was clearly safe at first, and the umpire at first base was ready to go home. I wasn't going to tell the umpire to his face though, as his biceps were almost big enough to rip apart his sleeves. Seriously, the dude was jacked. A run did score on the GDP though.

Leadoff hitter Sean Deegan would single to try and get things going again, but it was all for naught as Heath Johnson struck out to end the game. It was the fastest 14 run win I've ever seen at just about 2 and a half hours.

So yeah, it wasn't so exciting for a Nittany Lion fan, out of the 30 or so that might have been there. Some things were rather annoying. Having to hear the strike out video play 16 times in the game was driving me insane. As was the train that has to honk at the rail road crossing all of 100 feet from the stadium. LOUD NOISES! And their park, while having a decent view of campus and a nice double deck concourse, it doesn't hold a candle to Medlar.

Penn State should still be a pretty good team, and for those of you in State College, I highly encourage coming out to a game. Wanamaker, the ace, is a VERY good pitcher who is coming back from a year off after an injury. Watching him pitch is worth it.

Morgan Ensberg's Blog

formerlyanonymous — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:25:55 -0000

Morgan Ensberg's Blog

In his latest installment, how and why to peg a batter. Interesting stuff from the now broadcaster.

Iowa Baseball Beats Ranked Kansas

formerlyanonymous — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 05:44:59 -0000

Iowa Baseball Beats Ranked Kansas

Sure, Kansas is just at the bottom of the polls, but for a program like Iowa's (think the basketball team this year, but over a 20 year period) this is very encouraging. The best news is it wasn't even a Hippen (one of the most underrated aces in the Big Ten). I think the Hawkeyes have a good shot to make the Big Ten Tourney this season, and this is just one step towards that goal.

This is how I feel about football season. This is also a perfect metaphor for the Michigan season.

formerlyanonymous — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 04:19:13 -0000

This is how I feel about football season. This is also a perfect metaphor for the Michigan season.

All American Volleyball Player Leaves Team

formerlyanonymous — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 03:12:17 -0000

Disclosure: I'm affiliated with Michigan, but I thought some of you might be interested.

For those of you who may or may not follow the volleyball team, they're rather good. They're ranked #9 in the country and 15-5 overall. They are in contention to knock Penn State off as the national juggernaut.

Well interesting news comes from the volleyball team today. All American outside hitter Brook Dieter quit the team today despite leading the team in kills. No one knows exactly what happened. Dieter didn't play Saturday against Northwestern, and many speculated that she just had a nagging injury. After the game, Coach Herbert told the media:

Usually the reason people play is because they’ve earned playing time and that’s what happened in this case.

That's pretty strange as Dieter lead the team in kills just the night before in the loss to Illinois. Team captain Lauren Gibbemeyer cited something that I think may be a bit more revealing, mentioning "personal reasons." This immediately made me suspect health, or particularly, pregnancy might be a reason.

Whatever it is, it's a huge loss for the Gopher's volleyball team, especially as they take on #11 Michigan and #1 Penn State in the next two weekends.

Disclosure: I'm affiliated with Michigan, but I thought some of you might be interested.

Usually the reason people play is because they’ve earned playing time and that’s what happened in this case.

Whatever it is, it's a huge loss for the Gopher's volleyball team, especially as they take on #11 Michigan and #1 Penn State in the next two weekends.

Promoting Anarchy

formerlyanonymous — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 03:32:44 -0000

I'm a big advocate of anarchy, especially when its related to meaningless internet polls. For those of you who forgot, J Leman made a huge comeback to actually lead by 300 votes at one time (warning, this poll hates America). How did BSD managed to let Zug fall so far behind? That was me resetting my cookies about 500 times in an effort to ruin their poll.

via firmandcorrect.files.wordpress.com

Now I have run into a wall. My counterpoints (I'm just a baseball contributor, Tim does the football) over at VarsityBlue have set forth a meaningless Popularity Contest. The poll is protected from just clearing cookies and voting again. I need your help. Vote Nick Sheridan over Brandon Minor. Promote anarchy. I only need 833 votes.

via firmandcorrect.files.wordpress.com

Baseball Team vs Michigan

formerlyanonymous — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 23:03:22 -0000

Howdy Hawkeyes,

Since one or two of your mass readership may be interested in the baseball program, I offer you two links.

First from BigTen.org: Justin Toole is awesome. Basically, despite Iowa's horrible prospect for finishing the year, competing only with Northwestern and Michigan State for the bottom the conference, Justin Toole is one hell of a great player.

Second, since I cover Michigan Baseball, I put out my preview of Iowa for the weekend. I think the Hawkeyes have a chance to take a game from us, probably the Saturday game. Michigan has made meh pitchers look brilliant of late, so yeah. Hopefully the weather holds out.

Good luck this weekend, and please please please don't upset us... I wouldn't like that.

Howdy Hawkeyes,

Since one or two of your mass readership may be interested in the baseball program, I offer you two links.

Good luck this weekend, and please please please don't upset us... I wouldn't like that.

Purdue Baseball Preview

formerlyanonymous — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 06:17:40 -0000

Purdue Baseball Preview

I hear you guys may cover baseball. I'm the Michigan guy that does that. See you guys come tournament time.

Starting the 2009 Baseball Season: New(er) Faces, Lineup, and Starters

formerlyanonymous — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 21:36:15 -0000

I want to preface this with a small note. My services have been bought out by Varsity Blue. Being a close friend of Paul at their site, he has requested I start doing guest posts with them. I'd like to thank Maize n' Brew Dave for his generosity and exposure. Thanks to Beauford for the bumps as well. I'll still be around making comments, so keep the content coming.

Thanks,
formerlyanonymous

Thanks for all your awesome work FA! - the gang at MnB

Continuing the preview of Michigan Baseball's 2009 season, this post will address the new contributors and make my blind guess of a lineup.

New(er) Faces

The starting short stop this year appears to be redshirt sophomore Anthony Toth. Those close watching fans may remember Toth from a few starts at second base in 2007. As a freshman he appeared in 29 games with 4 starts, batting .440 in 25 at-bats. Toth redshirted his true sophomore season due to the extreme depth at the middle infield last year. With Christian at short, and both Mahler and Cislo lined up at second base, his middle infield prospects were low. Although initially slated to play second base for the Wolverines, he was a shortstop throughout high school and did get a few innings at shortstop in the NCAA regional against Vanderbilt in his freshman year. There is a chance that Toth and Cislo may swap positions on the infield, but we won't know until they hit the field.

#16, Anthony Toth in Middle, Image from Blue Cats Red Sox Flickr

At designated hitter, we don't have quite the number of options as we did last year. BigTenHardball.com is projecting Nick Urban, the backup middle infielder to take over the slot for the team this year. Urban is a redshirt junior who has

Lorenz in a PBR hat,
Image from
amatuerbaseballreport.com

been a career bench player to this point. He has made 33 appearances (1 start) with only 18 career at-bats. Due to the limited sample size, I wouldn't put too much stock in his career numbers.

BigTenHardball.com also suggests that "the keys to third base" have been handed to true freshman John Lorenz. Lorenz was listed as the #8 overall player in the state of Illinois after his junior year, but he suffered a broken hand his senior year, causing him to miss the entire season. He did play summer ball this year to get him back into the swing of things. Lorenz had been a shortstop throughout high school, but will be trying it out at third to start the season. It sounds like it's his job to lose.

Attempting the Impossible

Lineup guessing is an impossible task without knowing what's going on in practice. So here's my disclaimer, I just don't know how well these guys have progressed over the offseason. I don't know the new guys that well. This is just my thoughts on what the lineup will look like.

Lineup		Rotation			Bullpen
Kenny Fellows	8	Fri	Chris Fetters	RHP	Closer	Tyler Burgoon	RHP
Anthony Toth	6	Sat	Eric Katzman	LHP	Closer	Mike Dufek	RHP
Kevin Cislo	4	Sun	Travis Smith	RHP	Setup	Matt Broder	LHP
Ryan Lamarre	9	MW1	Mike Wilson	LHP	Long	Ben Jenzen	RHP
Mike Dufek	3	MW2	Kolby Wood	RHP	Lefty	Jeff DeCarlo	LHP
Alan Oaks	7	MW3	Brandon Sinnery	RHP	Short	Matt Gerbe	RHP
Chris Berset	2
Nick Urban	DH
John Lorenz	5

I want to preface this with a small note. My services have been bought out by Varsity Blue. Being a close friend of Paul at their site, he has requested I start doing guest posts with them. I'd like to thank Maize n' Brew Dave for his generosity and exposure. Thanks to Beauford for the bumps as well. I'll still be around making comments, so keep the content coming.

Thanks,
formerlyanonymous

Thanks for all your awesome work FA! - the gang at MnB

Continuing the preview of Michigan Baseball's 2009 season, this post will address the new contributors and make my blind guess of a lineup.

New(er) Faces

#16, Anthony Toth in Middle, Image from Blue Cats Red Sox Flickr

Lorenz in a PBR hat,
Image from
amatuerbaseballreport.com

been a career bench player to this point. He has made 33 appearances (1 start) with only 18 career at-bats. Due to the limited sample size, I wouldn't put too much stock in his career numbers.

Attempting the Impossible

Lineup		Rotation			Bullpen
Kenny Fellows	8	Fri	Chris Fetters	RHP	Closer	Tyler Burgoon	RHP
Anthony Toth	6	Sat	Eric Katzman	LHP	Closer	Mike Dufek	RHP
Kevin Cislo	4	Sun	Travis Smith	RHP	Setup	Matt Broder	LHP
Ryan Lamarre	9	MW1	Mike Wilson	LHP	Long	Ben Jenzen	RHP
Mike Dufek	3	MW2	Kolby Wood	RHP	Lefty	Jeff DeCarlo	LHP
Alan Oaks	7	MW3	Brandon Sinnery	RHP	Short	Matt Gerbe	RHP
Chris Berset	2
Nick Urban	DH
John Lorenz	5

Starting the 2009 Baseball Season: Pitching Keepers

formerlyanonymous — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 03:22:36 -0000

He's Bringing It, Image from MGoBlue.com

Moving along in the series to open up the Michigan season, we have come to returning pitchers. Like any other college program, consistent loss of pitchers is the norm. Many programs stockpile as many partial scholarship pitchers as they can, then they accept more walk ons. You can never have too much pitching in todays game of offensive explosions and MLB teams consistently poaching quality players right and left (especially the left, as in left handers). Unlike football, players can enter the pros (minor leagues) right out of high school. Many players in college are there just to polish themselves for a year or two to improve their draft stock. Its for this reason that Maloney lists 15 pure pitchers on his roster. Three other players are also listed as part time position players. Two of those were detailed in yesterday's post in Alan Oaks and Mike Dufek. These guys may see some limited action this year, but I wouldn't expect much more work than Adam Abraham did last year, 5 or so appearances early in the season. The other is Tyler Burgoon, who we'll talk about more later.

Before I get started, I'd love to give you a scouting report including descriptions of their pitches, such as a blazing fastball in the upper 90s with a outward slide on some, or a sharp slider that goes high 80s from 12-to-6, but honestly, its been a while since I've seen these guys pitch. Some of these I haven't seen in two years. Some of the pitchers I'll be mentioning I've never seen pitch. I went back and read some articles and box scores. Its up to you the viewer to go out and see these guys. Form your own opinion. Baseball is America's game. Go out to the Fish and enjoy it. If you've never been to a college game, you'll enjoy it. Its cozy and quaint. I wish I could, but I'm stuck in Houston. So that's my mini-soapbox rant to start the season. On to the introductions...

Projected Starters

To start this preview, we go no further than last year's (de facto) Big Ten Pitcher of the year (there is no way you can tell me that Zach Putnam was better overall, there is more than just record and being a senior) Chris Fetter. Fetter lead the conference in ERA (2.47), opposing batting average (.209), innings pitched (94.2), strike outs looking (34), wins (10), games started (3 way tie with 14), second in strike outs (82), 7th in hits allows (71, ok, so Putnam beat him here... in less innings), and 4th in runs allowed (35, Putnam beat him here too... in less inngings). I'm not trying to knock Putnam here, but how did Fetter not take Pitcher of the Year honors?

Chris Fetters, Image from MGoBlue.com

Fetter, by all indications will be the Friday night opener pitcher for the whole season. Based on Maloney's previous rotations, I have to believe he will start his ace in game 1 of every conference series to set the tone. There are some coaches out there that save the ace for the weekend to boost attendance, or on the last game to end on a good note, but that hasn't been Michigan's thing that I've ever noticed. By being the most used starter, we should expect 13-15 starts out of Fetter, along with 10-12 wins. Much of his success will depend on his support from the offense. Fetter can keep the opponent from scoring, but having watched Roy Oswalt, Andy Pettite, and Roger Clemens pitch as Astros, giving up 1 run isn't always enough to win. I'm not that pessimistic about our offense, there are just that many question marks. Its also worth noting that Fetter is on every major watch list there is for pitching both in the Big10 and the nation.

You can keep up with Fetter on the Captain's Blog. His posts are by far the most enlightening in terms of understanding the pressures of the student athlete. Great read.

	ERA	W	L	App	GS	CG	SHO	CBO	SV	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	2B	3B	HR	BF	B/Avg	WP	HBP	SFA	SHA	BK
2005	Redshirted Season
2006	2.22	5	2	16	10	1	1	3	1	73.0	66	25	18	14	48	8	1	6	292	.246	3	4	0	6	1
2007	4.71	6	3	16	12	0	0	0	1	70.2	85	45	37	21	48	16	2	5	317	.302	3	5	3	7	1
2008	2.47	10	2	16	14	5	1	1	0	94.2	71	35	26	28	82	8	2	7	386	.209	3	4	6	8	1
Total	3.06	21	7	48	36	6	2	4	2	238.1	222	105	81	63	178	32	5	18	995	.250	9	13	9	21	3

My projected second starter is the lefty Eric Katzman. Katzman was the second most valuable reliever down the stretch, so much though that he earned a start in the Big Ten Conference Championship game. The concern with Katzman is he hasn't been a starting pitcher consistently since high school. His small sample size of starts have all been either short or rough. He made the occasional start in Saturday doubleheader games, hardly ever making it past the 5th inning. If he's going to be the answer to one of the rotation spots, he had better have developed some arm strength/stamina.

That's Probably a Balk, Eric Katzman, Image from Blue Cats and Red Sox flickr

	ERA	W	L	App	GS	CG	SHO	CBO	SV	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	2B	3B	HR	BF	B/Avg	WP	HBP	SFA	SHA	BK
2007	5.92	3	2	13	4	0	0	0	0	24.1	27	20	16	22	20	2	2	2	127	.297	2	9	1	4	0
2008	3.52	2	1	17	5	0	0	0	0	38.1	34	18	15	28	33	7	1	4	177	.239	4	2	1	3	2
Total	4.45	5	3	30	9	0	0	0	0	62.2	61	38	31	50	53	9	3	6	304	.262	6	11	2	7	2

Other Starters - Guess Work

The other reason I see Katzman as the second starter is to have the left hander sandwhiched between two right handed starters. The leading candidates due to nothing other than experience are Travis Smith and Kolby Wood. I might even throw Mike Wilson into that hat as well if he hadn't spurned me every time he entered a game last year.

Smith is a right handed sophomore out of Austin, Texas. As a freshman, he had the best numbers as a starter from anyone not named Fetter or Putnam. Michigan was 6-2 in his starts, most of which were non-conference games. The Wolverines sturggled in finding a third and fourth starter last year. Midweek games were started by whoever the flavor or the week happened to be. Smith faired the best, but was still just meh. His 4.40 ERA was 5th on the team; his 43 innings pitched was good for fourth on the team. Hopefully he can avoid a sophomore slump and continue to build upon his past success.

Kolby Wood had quite a bit of success in the rotating Tuesday starter role, but he was also limited in innings. In his five starts, the team went 5-0. The problem with this? His longest outing was 4 innings, so he didn't receive the win in any of them. Kolby showed good potential, he just didn't have the arm strength as a freshman to sustain pitching over the long haul.

Mike Wilson, When he was good, Image from Rob Migrin, The Daily

Mike Wilson was not a good pitcher last year. His 9.00 ERA in 15 games, 9 starts, is just the tip of the iceberg. To put it in perspective, in those 15 games, Wilson only managed 34 innings. Even if he only had one inning per relief appearance, that just leaves him a shade over 3 innings per start. His opponent batting average was 2nd highest on the team at .313 (Adam Abraham decided to stick to 3b after that). Despite all of this, Mike still has a good chance at starting, and maybe even being one of our top pitchers. His sophomore year was the exact opposite of last year. This is what happens when you let Canadians play baseball, weird things happen. As a sophomore, Wilson posted a 3.45 ERA, going 7-1 in 15 games (12 starts). Hell, he threw a shutout one game. Then came the second inning of the Super Regional at Oregon State. Everything since then has been downhill. Hopefully Mike rights his ship and regains his confidence this season. We really need him to step up.

Tyler Burgoon, Image from Blue Cats and Red Sox's flickr

Tyler Burgoon is another interesting choice to start. Last year Tyler emerged from the closer by committee system to take over the duites. He was not there long because he was also forced into the rotating midweek starter role. I'm not sure what Maloney has in mind for Burgoon just yet, whether it be as a reliever or starter. Tyler pitched very well down the stretch and in the post season as a setup man for Powers. He is at least flexible enough to try either if the need arises.

Relief? Starters? Pine Riders?

The rest of the returning pitching staff is a myriad of question marks. Ben Jenzen is more of the Academic All Big Ten than he is athletic (not that there is anything wrong with that). Gerbe hasn't been that exciting since he was forced to redshirt his freshman season from injury. Miller hasn't looked good in his limited work. DeCarlo is another one of those Academic All Big Ten guys. His numbers are slightly better, but there just isn't enough to look at to judge. I'm pretty optimistic we will have at least 3 quality starters out of this whole mess. The mid-week games are going to be getting much tougher though. We really need one or two of these guys to step up and beat the MAC teams of the world. Unlike football, the Big10 isn't that far ahead of the MAC. My next post will be my projections at the remaining positions left on the defense. I'll have it out by Monday. I'm out.

He's Bringing It, Image from MGoBlue.com

Projected Starters

Chris Fetters, Image from MGoBlue.com

You can keep up with Fetter on the Captain's Blog. His posts are by far the most enlightening in terms of understanding the pressures of the student athlete. Great read.

	ERA	W	L	App	GS	CG	SHO	CBO	SV	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	2B	3B	HR	BF	B/Avg	WP	HBP	SFA	SHA	BK
2005	Redshirted Season
2006	2.22	5	2	16	10	1	1	3	1	73.0	66	25	18	14	48	8	1	6	292	.246	3	4	0	6	1
2007	4.71	6	3	16	12	0	0	0	1	70.2	85	45	37	21	48	16	2	5	317	.302	3	5	3	7	1
2008	2.47	10	2	16	14	5	1	1	0	94.2	71	35	26	28	82	8	2	7	386	.209	3	4	6	8	1
Total	3.06	21	7	48	36	6	2	4	2	238.1	222	105	81	63	178	32	5	18	995	.250	9	13	9	21	3

That's Probably a Balk, Eric Katzman, Image from Blue Cats and Red Sox flickr

	ERA	W	L	App	GS	CG	SHO	CBO	SV	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	2B	3B	HR	BF	B/Avg	WP	HBP	SFA	SHA	BK
2007	5.92	3	2	13	4	0	0	0	0	24.1	27	20	16	22	20	2	2	2	127	.297	2	9	1	4	0
2008	3.52	2	1	17	5	0	0	0	0	38.1	34	18	15	28	33	7	1	4	177	.239	4	2	1	3	2
Total	4.45	5	3	30	9	0	0	0	0	62.2	61	38	31	50	53	9	3	6	304	.262	6	11	2	7	2

Other Starters - Guess Work

Mike Wilson, When he was good, Image from Rob Migrin, The Daily

Tyler Burgoon, Image from Blue Cats and Red Sox's flickr

Relief? Starters? Pine Riders?

Starting the 2009 Baseball Season: Offensive Keepers

formerlyanonymous — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 23:09:44 -0000

With a week (still) left until first pitch, I’m going to start doing a little bit of a build up for the baseball team this week. Today I’m going to run through the main starters who return on offense from last year, with a few tid-bits about the replacement players who may have a shot at starting this season. With the 4 position players (and one DH) gone from last year, there are going to be many a new face at the Fish to start the season.

Chris Berset, Image from
Blue Cats and Red Sox's flickr

Behind the plate, Michigan will be returning 3rd year starter Chris Berset. Berset is a switch hitting (throws right, obviously, I mean he's a catcher) junior who is becoming known more for his reliability behind the plate rather than at it. As a freshman, Berset played in 37 games, 24 starts, recording a nice .300 batting average. Not too shabby. Last year, Berset earned the starting catching duties outright with 42 games, 37 starts. Chris's bat never really got going last year. He peaked in mid April with a .273 batting average, but ended the year at .244. Part of this may be due to the large workload behind the plate. This was a career high for innings caught this season, so it will be interesting to see how he has progressed this year. Expect Berset in the bottom half of the order, perhaps as high as 6th if can get his swing back. More realistically, I'm guessing 7 or 8 hole.

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2007	.301	83	19	25	6	0	2	18	37	.446	13	2	14	4	.404	1	2	0	0	160	23	5	.973
2008	.244	119	24	29	3	0	1	18	35	.294	13	4	24	0	.336	1	7	1	3	240	30	3	.989
Total	.267	202	43	54	9	0	3	36	72	.356	26	6	38	4	.364	2	9	1	3	400	53	8	.983

Kevin Cislo, Image from
Blue Cats and Red Sox's flickr

Returning at center field is one of the teams captains, Kevin Cislo. Kevin will be the one of three outfielder returning for the Wolverines. Cislo is the two time First Team All-Big Ten, 2nd base in 2007, OF in 2008. Don't expect to see him at second base any time soon. Michigan appears to be grooming Nick Urban to replace Leif Mahler (who I am ashamed to admit I left out of my last post). Kevin also had ample playing time as a freshman; for his career, he has 157 games played, 120 of which were starts.

Cislo currently has a career batting average of .330, highest of any of the returning starters. My guess has him batting in the 2 spot to start the season. He is a predominately singles hitter who won't collect a large number of RBIs, but can score runs and create things on the base paths. Look for him to improve his walk numbers a bit more this year. One thing else to keep in mind is Cislo's stellar play on defense. Cislo hasn't had an error since June 3rd, 2007 (at Vandy in game 1 of the regional championship). That is a span of 124 attempts without an error. All of them came while playing second base. In his career, Kevin only has 7 errors overall, look for him to stay the course and end the year with less than 5. Also, I'll keep propping the Captain's Corner Blog that Cislo writes with Fetter and Kalczynski. Kevin has a pretty good sense of humor and apparently his tacos get a bit messy? He's also giving shout outs to the people behind the scenes that make the baseball team click. Day 9's update gave thanks to Jason Cole, the strength and conditioning coach not named Barwis. It's a good read.

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2006	.242	62	19	15	1	2	0	11	20	.323	19	2	17	0	.434	0	3	3	6	48	66	1	.991
2007	.364	162	40	59	5	1	1	23	69	.426	19	7	21	0	.445	3	2	7	12	66	140	6	.972
2008	.348	178	41	62	5	2	1	28	74	.416	28	9	19	1	.456	2	6	18	26	95	21	0	1.000
Total	.338	402	100	136	11	5	2	62	163	.405	66	18	57	1	.448	5	11	28	44	209	227	7	.984

Mike Dufek, Aptly named "waiting his turn"
Image from Blue Cats and Red Sox's flickr

Mike Dufek, a left handed hitting but right handed thrower, is the starter on the infield who returns for the Wolverines. Mike started the season as a primary pinch hitter and part time relief pitcher. While his pitching prospects fell, Mike's batting prospects earned him a consistent spot starting at first base to end the season. Dufek comes from a logn line of Michigan Men^TM; His grandfather was the MVP of the 1949 Rose Bowl and his uncle was a All American defensive back, and another uncle was an offensive tackle who eventually played for the Jets. It appears Mike also has taken a keen liking to Rick Leach from his Michigan roots. Dufek changed his number from #24 to #7 in honor of the baseball great. Yes, I said baseball. Leach lettered all four years in baseball as well. What this has to do with this year's baseball team, absolutely nothing, but I figured it would be an interesting fact for some of you.

Back to the player... Mike didn't get much time playing as a freshman. He received a few mop up innings here and there, ending with a - cough- paltry .095 batting average. Year two provided much better results as he batted .321 over 109 at-bats. Dufek also provided a better defensive presense at first place over Nate Recknagel. Dufek hasn't shown himself to be a big star yet, but entering his junior year, he has the opportunity to take the reigns and prove himself. I expect him to bat in the heart of the order, probably the 4 or 5 hole if he builds off last year. He offers a bit of pop but doesn't work the count enough to be in the top of the order. I'm not going to include him in the returning pitchers as he had so little work, and what there was - well, it wasn't good (17 runs, in 23 innings).

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2007	.095	21	0	2	1	0	0	2	3	.143	3	0	5	1	.200	1	0	0	0	46	4	1	.980
2008	.321	109	21	35	6	0	3	25	50	.459	7	0	17	3	.356	2	0	2	2	199	13	3	.986
Total	.285	130	21	37	7	0	3	27	53	.408	10	0	22	4	.329	3	0	2	2	245	17	4	.985

Ryan Lamarre, Image from
Lon Horwedel, The Ann Arbor News

Ryan Lamarre finished as the everyday right fielder for Coach Maloney last year. As a freshman, he started 40 games in the outfield in a rather successful season. He ended up batting .305 for the season and made a run at Big Ten Freshman of the year. He ultimately fell short, but appears to have great potential. The one shortfall Lamarre had last season was his patience at the plate. His 11:25 walk-to-strikeout ratio puts it in perspective. He can be cut slack for being a freshman, and Coach Maloney has had a year to work with him which should help. There really isn't much else to say about Lamarre. His game is normally pretty quite, but he produces good results. Look for him to hit in the middle of the order, especially if he can develop power. Any of the 4/5/6 spots are likely.

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2008	.305	141	27	43	5	0	3	23	57	.404	11	5	25	2	.376	0	7	8	13	85	2	2	.978

Adam Oaks, Image from
his MGoBlue Profile

Alan Oaks is likely to regain his starting role at either left field or at designated hitter. Oaks struggled as a sophomore in his 48 games (39 starts) and lead the team with 42 strike outs. Oaks is more you're stereotypical power hitter, he can get many extra base hits, but his average will be low and he will strike out quite a bit. His defense has been somewhat meh for an outfielder. He had 5 errors last year in 49 chances. Not the best performance ever, but not that poor. I really see him taking the DH role over and batting around the 6-spot. Everything will be a question mark until he starts producing.

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG%	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2007	.204	49	9	10	5	1	2	9	23	.469	7	0	16	1	.298	1	0	0	0	20	2	0	1.000
2008	.250	128	18	32	5	0	6	19	55	.430	11	3	42	1	.317	3	2	2	2	48	4	5	.912
Total	.237	177	27	42	10	1	8	28	78	.441	18	3	58	2	.312	4	2	2	2	68	6	5	.937

Kenny Fellows, Image from
Blue Cats and Red Sox's flickr

The reason I think he becomes the DH is the option of putting Kenny Fellows in the outfield for defensive purposes. Fellows has been a great role player for the team, and now in his 5th year senior season, he has a chance to make it to the field more often. Fellows has always come off as a center fielder to me, but with Cislo entrenched there, he will probably start in left field. Fellows has good speed and is a good contact hitter. He was our primary pinch hitter/runner almost all last season. His .333 batting average ranked him fourth on the team, second behind only Cislo on the returners. Fellows may be a solid lead off man for the team to set up Cislo and the heart of the order. Fellows has the ability to be a base stealing threat. He attempted a steal about once in every three times he reached base (for those tempo-free statistic fans), and was successful 7 of 9 times. I also wouldn't be suprised to see Kenny batting anywhere else in the lineup. I would imagine it would be any of the 1, 2, 6, 7, or 8 spots. He doesn't appear to have the power of the 3, 4, 5 hitters.

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2006	.000	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000	0	0	0	0	.000	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	.000
2007	.150	20	2	3	1	0	0	1	4	.200	4	0	6	2	.292	0	3	2	3	16	0	1	.941
2008	.333	36	17	12	1	0	0	7	13	.361	7	1	4	0	.455	0	1	5	5	21	0	1	.955
Total	.263	57	19	15	2	0	0	8	17	.298	11	1	10	2	.391	0	4	7	9	37	0	2	.949

In my next post I will try to get to either the pitchers returning (of which there are many to go over) or who I expect to start at the remaining infield spots. A special shout to Blue Cats and Red Sox for her amazing phots. Hopefully she makes it back out to Ann Arbor again soon.

Chris Berset, Image from
Blue Cats and Red Sox's flickr

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2007	.301	83	19	25	6	0	2	18	37	.446	13	2	14	4	.404	1	2	0	0	160	23	5	.973
2008	.244	119	24	29	3	0	1	18	35	.294	13	4	24	0	.336	1	7	1	3	240	30	3	.989
Total	.267	202	43	54	9	0	3	36	72	.356	26	6	38	4	.364	2	9	1	3	400	53	8	.983

Kevin Cislo, Image from
Blue Cats and Red Sox's flickr

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2006	.242	62	19	15	1	2	0	11	20	.323	19	2	17	0	.434	0	3	3	6	48	66	1	.991
2007	.364	162	40	59	5	1	1	23	69	.426	19	7	21	0	.445	3	2	7	12	66	140	6	.972
2008	.348	178	41	62	5	2	1	28	74	.416	28	9	19	1	.456	2	6	18	26	95	21	0	1.000
Total	.338	402	100	136	11	5	2	62	163	.405	66	18	57	1	.448	5	11	28	44	209	227	7	.984

Mike Dufek, Aptly named "waiting his turn"
Image from Blue Cats and Red Sox's flickr

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2007	.095	21	0	2	1	0	0	2	3	.143	3	0	5	1	.200	1	0	0	0	46	4	1	.980
2008	.321	109	21	35	6	0	3	25	50	.459	7	0	17	3	.356	2	0	2	2	199	13	3	.986
Total	.285	130	21	37	7	0	3	27	53	.408	10	0	22	4	.329	3	0	2	2	245	17	4	.985

Ryan Lamarre, Image from
Lon Horwedel, The Ann Arbor News

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2008	.305	141	27	43	5	0	3	23	57	.404	11	5	25	2	.376	0	7	8	13	85	2	2	.978

Adam Oaks, Image from
his MGoBlue Profile

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG%	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2007	.204	49	9	10	5	1	2	9	23	.469	7	0	16	1	.298	1	0	0	0	20	2	0	1.000
2008	.250	128	18	32	5	0	6	19	55	.430	11	3	42	1	.317	3	2	2	2	48	4	5	.912
Total	.237	177	27	42	10	1	8	28	78	.441	18	3	58	2	.312	4	2	2	2	68	6	5	.937

Kenny Fellows, Image from
Blue Cats and Red Sox's flickr

	Avg	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HP	K	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB	AT	PO	A	E	FLD%
2006	.000	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000	0	0	0	0	.000	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	.000
2007	.150	20	2	3	1	0	0	1	4	.200	4	0	6	2	.292	0	3	2	3	16	0	1	.941
2008	.333	36	17	12	1	0	0	7	13	.361	7	1	4	0	.455	0	1	5	5	21	0	1	.955
Total	.263	57	19	15	2	0	0	8	17	.298	11	1	10	2	.391	0	4	7	9	37	0	2	.949

Starting the 2009 Baseball Season: Players Lost

formerlyanonymous — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 05:53:26 -0000


Zach Putnam, Image from MGOBLUE.COM	Adam Abraham, Image from LEISA THOMPSON, THE ANN ARBOR NEWS

With one week left until first pitch, I'm going to start doing a little bit of a build up for the baseball team this week. Today I'm starting with the players that left the team last year. As we get closer, I'll examine who's returning this year and what we might expect as we move closer. I also have previews put together for the BigEast/Big10 Challenge, or at least the BigEast Challengers. I skipped Purdue for the time being, mainly because I just haven't had time. Their sports information department was also very slow at getting information out on their website as well. They just finalized their schedule this month. So, to players lost (all stats pulled from Mgoblue.com):


Nate Recknagel, Image from LEISA THOMPSON, THE ANN ARBOR NEWS	Adam Abraham, Image from BEN SIMON, MICHIGAN DAILY

Offense

Player	POS	AVG	GP-GS	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HBP	Ks	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB-ATT	PO	Asst	Err	F%
Nate Recknagel	1B	.368	58-58	209	56	77	9	1	23	68	157	.751	33	8	30	3	.465	4	0	5-6	443	45	10	.980
Adam Abraham	3B	.352	60-60	233	44	82	14	3	7	54	123	.528	20	6	26	3	.415	1	1	2-5	36	112	15	.908
Jason Christian	SS	.330	50-48	194	56	64	13	6	7	48	110	.567	39	3	36	2	.445	2	2	16-18	83	113	13	.938
Zach Putnam	DH	.307	55-55	199	47	61	13	2	11	51	111	.558	28	5	29	3	.400	3	0	3-3	5	15	0	1.00
Derek VanBuskirk	OF	.294	60-60	221	53	65	10	1	10	44	107	.484	29	2	36	2	.381	0	4	11-12	107	2	1	.991
Jason Malefakis	PH	1.00	1-0	1	0	1	0	0	0	0	1	1.00	0	0	0	0	1.00	0	0	0-0	0	0	0	0
Leaving Totals		.330	60	1056	256	349	59	13	58	265	608	.576	149	24	157	13	.413	10	7	37-44	674	287	39	.961
Team		.315	60	2041	464	643	101	15	75	433	999	.489	252	55	339	26	.401	22	43	78-100	1507	592	73	.966

So that's a lot of loss. We lose nearly 52% of all of our at-bats, 3/4 of our infield, 61% of our runs scored, and about 47% of our stolen bases. That's awesome. [/sarcasm]. What the few many of us Michigan baseball fans must keep in mind this year is that last year's team might have been the best team we have had in over a decade, and while we do recruit well for a northern mid-major, we are no Rice, Tennessee, or South Carolina. Michigan doesn't just reload with extreme quality talent. Last year's team had a large group of upperclassmen who had several years on the field. The group of five starters are probably the best leaving/graduating class Michigan has had since the CWS runs in the 80s. It's never good to lose this many players. Luckily we are in a weak conference for baseball, so while these losses hurt, they aren't going to kill us.

Derek VanBuskirk, Image from MGoBlue

Pitching

Player	ERA	W-L	APP	GS	CG	SV	IP	H	R	ER	BB	Ks	2B	3B	HR	AB	B/Avg	WP	HBP	BK	SFA	SHA
Zach Putnam	2.58	9-0	12	12	1	0	76.2	62	29	22	23	78	10	1	4	278	.223	2	7	0	0	3
Michael Powers	2.60	6-4	28	1	0	8	62.1	62	18	18	20	62	9	1	1	225	.276	4	3	2	3	7
Sam Yashinsky	0.00	0-0	1	0	0	0	1.0	1	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	4	.250	0	0	0	0	0
Adam Abramham	4.76	0-0	5	0	0	1	5.2	8	3	3	3	5	1	0	0	25	.320	0	1	0	0	0
Leaving Totals:	2.65	15-4	46	13	1	9	145.2	133	50	43	46	146	20	2	5	532	.250	6	11	2	3	7
Team Totals:	4.19	46-14	60	60	6	16	502.1	469	274	234	237	444	74	9	33	1875	.250	42	57	7	20	44

The good news on the pitching front is we aren't losing as many great stars. Last year's pitching was held together by the two aces on the mound, one of which being Zach Putnam. Along with DH'ing for the team, Putnam was also arguably our second best starter in the league (behind returning Wolverine Chris Fetter). Putnam ranked in the top 10 of all 13 pitching categories tracked by the Big10 last year. Our year ending closer was Michael Powers. Powers finished the year one of the top closers in the nation and was nearly unhittable in post season play. What's very worriesome for the upcoming year is the team ERA. The leaving players only allowed 2.65 earned runs per 9 innings while the rest of the team gave up 4.81.

Michael Powers, Image from churl


Zach Putnam, Image from MGOBLUE.COM	Adam Abraham, Image from LEISA THOMPSON, THE ANN ARBOR NEWS


Nate Recknagel, Image from LEISA THOMPSON, THE ANN ARBOR NEWS	Adam Abraham, Image from BEN SIMON, MICHIGAN DAILY

Offense

Player	POS	AVG	GP-GS	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	SLG	BB	HBP	Ks	GDP	OB%	SF	SH	SB-ATT	PO	Asst	Err	F%
Nate Recknagel	1B	.368	58-58	209	56	77	9	1	23	68	157	.751	33	8	30	3	.465	4	0	5-6	443	45	10	.980
Adam Abraham	3B	.352	60-60	233	44	82	14	3	7	54	123	.528	20	6	26	3	.415	1	1	2-5	36	112	15	.908
Jason Christian	SS	.330	50-48	194	56	64	13	6	7	48	110	.567	39	3	36	2	.445	2	2	16-18	83	113	13	.938
Zach Putnam	DH	.307	55-55	199	47	61	13	2	11	51	111	.558	28	5	29	3	.400	3	0	3-3	5	15	0	1.00
Derek VanBuskirk	OF	.294	60-60	221	53	65	10	1	10	44	107	.484	29	2	36	2	.381	0	4	11-12	107	2	1	.991
Jason Malefakis	PH	1.00	1-0	1	0	1	0	0	0	0	1	1.00	0	0	0	0	1.00	0	0	0-0	0	0	0	0
Leaving Totals		.330	60	1056	256	349	59	13	58	265	608	.576	149	24	157	13	.413	10	7	37-44	674	287	39	.961
Team		.315	60	2041	464	643	101	15	75	433	999	.489	252	55	339	26	.401	22	43	78-100	1507	592	73	.966

Derek VanBuskirk, Image from MGoBlue

Pitching

Player	ERA	W-L	APP	GS	CG	SV	IP	H	R	ER	BB	Ks	2B	3B	HR	AB	B/Avg	WP	HBP	BK	SFA	SHA
Zach Putnam	2.58	9-0	12	12	1	0	76.2	62	29	22	23	78	10	1	4	278	.223	2	7	0	0	3
Michael Powers	2.60	6-4	28	1	0	8	62.1	62	18	18	20	62	9	1	1	225	.276	4	3	2	3	7
Sam Yashinsky	0.00	0-0	1	0	0	0	1.0	1	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	4	.250	0	0	0	0	0
Adam Abramham	4.76	0-0	5	0	0	1	5.2	8	3	3	3	5	1	0	0	25	.320	0	1	0	0	0
Leaving Totals:	2.65	15-4	46	13	1	9	145.2	133	50	43	46	146	20	2	5	532	.250	6	11	2	3	7
Team Totals:	4.19	46-14	60	60	6	16	502.1	469	274	234	237	444	74	9	33	1875	.250	42	57	7	20	44

Michael Powers, Image from churl

Baseball Captain Blog

formerlyanonymous — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 02:07:49 -0000

BigTenHardball pointed out the new "Captain's Corner Blog" on mgoblue in a post tonight and the blog is full of awesome descriptions. Seniors Chris Fetters, Tim Kalczynski (known as Timmy Kal), and Kevin Cislo are offering an insight into the daily life of a student athlete, much in the same way as The Fat White Guy. While the craze has been spreading throughout several programs, this is the first time I've noticed it with any Michigan team.

I decided to highlight a few of the gems from the first 8 days of practice so far:

Day 3

The freshmen on the team were able to demonstrate that their athletic abilities such as coordination, flexibility, and overall lack of athletic physique could transfer over into their routine. They were able to show their skills off by having a dance off with the hockey team's freshmen. With their efforts, they were able to muster a score of 31 on a 40 point scale. Overall, they were able to entertain the crowd and at the same time rack up fines in the locker room kangaroo kourt which is a team bonding event where teammates fine each other for saying or doing laughable, unintelligent things. --Kevin Cislo

Day 5

I would compare our performance today to eating Kevin Cislo's homemade tacos. The first few are pretty good, but the plate gets messier with each one. By the time you get to your fifth taco, the plate is full of lettuce, stray cheese, and taco meat grease. It's all over your hands and your left wondering how there seems to be more food on your plate than in your stomach. Similarly, outfielders Nick Urban, Tyler Mills, Bryce Aspinwall and company set a strong tone as their throws were right on target. When we moved to infield work, it just wasn't as clean. It's nothing to get too worried about. It was one of those days. Hopefully, we don't have any more of those. --Tim Kalczynski

Day 8

Ann Arbor is an interesting place. It's usually pretty cold around this time of year and students are dressed in layers of sweatshirts, jackets and hats. However, when the weather warms up just a hair, parts of Ann Arbor turn into Miami Beach. When I was walking back from class around noon, I saw a guy running shirtless (in his defense he had the chest of a sasquatch), a homeless man eating an ice cream cone (outside) and a girl sunbathing on the roof of one of the sororities…and yet I was not the least bit surprised. -- Tim Kalczynski

In that last post by Timmy Kal, he also briefly discusses the benefits of Rodriguez on the baseball team... the brand new field turf in Oosterbaan.

My personal favorite post was Day 7 by Chris Fetters. Fetters gave the general description of how they prepare themselves for the spring semester from class scheduling to exams on the road. I'd highly suggest any fan of the team to check in with the posting. It's some quality stuff. They don't have an RSS feed going on it yet, and I'm not keeping my fingers crossed. I sent in an email to the webmaster for mgoblue and the sports information department. I'll pass along any response if I ever get it.

I decided to highlight a few of the gems from the first 8 days of practice so far:

Day 3

The freshmen on the team were able to demonstrate that their athletic abilities such as coordination, flexibility, and overall lack of athletic physique could transfer over into their routine. They were able to show their skills off by having a dance off with the hockey team's freshmen. With their efforts, they were able to muster a score of 31 on a 40 point scale. Overall, they were able to entertain the crowd and at the same time rack up fines in the locker room kangaroo kourt which is a team bonding event where teammates fine each other for saying or doing laughable, unintelligent things. --Kevin Cislo

Day 5

I would compare our performance today to eating Kevin Cislo's homemade tacos. The first few are pretty good, but the plate gets messier with each one. By the time you get to your fifth taco, the plate is full of lettuce, stray cheese, and taco meat grease. It's all over your hands and your left wondering how there seems to be more food on your plate than in your stomach. Similarly, outfielders Nick Urban, Tyler Mills, Bryce Aspinwall and company set a strong tone as their throws were right on target. When we moved to infield work, it just wasn't as clean. It's nothing to get too worried about. It was one of those days. Hopefully, we don't have any more of those. --Tim Kalczynski

Day 8

Ann Arbor is an interesting place. It's usually pretty cold around this time of year and students are dressed in layers of sweatshirts, jackets and hats. However, when the weather warms up just a hair, parts of Ann Arbor turn into Miami Beach. When I was walking back from class around noon, I saw a guy running shirtless (in his defense he had the chest of a sasquatch), a homeless man eating an ice cream cone (outside) and a girl sunbathing on the roof of one of the sororities…and yet I was not the least bit surprised. -- Tim Kalczynski

In that last post by Timmy Kal, he also briefly discusses the benefits of Rodriguez on the baseball team... the brand new field turf in Oosterbaan.

BTN Annouces Baseball and Softball TV Schedule

formerlyanonymous — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 17:08:31 -0000

FYI

Beauford

From BigTenNetwork Headlines:

Baseball:

Date Time Opponent

Friday April 3 4pm vs Penn State

Friday April 1 7pm vs Illinois

Friday May 1 7pm @ Ohio State

Saturday May 2 1pm @ Ohio State

Sunday May 3 1pm @ Ohio State

May 20-24 ENTIRE Big10 Tournament

It appears baseball coverage won't be improving much this years in terms of quantity of games. Here's hoping maybe quality will be better. Penn State should be a great kick off for Michigan on the Network. They are the annual challenge Michigan for the crown this year.

Softball:

Date Time Opponent

Saturday March 21 1pm @ Northwestern

Sunday March 22 2pm @ Northwestern

Saturday April 4 2pm vs Purdue

Sunday April 5 1pm vs Purdue

Wednesday May 6 5pm vs Ohio State

Wednesday May 6 7:30pm vs Ohio State Game 2

BigTenNetwork apparently knows softball. Northwestern is a top ten team and our series against them is the opener for the BTN coverage.

I personally hope there may be more games covered, or at least streamed through bigtennetwork.com. I'm not holding my breath as that generally requires at least 3-5 cameramen, their crew, and announcers. I really wish they'd just not use announcers and just show the game for internet broadcasts. It'd be immensely convenient, but I can only dream it.

A Trip to Austin puts Michigan Fans into Perspective

formerlyanonymous — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 23:23:13 -0000

Ed - Bumped from Fanposts because college football tourism is awesome, and this is awesomely done.

B2

Pregame @ Darrell K Royal... via photos-b.ak.fbcdn.net

So this last weekend I went to visit my sister, a freshman at UT. For those of you unaware, Texas played Baylor this weekend in a fairly lopsided affair. The stadium (Darrell K. Royal - Texas Memorial Stadium) was extremely nice, and for those of you who have never been to Austin, its beautiful. The pagentry of the pregame, the history, the pride--it was awesome. The game wasn't much of a let down either. Baylor brought everything they had. Robert Griffin will terrorize the Big12 in 2-3 years. This being his freshman year, he almost set the Big12 record for consecutive pass attempts without an interception. I covet him. He would be perfect for our current Michigan team. The final score ended up much more lopsided than the play would have suggested early. Texas eventually went on to win 45-21.

But what stood out to me the most is something I see at Michigan all too often, bad fandom. I've considered Texas and Michigan to be very similar programs, especially over the last few years. The histories, the traditions, the success, Texas has been just a few years behind Michigan in many of its acheivements (such as the 97 M split MNC compared to the 05 UT MNC, wins all time, etc). The similarities between Mack Brown and Lloyd Carr have always fascinated me. Even the position of the two schools in respect to rivals has its similarities. After my trip to Austin, I've found even our fandoms are similarly self righteous and overall, just poor.

Now I will throw out the idea that yes, this game was against Baylor (the Big10 equivalent of Indiana) and the game was played at 11am local time. I could see this causing a slightly smaller crowd at Michigan Stadium, but what I saw in and around Darrell K. Royal was much worse than any Michigan game I'd been to or seen in the last few years.

Looking at the picture at the very top, you can see some empty seats along the alumni sections. This is of very little surprise at pregame. One would think the alumni are just coming in a little slow, perhaps walking the few blocks from the tailgating areas. The problem was this wasn't the case. The stadium never filled up. The stadium was no more than 70% capacity at any time. (box score says 97,000, i say bull)

via photos-c.ak.fbcdn.net

Late in the 1st half, Baylor was driving down the field down a touchdown (14-7). I couldnt help but thinking to myself, "Wow, I have found a stadium quieter than Michigan Stadium." Baylor drove the field to eventually score. The fans were dumbfounded. Texas scored on the ensuing possession; this score ended up being the last time Baylor posed a threat. Griffin threw his second pick of the season, Texas returned it for a touchdown, they were then up 21-14. This was at the 6:06 mark left in the half.

Over the next few minutes, droves of fans got up, to what I assumed was to beat the half time rush to the concession stands and restrooms. The game played on, half time started, both bands played. The shows were meh, but they were still alright. When it came for the 2nd half to start, I noticed an overwhelming number of empty seats still.

via photos-f.ak.fbcdn.net

Well, the alumni section left. The rest of the stadium was about as empty. By the fourth quarter, there couldn't have been 30,000 people still in the stadium.

Late in the 4th Quarter via photos-h.ak.fbcdn.net

After the game, I went with my sister to return her friends student ID at San Jacinto, the dorms across the street from the stadium. While waiting for the guy to come downstairs (more on the students in a second), I overheard a lady on her cell phone who appeared to be in her early 30s say,

I stayed longer at this game than any other, I was surprised. I made it a whole 30 minutes.

It came off as she meant 30 minutes of time, not of game clock. I was floored. I coughed up a little bit of my drink and turned around with what must have been a grotesque look of shock. She noticed me cringed and walked away. I will admit this may have just been one fair weather fan in a group of die-hards, but between the sudden collapse in attendance, the plethora of soccer moms who look like they'd rather be sipping on their margaritas, and the way a large number of students I met, I have to imagine this isn't a chance occurrence.

So continuing the story, we met up with the kid who's ID and ticket I used. The average weekend schedule for any non-business major student looks like this: Firday - Drunk of 6th Street, Saturday - Sleep until 3pm regardless of the time of their game, Sunday - Study like a feind. That summarizes this kid thoroughly. It also characterized half of the students eating in Jester after the game. At every table, there were at least two or three kids that had just awoken and had no idea how the game went. They'd sit next to their buddies and ask "how much did we beat them by?" I'm not talking about just dorky kids who wouldn't know a football from a hole in the head either. I'm talking about your average college guy who should love college football. I've heard plenty of complaints about the fraternity and sorority girls at Michigan, here it's nearly half of the student body.

The more I've thought about it, the more I have to blame on the Texas Athletic Department's outreach to students. This is the first stadium I've ever been to without a student section. Students are peppered in with random fans everywhere but bottom of the home side. Tailgating for students is non-existent near the campus as well. Those living out on West Campus past the Drag may have some house partying going on, but that would be like partying at Greenwood or the far side of Washtenaw at Michigan. It's just so far out of the way, its not worth going. The majority of freshman dorms are only a block away from the stadium. My sister was totally unaware tailgating even took place. While I acknowledge there are students like this at Michigan as well, it appears to be a much larger percentage of Texas students.

After thinking about the comparisons between Michigan and Texas fans, I've found a whole new appreciation for Michigan fans. While our older fans continue to suck by demanding the young ones to sit down, they stay and root on our team. Our undergraduates are plagued with those who are fifteen minutes tardy and drunk, but at least they show up, and most importantly they care.

I do want to specify, I mean nothing negative about UT and their fans with this post. I am just noting the behavior I observed this weekend. Good luck to both teams down the stretch.

Go Blue & Hook'em Horns.

Ed - Bumped from Fanposts because college football tourism is awesome, and this is awesomely done.

B2

Pregame @ Darrell K Royal... via photos-b.ak.fbcdn.net

via photos-c.ak.fbcdn.net

via photos-f.ak.fbcdn.net

Well, the alumni section left. The rest of the stadium was about as empty. By the fourth quarter, there couldn't have been 30,000 people still in the stadium.

Late in the 4th Quarter via photos-h.ak.fbcdn.net

I stayed longer at this game than any other, I was surprised. I made it a whole 30 minutes.

I do want to specify, I mean nothing negative about UT and their fans with this post. I am just noting the behavior I observed this weekend. Good luck to both teams down the stretch.

Go Blue & Hook'em Horns.

LA Times says anyone but Penn State

formerlyanonymous — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 20:40:20 -0000

Can't get no love for Penn State or the Big10.

The always idiotic Tom Dienhart:

So, please, don't give us Penn State on Jan. 8, 2009, in Dolphin Stadium. Give us life, give us liberty, give us hope for a good game. That means give us Texas, Florida, Alabama, Georgia or USC. Heck, we'll even take Texas Tech and its diabolical offense and kooky coach. They all have been more impressive than – and likely would beat – any Big Ten team.

Even a perfect Penn State.

More with the LA Times being ridiculous:

Big Ten is in a boring State No one wants to see this conference in the BCS title game again, do they?

Can't get no love for Penn State or the Big10.

The always idiotic Tom Dienhart:

So, please, don't give us Penn State on Jan. 8, 2009, in Dolphin Stadium. Give us life, give us liberty, give us hope for a good game. That means give us Texas, Florida, Alabama, Georgia or USC. Heck, we'll even take Texas Tech and its diabolical offense and kooky coach. They all have been more impressive than – and likely would beat – any Big Ten team.

Even a perfect Penn State.

More with the LA Times being ridiculous:

Big Ten is in a boring State No one wants to see this conference in the BCS title game again, do they?

UM sports on Google Books

formerlyanonymous — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 21:53:59 -0000

I went perusing through google books today looking for some old information. Found six books with limited or unlimited previews available to the online reader.

I read through the history of the Michigan baseball team. It was rather interesting. I found an alumnus of my fraternity happened to be one of the two founders of the Michigan baseball program.

There were 3 baseball books, one track (the story of the quest for the sub four minute mile), one hockey, and one general sports (although its extremely limited in viewing ability).

Enjoy if you'd like:

http://books.google.com/books?uid=15409566281369290648

If the link doesn't work, let me know in the comments. I saved them into my google library and I'm not sure how public that is as I'm too lazy to list each book individually.

I went perusing through google books today looking for some old information. Found six books with limited or unlimited previews available to the online reader.

I read through the history of the Michigan baseball team. It was rather interesting. I found an alumnus of my fraternity happened to be one of the two founders of the Michigan baseball program.

There were 3 baseball books, one track (the story of the quest for the sub four minute mile), one hockey, and one general sports (although its extremely limited in viewing ability).

Enjoy if you'd like:

http://books.google.com/books?uid=15409566281369290648

If the link doesn't work, let me know in the comments. I saved them into my google library and I'm not sure how public that is as I'm too lazy to list each book individually.

Big10/BigEast Challenge!

formerlyanonymous — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 18:33:21 -0000

This had to be bumped to the front page. As always, outstanding work by formerlyanonymous! - MnB Dave

Yesterday Jim Delaney and the Big10 conference announced a deal with the BigEast to create a yearly faceoff of the Big10 and BigEast teams in an early season tournament. The site for the 2009 challenge is St. Petersburg and Clearwater, Florida in late February. I'm not sure of the stadiums they will be playing in, but those two cities are home to the Rays and Phillies respectively. Mgoblue builds it up this way:

The tournament is scheduled for the same week that major league pitchers and catchers report to spring training, which will add to the buzz surrounding the event. Games will be played in venues in the St. Petersburg/Clearwater area, including Bright House Field, Knology Park and Progress Energy Park/Al Lang Field, with marquee matchups scheduled as part of nightly doubleheaders. There will be eight inter-conference contests daily, with the two extra Big Ten teams competing against each other in a non-league game.

Only eight or 12 BigEast teams (Cincinnati, Connecticut, Georgetown, Notre Dame, Seton Hall, St. John's, USF, and West Virginia) will participate despite the Big10 sending all 10 teams. This will lead to at least one pair of Big10 teams playing each other in a non-conference game.

The schedule is available on the BigEast website:

Day 1 – Friday, February 20
Ohio State vs. Notre Dame
Penn State vs. St. John’s
Illinois vs. Iowa
Michigan State vs. Connecticut
Michigan vs. USF
Northwestern vs. Georgetown
Minnesota vs. Seton Hall
Indiana vs. West Virginia
Purdue vs. Cincinnati

Day 2 – Saturday, February 21
Michigan vs. Cincinnati
Purdue vs. USF
Penn State vs. Northwestern
Ohio State vs. Connecticut
Indiana vs. Georgetown
Illinois vs. Notre Dame
Minnesota vs. West Virginia
Michigan State vs. Seton Hall
Iowa vs. St. John’s

Day 3 – Sunday, February 22
Michigan vs. St. John’s
Ohio State vs. Cincinnati
Minnesota vs. Michigan State
Northwestern vs. Connecticut
Indiana vs. USF
Iowa vs. Georgetown
Purdue vs. Notre Dame
Penn State vs. Seton Hall
Illinois vs. West Virginia

Michigan's faceoff with St. John's tenatively scheduled on Day 3 should be one to watch. The two programs have recently become the flagship mid-major/northern programs in a sport dominated by the south and west. If any students happen to be big baseball fans and are spending spring break in Florida, this happens to be the first weekend of spring break.

This had to be bumped to the front page. As always, outstanding work by formerlyanonymous! - MnB Dave

The tournament is scheduled for the same week that major league pitchers and catchers report to spring training, which will add to the buzz surrounding the event. Games will be played in venues in the St. Petersburg/Clearwater area, including Bright House Field, Knology Park and Progress Energy Park/Al Lang Field, with marquee matchups scheduled as part of nightly doubleheaders. There will be eight inter-conference contests daily, with the two extra Big Ten teams competing against each other in a non-league game.

The schedule is available on the BigEast website:

Day 1 – Friday, February 20
Ohio State vs. Notre Dame
Penn State vs. St. John’s
Illinois vs. Iowa
Michigan State vs. Connecticut
Michigan vs. USF
Northwestern vs. Georgetown
Minnesota vs. Seton Hall
Indiana vs. West Virginia
Purdue vs. Cincinnati

Day 2 – Saturday, February 21
Michigan vs. Cincinnati
Purdue vs. USF
Penn State vs. Northwestern
Ohio State vs. Connecticut
Indiana vs. Georgetown
Illinois vs. Notre Dame
Minnesota vs. West Virginia
Michigan State vs. Seton Hall
Iowa vs. St. John’s

Day 3 – Sunday, February 22
Michigan vs. St. John’s
Ohio State vs. Cincinnati
Minnesota vs. Michigan State
Northwestern vs. Connecticut
Indiana vs. USF
Iowa vs. Georgetown
Purdue vs. Notre Dame
Penn State vs. Seton Hall
Illinois vs. West Virginia

Volleyball kicks off with a win

formerlyanonymous — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 23:04:54 -0000

I know football starts tomorrow, but Volleyball starts today dammit. As the only Michigan team to probably be in Houston this year, you best believe I'm going to go see my favorite women's sport and write about it. Plus the team is actually pretty good. And attractive women in spandex are much more attractive than attractive women not in spandex. It's a fact.

--formerlyanonymous

Volleyball started off the season right today with a sweep (3-0) versus Louisiana Lafayette and the Rajun Cajuns at Fox Gymnasium on Rice University's campus. Unfortuantely for yours truly, Rice's athletic facilities are currently under a large amount of construction and Rice, despite all their brilliance, can't post signs directing people to the playing site. The site itself was a dump of a practice facility. The tournament is held at the basketball arena which won't be open until basketball season. I ended up missing the first game and the first handful of points in game 2. Without knowing it, I sat behind the Rice coach who gave me a good run down of the portion I missed. To quote her, "It was 25-10," with the scrunched up type of face that just says, "It was ugly."

Fast forward to a 9-5 lead by Michigan in game 2. When I arrived the 1st Michigan front was already on the court. The primary attack group features outside hitter junior #18 Juliana Paz, senior middleblocker #2 Beth Karpiak, and junior rightside hitter #5 Megan Bower. The Rajun Cajuns appeared to have a gameplan set up to shut down Bower. This opened the door for Karpiak. While rather spotty on nailing her one-sets (a quick set to the middleblocker) during game two, any two-set (more traditional set to the middleblocker) was blasted to the floor. Paz was the main force in keeping the game close throughout the middle of the second game. UL-Lafayette had no chance to block most of her shots as she mixed both the line and cross shots with high velocity and great accuracy. Michigan took this game 25-22, but never trailed after my arrival.

In set three, it was all Michigan, all the time. Karpiak appeared to have much better communication with sophomore setter Lexi Zimmerman. UL-Lafayette appeared well overmatched and fell soundly 25-17.

A couple things were exposed in the first match of the season:

There is a great difference between Michigan's top front row and its secondary front row. Paz, Karpiak, and Bower are leaps and bounds better than Rood (Jr Outside), Bruck (RS Fr. MB/Right side). Rood was couldn't land any kills in the third game and was replaced by freshman outside hitter Alex Hunt. She did not impress much either, but had limited action on the court.

The second thing easily noticeable in this game was Michigan's lack of height. Michigan's top three top out at six foot one. This may hurt when it comes to the Big10 season against the behemouths at #1 Penn State who measure no LESS THAN six foot three, much less #13 Wisconsin or #16 Minnesota. Blocking against UL-Lafayette was less than spectacular due to the lack of height. There were several balls that were missed and many others blocked out of bounds. Michigan defintely had room to improve there.

Another area to keep an eye on this season is the defensive specialist. Currently, true freshman #3 Sloane Donhoff appears to be the frontrunner for the position. Last years specialist Senior Kerry Hance has taken over full time Libero duties and has looked solid in the role.

Grades for the Game (UL-Lafayette is a very mediocre opponent):

Lexi Zimmerman - A... played very well
Juliana Paz - A... solid back and front row play
Megan Bowers - A-... couple miscues here, but overall successful
Beth Karpiak - B+... 2nd game was spotty. I heard the first game might have been very good, but construction kept me from seeing it
Kerry Hance - A... hardly missed a dig
Sloane Donhoff - A... when you don't write any notes on a DS, that means they did well
Alex Hunt - B... possibly because I'm comparing her to Bowers/Paz, but no luck blocking or hitting
Karlee Bruck - A-... blocked very well in her limited time. at 6'3" she is going to need to step it up before conference play

Team Score: A-... the 2nd game was an unnecessary struggle against a mediocre/weak team.

The Wolverines next take on University of Texas-San Antonio on Saturday at 11a.m. CDT. I don't think there is any live coverage of the game as CSTV has decided to cut back in everything this school year. I wouldn't expect to hear a radio broadcast either as the coming of Rich Rodriguez and the new football season will be the main media focus. I'll be at home for the UTSA game, but should be making another trip up to Rice for the night cap which features Michigan taking on the host Rice University.

I'm also thinking about doing a short post on which players are worth google image stalking. My current top picks are #2 Beth Karpiak and #1 Veronica Rood. There is also one of the girls who had a sling on her arm that looked rather good looking, but I couldn't identify her because she had a jacket over her number.

My pictures (yes, they suck): ht http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2444386&l=52b47&id=2207293

For mgoblue recap (as they care about minor notes that pertain to volleyball and stats and stuff): http://mgoblue.com/volleyball/article.aspx?id=144230

For the stats: http://mgoblue.com/volleyball/article.aspx?id=144234

I know football starts tomorrow, but Volleyball starts today dammit. As the only Michigan team to probably be in Houston this year, you best believe I'm going to go see my favorite women's sport and write about it. Plus the team is actually pretty good. And attractive women in spandex are much more attractive than attractive women not in spandex. It's a fact.

--formerlyanonymous

A couple things were exposed in the first match of the season:

Grades for the Game (UL-Lafayette is a very mediocre opponent):

Lexi Zimmerman - A... played very well
Juliana Paz - A... solid back and front row play
Megan Bowers - A-... couple miscues here, but overall successful
Beth Karpiak - B+... 2nd game was spotty. I heard the first game might have been very good, but construction kept me from seeing it
Kerry Hance - A... hardly missed a dig
Sloane Donhoff - A... when you don't write any notes on a DS, that means they did well
Alex Hunt - B... possibly because I'm comparing her to Bowers/Paz, but no luck blocking or hitting
Karlee Bruck - A-... blocked very well in her limited time. at 6'3" she is going to need to step it up before conference play

Team Score: A-... the 2nd game was an unnecessary struggle against a mediocre/weak team.

My pictures (yes, they suck): ht http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2444386&l=52b47&id=2207293

For mgoblue recap (as they care about minor notes that pertain to volleyball and stats and stuff): http://mgoblue.com/volleyball/article.aspx?id=144230

For the stats: http://mgoblue.com/volleyball/article.aspx?id=144234

Recap: Michigan 5 Illinois 2

formerlyanonymous — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:26:38 -0000

Michigan came back in this one. The game started out as a pitcher's duel. Shaw for Illinois came out impressively. Over his first 6 2/3 innings, Shaw only gave up 1 run on 4 hits, 4 BB, and 7 Ks. After that he gave up 2 hits, 2 BB, and 3 runs without recording a single out. After intentionally walking Recknagel, you would have thought the Illinois coaching staff would have removed him from the game. At that point Shaw had already thrown 122 pitches. He then went and walked Putnam on 6 pitches. Again, why was he not pulled? Against Abraham the floodgates opened for Michigan. Abraham hit a 2 RBI single to give Michigan a lead they would never relinquish. For the first two to three innings I couldn't get my head around the fact Shaw got the start. He had only mixed success against Michigan early in the season giving up 4 runs in 4 innings. Recknagel and VanBuskirk were the only Michigan starters not to register a hit against him. Kudos to Coach Hartleb for making the right call in starter. Even the picks at relief pitcher made sense despite the radio announcers' lack of understanding. Sterk and Reeser both had great success against Michigan during the season. Even Stankiewicz, who had done meh against Michigan had been one of the hotter relievers down the stretch.

For Michigan, Putnam went 7 innings on the mound to secure the win. He allowed 2 runs on 5 hits, 3 walks and 9 strikeouts. Powers came in to start the 8th inning, going 2 innings allowing 1 hit with 3 strike outs to earn the save. The ultimate turning point in the game came from a resilient Putnam to finish off Illinois in the 5th inning. Down 3-0 in the count, Putnam battled back with 3 straight fouled off pitches to force the count full. Each of the fouled attempts was accompanied by both base runners going on the pitch. The fourth time was a charm for Putnam as he struck out Bonadonna and McMurray was caught stealing at third. Michigan's offense woke up the next inning to score their first run and begin the comeback.

Offensively, the hero has to be Adam Abraham. The 2 out single to give Michigan the lead and extend the inning was the beginning of the end for Illinois. Abraham finished the night going 1/3 with 1 run, 2 RBIs, and a walk.

A couple notes that caught my eye during the game:

The grass at the Fish plays ground balls slowly. Normally you see that with a team that bunts often or a team that faces a team that hits a lot of hard grounders. I'm not sure why Michigan keeps it that way. Although we bunt a bit, we seem to hit several ground balls through the infield.
I heard several moans and groans about the home plate umpire's strike zone not only in our game, but in the game before ours as well. The radio guys were very adamant about how odd the strike zone was.
The radio guys are fairly decent. The one who sounds like he might be high during the broadcast doesn't know the difference between a pitcher and a DH though. He said if VanBuskirk would have touched a foul ball and dropped it, it would be fair and count as a hit. For those of you who aren't baseball savvy, that is very wrong. He also went on a rant about Bonadonna not having a homerun all season not 2 seconds after his partner just talked about Bonadonna's homerun last night. I'll discount their not knowing players names as they didn't call too many games this season. They did do their homework on stats though. Most of my notes during the game were flubs by the guy who I still think was stoned.

So now we will face Purdue. I started researching them some today. I have no idea who they start against us. Looking through last season's head to head comparison, the only pitcher I've seen with great success as a starter was Sedlmeyer, who hasn't started a game in weeks. Their closer Linblom though also had some good numbers. I'll try to get something out during the day tomorrow. No promises as its a half day at the office.

A couple notes that caught my eye during the game:

The grass at the Fish plays ground balls slowly. Normally you see that with a team that bunts often or a team that faces a team that hits a lot of hard grounders. I'm not sure why Michigan keeps it that way. Although we bunt a bit, we seem to hit several ground balls through the infield.
I heard several moans and groans about the home plate umpire's strike zone not only in our game, but in the game before ours as well. The radio guys were very adamant about how odd the strike zone was.
The radio guys are fairly decent. The one who sounds like he might be high during the broadcast doesn't know the difference between a pitcher and a DH though. He said if VanBuskirk would have touched a foul ball and dropped it, it would be fair and count as a hit. For those of you who aren't baseball savvy, that is very wrong. He also went on a rant about Bonadonna not having a homerun all season not 2 seconds after his partner just talked about Bonadonna's homerun last night. I'll discount their not knowing players names as they didn't call too many games this season. They did do their homework on stats though. Most of my notes during the game were flubs by the guy who I still think was stoned.

Penn State vs Purdue

formerlyanonymous — Thu, 22 May 2008 13:00:29 -0000

Disclaimer: I haven't really scouted Purdue at all, much less Penn State, as Michigan couldn't face either team in their first game.

Bischoff should be the starter today for Purdue. I assume Macy for the Nittany Lions. Macy has been fairly hot down the stretch, but doesn't generally go past 6 innings. His last three starts are W@Minnesota (6 innings 0 runs), W vs Iowa (5 innings, 1 run), and L vs MSU (5.1 innings, 4 runs) He didn't earn a starting job until after the Illinois series (6 starts now). He never had an appearance against Purdue as he was the midweek starter right after the Purdue series (his first start of the season).

Bischoff was roughed up by PSU in his start. He went 4 innnings, 6 hits, 5 runs (4 earned), on 4 walks and 5 Ks. Nakata had 2 BBs and a single, Blackburn had 2 singles and a home run against him. Other than that there were quite a few errors by Purdue, but Bischoff worked out of most of the trouble.

I almost like to say Penn State could win this one. Bischoff has been near untouchable as of late though.

Purdue 4 Penn State 3 (extra innings?)

Disclaimer: I haven't really scouted Purdue at all, much less Penn State, as Michigan couldn't face either team in their first game.

I almost like to say Penn State could win this one. Bischoff has been near untouchable as of late though.

Purdue 4 Penn State 3 (extra innings?)

Michigan vs Illinois Preview

formerlyanonymous — Thu, 22 May 2008 02:07:05 -0000

This one is a little bit longer and should catch you up on our season and our players, as well as the game tomorrow. No players to watch for as I could just list Michigan's whole team. Not know what starter is pitching for either team doesn't help my cause either.

Starters

Fetters vs Putnam

The biggest unknown for Michigan fans coming into this game is will Coach Maloney be starting the first or second best pitcher in the Big Ten? The second biggest question, despite Putnam winning the award, is who is the best starting pitcher on the team? Michigan is home to the top two starters in the league this year. Chris Fetter leads the team with an overall ERA of 2.49, while carrying a record of 9-1. Zach Putnam, voted Big Ten Pitcher of the Year, holds an overall ERA of 2.64 with a record of 7-0. Both of these pitchers could easily start in the Michigan tournament opener, and here is each of their cases.

Chris Fetters has been the ace of the Michigan team all season. He leads all team starters in ERA, wins (9), starts (12), complete games (4, all 7 innings), shut outs (1), innings (79.2), and opponent batting average (.208). He boasts a 65 to 21 strikeouts to walks ratio, second best on the team. Fetter’s one loss this season came in a complete game where he gave up one earned run on a walk off single. The other benefit of starting Fetter is his tendency to induce more groundballs. With the high-powered offense of Illinois, it will be important to keep the ball in the ballpark.

Putnam, however, is more of a fly ball pitcher. This is also a positive against Illinois, especially toward the top of their lineup. Centerfielder Kyle Hudson and second basemen Joe Bonadonna account for 46 of the Illini 98 steals on the year. Coach Dan Hartleb often employs the hit and run with these two on base to help generate more offense. By throwing a pitcher with a higher fly ball to groundball ratio, the hit and run will be a higher risk play for the Illini coaching staff. Along with the fly balls, Putnam also has his fair share of strikeouts. Putnam leads the team with 9.05 strikeouts per nine innings. His .215 opponent batting average is almost as good as Fetter’s.

Coming down the stretch, both pitchers have pitched fairly well. Putnam has gained a victory in his last five starts, including a nine inning complete game against Ohio State. Fetter comes in off a shaky start against Northwestern receiving a no decision.

I think the nod in this game goes to Putnam. Illinois is a team that will hit for more average than power. Both Fetter and Putnam can go just as deep into games. There has been some rumbling from some fans that maybe Putnam hasn’t fully healed from his strep throat infection a week ago, but his outing against Northwestern does not signal any concern. As an added bonus, if Fetter becomes the second starter in the tournament and Michigan wins against Illinois, he would be a better fit going against Purdue as a groundball pitcher.

Haig vs Martin/Shaw

Going to the hill for the Illini will probably be Phil Haig. Haig made an appearance out of the bullpen against Michigan giving up 2 hits and one run over 3 innings while recording 5 strikeouts. That performance led to a position in the starting rotation the following weekend. After a few rough starts, Haig settled into his rotation spot nicely. Over his last three starts he has been the Illini’s best pitcher after Manson. In his last three games he has posted a 2-0 record including a complete game shut out (7 innings) versus Purdue.

If Haig doesn’t start, it could be a close call between Aaron Martin and Scott Shaw. Neither did particularly well against Michigan. Shaw lasted 3 innings giving up 7 runs on 7 hits. Martin lasted slightly longer, going 4.2 innings allowing 7 hits and 7 runs, 5 of which were earned. Both starters have struggled down the stretch as well. Martin has not registered a win since April 7th, a span of 6 starts. Shaw has not had nearly as many starts recently due to rain, but that is most likely a good thing for Illinois as he holds an 8.15 ERA and .340 opponent batting average.

Relief Work

The Good:
Michigan will have a fully rested bullpen to open the tournament. Mike Powers is the lead man out of the pen for the Wolverines and will be the first called upon if ever there is trouble. In 23 appearances this year, Powers is 6-4 with 4 saves. He boasts a 2.94 ERA, .280 opponent batting average, and a 50 to 17 strikeout to walk ratio in 52 innings of work. Against Illinois this year, Powers worked 6 innings allowing 8 hits and two runs while registering 5 strikeouts. Other pitchers with success against Illinois this year include Matt Miller and Travis Smith. Smith actually was a starter at the time of the Illinois series. He had his best start of the season lasting 7 innings while only giving up 3 runs, 2 of which were earned.

The Bad:
Despite being two of Michigan’s top relievers throughout the season, both Ben Jenzen and Tyler Burgoon both had rough outings versus Illinois this season. The two combined for 6.1 innings, 7 hits, and 4 runs allowed. I wouldn’t expect either of these two to enter the game unless Michigan has a comfortable lead.

The Ugly:
Mike Wilson will not see playing time in this game unless absolutely necessary. Along with holding a team high 8.73 ERA and being tied for the most losses on the team with 4, Wilson had an abysmal outing against the Illini this season. His start lasted all of .2 innings, allowing 2 runs on 3 hits and 2 walks. He will only make an appearance if it is a lefty-on-lefty match up.

Illinois’s Bullpen

As I mentioned in my Illinois vs OSU preview, the two main guys out of the bullpen for Illinois are Sterk and Reeser.

If he gets in trouble early, watch for relief pitcher Mike Sterk to enter the game. Sterk closed out many of Manson’s starts this season already. Sterk owns a 4.05 ERA, which is the best on the team with at least one full inning pitched. He also has three saves on the season. Sterk is not the primary closer, however, as that job has been delegated to Ben Reeser. Reeser has 5 saves on the season and has the next best ERA on the team after Sterk with 4.24.

Neither pitched in game one, they will be ready in game two. Expect to see at least one enter this game. Sterk had one good outing against Michigan shutting out the Wolverines over 2 innings while allowing one hit and one walk. Reeser had one appearance lasting one inning allowing only one hit. Outside of those two, Michigan also faced quite a few other relievers during the regular season series. Wes Braun had the best success out against Michigan. Braun pitched 2.1 inning, allowing 2 hits back-to-back including a Putnam homerun. Those were the only runs he allowed while walking only 2 and striking out one.

Offensive Threats-Illinois:

Illinois’s line up can create plenty of buzz. The Illini lead the league in hitting this year (including the tournament) with a .338 team batting average. Everything starts with the leadoff man, centerfielder Kyle Hudson. Hudson, a unanimous 1st team All Big Ten, is currently batting .402 with a .504 on base percentage, both good for third in the Big Ten. He also holds the record for steals in a season by an Illini with 40 in 49 attempts. Batting second for the Illini is Joe Bonadonna. Bonadonna is batting .372 currently and is also a steal threat. He has swiped 26 bases in 32 attempts. Bonadonna has had a bit better success hitting against Putnam (2/3 2 2Bs, R, RBI) than he has Fetter (0/2 SAC FLY, RBI). Expect several pickoff attempts when either of these two men is on base. As mentioned in the starting pitching section, both of these players are utilized in hit and runs when the situation presents itself. Batting third in the Illini lineup is 2nd Team All Big Ten shortstop Brandon Wikoff. Wikoff leads the team with 60 RBIs on the season. Wikoff has had slightly better success against Fetter compared to Putnam, registering two singles in three plate appearances. Behind Wikoff is normally catcher Aaron Johnson, right fielder Daniel Webb, and first basemen Ryan Hastings. All three are big power bats with at least five home runs apiece. Webb is equally dangerous as a contact hitter with a .386 batting average. Webb also had a better game against Fetter going 2/3 with two singles. Against Putnam, Webb went 0/3 with a RBI. Rounding out the lineup for the Illini is DH Dominic Altobelli, third basemen John Schlichter, and left fielder Casey McMurray. Schlicter is the only batter in the starting lineup who has a batting average under .320 for the year.

Offensive Threats-Michigan:

Michigan is nationally ranked for a reason, and its not just because they play a cream puff schedule. The offense from Michigan is explosive. The Wolverines lead the Big Ten in runs scored this season with 434 total runs. This was 37 more runs than the next closest team. The lineup features an All Big Ten player at first, second, third, shortstop, and center field, and conferences don’t give you all-conference honors for your defense. On top of the starting lineup for the Wolverines is shortstop Jason Christian. Christian ranks fourth on the team in on base percentage (.440) and batting average (.325). Following Christian is second basemen Leif Mahler. Mahler started the season as the number nine hitter, but following his .400 batting average, 6 runs, and 4 RBIs against Illinois mid season, he earned a spot in the number two hole. Following Mahler is Big Ten Player of the Year Nate Recknagel. Recknagel lead the Big Ten in slugging percentage (.787), home runs (23), and total bases (155). His .381 batting average, 68 RBIs, and 54 runs lead the Michigan team. Recknagel is still in the hunting for at least 2 national player of the year awards. Protecting Recknagel in the lineup is All Big Ten first teamer at designated hitter Zach Putnam (.320 batting average, 46 RBIs), All Big Ten third teamer at third base Adam Abraham (.340 batting average, 50 RBIs), and left fielder Derek VanBuskirk (51 runs scored). Rounding out the batting order are centerfielder Kevin Cislo (40 runs scored, 17 stolen bases), catcher Chris Berset, and right fielder Ryan LaMarre. In some games, Recknagel will play catcher and Mike Dufek will enter the game at first base to create more offense. Dufek on the season holds a .320 average with 25 RBIs. The first pinch hitter used in most games is outfielder Kenny Fellows. Fellows is batting .324 in only 34 at bats.

Predictions

This game could be much closer than what most people would think. Illinois can score runs in bunches very easily. They have struggled down the stretch though and in Wednesday’s game versus Ohio State they did not hit very well. Regardless of who pitches for Michigan, the first few innings should go smoothly for the Wolverines. Once the starter begins to tire, they will give up 2-3 runs. On offense, don’t expect Haig to last past the 7th inning. Michigan’s lineup is too powerful to keep down for too long.

Michigan 12 Illinois 5

Michigan hitters vs. Illinois pitchers this season (stats at top are whole season):

- - SS Jason Christian (.325 BA, 52 R, 43 RBI, .440 OB%, 13/14 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/4 HR, R, RBI, GDP
      - Martin – 2/2 2B, 2R, RBI, 2BB
      - Haig – 0/1 K
      - Shaw – 1/3 2R, 2 RBI
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3 R
      - Chmielewski – 1/1 3B, R, 2RBI
      - Braun – 0/1
      - Barrett – 1/2 R, K
      - Sterk – 0/1
      - Reeser – 0/1
  - 2B Leif Mahler (.309 BA, 49 R, 37 RBI, .388 OB%, 5/5 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/3 HR, R, 2RBI
      - Martin – 2/2 2B, 2R, RBI, SacB
      - Haig – 0/2 K
      - Shaw – 2/2 2B, R, RBI
      - Stankiewicz – 1/2 2B
      - Chmielewski – 0/0 R, BB
      - Braun – 0/1
      - Barrett – 0/1 R, BB
      - Sterk – 0/1
      - Reeser – 0/1K
  - 1B/C Nate Recknagel (.381BA, 54R, 23HR, 68RBI, .787SLUG, .471OB%, 4/5SB)
    - - Manson – 2/3 HR, 2R, RBI, HBP, K
      - Martin – 0/2 BB
      - Haig – 0/1
      - Shaw – 0/1 HBP
      - Stankiewicz – 0/2 BB, 2 GDP
      - Chmielewski – 1/1 RBI
      - Barrett – 1/3 RBI
      - Braun – 0/1
      - Sterk – 1/1 2B
  - DH/P Zach Putnam (.320 BA, 43 R, 46 RBI, .404 OB %, 3/3 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/4 HR, RBI
      - Martin – 1/3
      - Haig – 1/1
      - Shaw – 0/1 R, BB, K
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3 HR, 2R, 2RBI, K
      - Chmielewski – 1/1 2B, R, RBI
      - Braun – 1/2 HR, R, 2RBI
      - Barrett – 1/3 RBI
      - Sterk – 0/1
  - 3B Adam Abraham (.344 BA, 39 R, 48 RBI, .408 OB%, 1/3 SB)
    - - Manson – 0/2 SF, RBI
      - Martin – 0/3 GDP
      - Haig – 0/2
      - Shaw – 1/2 2B, 2RBI
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3 HR, R, 2RBI
      - Chmielewski – 0/1
      - Braun – 0/1 BB
      - Barrett – 0/3 RBI
      - Sterk – 0/0 BB
  - LF Derek VanBuskirk (.293 BA, 51 R, 41 RBI, .381 OB%, 11/12 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/3 R
      - Martin – 0/2 R, BB
      - Haig – 0/2 R 2K (reached on K/WP)
      - Shaw – 0/2 K
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3 HR, R, RBI
      - Chmielewski – 0/1
      - Barrett – 1/1 2B, R, 2BB
      - Braun – 0/1
      - Sterk – 0/1
  - CF Kevin Cislo (.359 BA, 40 R, 26 RBI, .474 OB%, 17/25 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/3 R, BB
      - Martin – 1/2
      - Haig – 0/0 HBP, CS 2-4
      - Shaw – 1/1 2B, R, RBI, SB
      - Stankiewicz – 2/2 R, BB
      - Chmielewski – 0/1 K
      - Braun – 0/1
      - Barrett – 2/3 R
  - C Chris Berset (.250 BA, 21 R, 17 RBI, .342 OB%, 1/3 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/2 R HBP
      - Martin – 0/1 BB, SacB, K
      - Haig – 0/2 RBI K (RBI on E5)
      - Shaw – 1/2 R
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3 2B, R, RBI
      - Chmielewski – 0/0 BB
      - Barrett – 1/2 HR, R, RBI
      - Sterk – 0/1 K
      - Reeser – 0/0 SacB
  - RF Ryan LaMarre (.287 BA, 21 R, 21 RBI, .351 OB%, 8/12 SB)
    - - Martin – 1/2 R, RBI
      - Stankiewicz – R as Pinch Runner
      - Chmielewski – 1/1
      - Barrett – 1/2 2RBI
  - 1B/C Mike Dufek (.315 BA, 20 R, 24 RBI, .355 OB%, 8/12 SB)
    - - Braun – 1/1 R
  - PH/RF Alan Oaks (.260 BA, 18 R, 19 RBI, .329 OB%, 2/2 SB)
    - - Manson – 0/3 K
      - Martin – 0/2 BB, K
      - Haig – 1/1 BB
      - Shaw – 1/2 2B, R, K
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3
      - Barrett – 0/1 K
      - Braun – 0/1 K
      - Reeser – 1/1

Starters

Fetters vs Putnam

Haig vs Martin/Shaw

Relief Work

Illinois’s Bullpen

As I mentioned in my Illinois vs OSU preview, the two main guys out of the bullpen for Illinois are Sterk and Reeser.

If he gets in trouble early, watch for relief pitcher Mike Sterk to enter the game. Sterk closed out many of Manson’s starts this season already. Sterk owns a 4.05 ERA, which is the best on the team with at least one full inning pitched. He also has three saves on the season. Sterk is not the primary closer, however, as that job has been delegated to Ben Reeser. Reeser has 5 saves on the season and has the next best ERA on the team after Sterk with 4.24.

Offensive Threats-Illinois:

Offensive Threats-Michigan:

Predictions

Michigan 12 Illinois 5

Michigan hitters vs. Illinois pitchers this season (stats at top are whole season):

- - SS Jason Christian (.325 BA, 52 R, 43 RBI, .440 OB%, 13/14 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/4 HR, R, RBI, GDP
      - Martin – 2/2 2B, 2R, RBI, 2BB
      - Haig – 0/1 K
      - Shaw – 1/3 2R, 2 RBI
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3 R
      - Chmielewski – 1/1 3B, R, 2RBI
      - Braun – 0/1
      - Barrett – 1/2 R, K
      - Sterk – 0/1
      - Reeser – 0/1
  - 2B Leif Mahler (.309 BA, 49 R, 37 RBI, .388 OB%, 5/5 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/3 HR, R, 2RBI
      - Martin – 2/2 2B, 2R, RBI, SacB
      - Haig – 0/2 K
      - Shaw – 2/2 2B, R, RBI
      - Stankiewicz – 1/2 2B
      - Chmielewski – 0/0 R, BB
      - Braun – 0/1
      - Barrett – 0/1 R, BB
      - Sterk – 0/1
      - Reeser – 0/1K
  - 1B/C Nate Recknagel (.381BA, 54R, 23HR, 68RBI, .787SLUG, .471OB%, 4/5SB)
    - - Manson – 2/3 HR, 2R, RBI, HBP, K
      - Martin – 0/2 BB
      - Haig – 0/1
      - Shaw – 0/1 HBP
      - Stankiewicz – 0/2 BB, 2 GDP
      - Chmielewski – 1/1 RBI
      - Barrett – 1/3 RBI
      - Braun – 0/1
      - Sterk – 1/1 2B
  - DH/P Zach Putnam (.320 BA, 43 R, 46 RBI, .404 OB %, 3/3 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/4 HR, RBI
      - Martin – 1/3
      - Haig – 1/1
      - Shaw – 0/1 R, BB, K
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3 HR, 2R, 2RBI, K
      - Chmielewski – 1/1 2B, R, RBI
      - Braun – 1/2 HR, R, 2RBI
      - Barrett – 1/3 RBI
      - Sterk – 0/1
  - 3B Adam Abraham (.344 BA, 39 R, 48 RBI, .408 OB%, 1/3 SB)
    - - Manson – 0/2 SF, RBI
      - Martin – 0/3 GDP
      - Haig – 0/2
      - Shaw – 1/2 2B, 2RBI
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3 HR, R, 2RBI
      - Chmielewski – 0/1
      - Braun – 0/1 BB
      - Barrett – 0/3 RBI
      - Sterk – 0/0 BB
  - LF Derek VanBuskirk (.293 BA, 51 R, 41 RBI, .381 OB%, 11/12 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/3 R
      - Martin – 0/2 R, BB
      - Haig – 0/2 R 2K (reached on K/WP)
      - Shaw – 0/2 K
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3 HR, R, RBI
      - Chmielewski – 0/1
      - Barrett – 1/1 2B, R, 2BB
      - Braun – 0/1
      - Sterk – 0/1
  - CF Kevin Cislo (.359 BA, 40 R, 26 RBI, .474 OB%, 17/25 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/3 R, BB
      - Martin – 1/2
      - Haig – 0/0 HBP, CS 2-4
      - Shaw – 1/1 2B, R, RBI, SB
      - Stankiewicz – 2/2 R, BB
      - Chmielewski – 0/1 K
      - Braun – 0/1
      - Barrett – 2/3 R
  - C Chris Berset (.250 BA, 21 R, 17 RBI, .342 OB%, 1/3 SB)
    - - Manson – 1/2 R HBP
      - Martin – 0/1 BB, SacB, K
      - Haig – 0/2 RBI K (RBI on E5)
      - Shaw – 1/2 R
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3 2B, R, RBI
      - Chmielewski – 0/0 BB
      - Barrett – 1/2 HR, R, RBI
      - Sterk – 0/1 K
      - Reeser – 0/0 SacB
  - RF Ryan LaMarre (.287 BA, 21 R, 21 RBI, .351 OB%, 8/12 SB)
    - - Martin – 1/2 R, RBI
      - Stankiewicz – R as Pinch Runner
      - Chmielewski – 1/1
      - Barrett – 1/2 2RBI
  - 1B/C Mike Dufek (.315 BA, 20 R, 24 RBI, .355 OB%, 8/12 SB)
    - - Braun – 1/1 R
  - PH/RF Alan Oaks (.260 BA, 18 R, 19 RBI, .329 OB%, 2/2 SB)
    - - Manson – 0/3 K
      - Martin – 0/2 BB, K
      - Haig – 1/1 BB
      - Shaw – 1/2 2B, R, K
      - Stankiewicz – 1/3
      - Barrett – 0/1 K
      - Braun – 0/1 K
      - Reeser – 1/1

We're Not playing OSU tomorrow

formerlyanonymous — Wed, 21 May 2008 18:38:51 -0000

Again, the awesome work of FormerlyAnonymous jumps to the frontpage with an OUTSTANDING recap of the OSU Illinois Big Ten Tournament game. We get either Illinois or Indiana. FWIW, Illinois' pitcher threw one hell of a game. Michigan's up tomorrow! - MnB Dave

ILLINOIS TAKES FIRST GAME OF BASEBALL TOURNAMENT FROM OSU

Abbreviated Recap:

Illinois wins Game 1 by a score 3-2. OSU heads to the losers bracket where they will play the loser of the afternoon game. If Penn State wins the late game over Indiana, Michigan will face Illinois tomorrow night at 7pm. If Indiana wins, we face Indiana in the same time slot.

OSU started #3 starter DeLucia, who along with Wolosiansky, have been their hottest pitchers down the stretch. DeLucia gave up 2 runs, 1 earned, in 4 innings. Wolosiansky entered the game in the 5th inning. He went 3 innings, allowing 1 HR to Bonadonna in the 7th. While the choice for DeLucia was great, the choice to use Wolosiansky was questionable. While the Buckeyes did not want to risk entering the loser's bracket, Wolosiansky has been OSU's hottest starter down the stretch. His appearance today was on short rest as well. It remains to be seen how this many appearances will affect his performance down the tournament.

For Illinois, Manson pitched brilliantly. He threw a complete game four hitter, allowing two runs in the second, both unearned. More impressive was his 0 walks and 4 strike outs.

Stars of the game:
Illinois:
Manson: CG, 0ER, 4H, 0BB, 4K
Bonadonna: 1/4 HR, BB
Wikoff: 2/4 R, RBI

OSU:
Burkhart: 1/2 2RBI, SAC
Hurley: 1/3 R
Wolosiansky: 3INN, 5H, 1R, 1BB, 1K

I'll probably have one of these for the late game too, I'm not too concerned about the non-michigan games. I'm working up a big thing for Michigan later tonight though. I've spent the last 3 days going through every at-bat Michigan has had against every pitcher on every team minus Penn State (as it was statistically impossible for us to play them). The one thing I realize is we hardly ever ground out to third base.

ILLINOIS TAKES FIRST GAME OF BASEBALL TOURNAMENT FROM OSU

Abbreviated Recap:

PSU vs Indiana Baseball

formerlyanonymous — Mon, 19 May 2008 15:59:55 -0000

Bumped from the Fanposts is this excellent preview of the upcoming baseball game between PSU and Indiana. Also, I'm lazy today and there is no football news to speak of. Enjoy.

-BSD

Thought I'd post this here as well with the game coming up on Wednesday. So if there are any PSU baseball fans out there, this game won't be televised, but should be a good one.

Game is Wednesday @ 330pm, at Michigan's Ray Fisher Stadium at the Wilpon Sports Complex. If you're in the area tickets are $7. After Medlar Field, the Fish might be the second best field in the Big Ten.

Preview:

In the second game of the day, we have Penn State versus Indiana. Penn State swept the four game season series in mid April, but since then Indiana has been one of the hottest teams in the Big Ten. The Hoosiers are winners 12 of their last 16 conference games, including two from 1st place Michigan, three from 2nd place Purdue, and a sweep on the road of Michigan State.

Offense has not been a problem this year for Indiana. The leader on offense this year is probably Big Ten player of the year candidate Josh Phegley. Phegley is the regular season Big Ten batting champion with a .436 average. He also holds the regular season crown 71 RBIs. Phegley ranks in the top 3 in slugging percentage (.733), on base percentage (.514), runs scored (63), hits (88), doubles (17), and home runs (13). Indiana as a team finished second in the Big Ten overall with a .337 batting average.

On the other side of the spectrum is Penn State. Penn State finished second to last in the Big Ten in team batting average, posting a .291 overall. Leading the way for Penn State are the three, four, and five hitters in the line up DH Joe Blackburn (.341 batting average, 41 RBI), C Rob Yodice (.291 batting average, 49 RBI), and CF Brian Ernst (.356 batting average). Blackburn, Ernst, and LF Ryan Boonie are the only hitters in the starting lineup currently batting over three hundred.

This is good news for the Hoosier pitching staff that has come out red hot in the second half of the season. Opening the tournament for Indiana is Matt Bashore. Bashore (7-3) currently holds the third highest ERA at 3.16 and the lead in strikeouts with 86 (25 looking). His last loss came at the hands of the Nittany Lions just over one month ago. Bashore pitched 5.1 innings allowing 6 runs, 3 earned, on 7 hits, 4 walks, and 3 strikeouts in the loss. Since that game, Bashore has pitched four straight complete-game victories.

Going up against Bashore for Penn State will be Mike Wanamaker. Wanamaker is fourth in the Big Ten in ERA with a 3.69 mark and holds a 5-5 record overall. Wanamaker’s low winning percentage has been more a case of bad luck than it has poor pitching. Wanamaker has lost two games this season when giving up only one earned run. He also ran into a hot Miami (FL) team, ranked #5 at the time, early in the season. He has really only pitched poorly in two games this season, including his most recent outing at Minnesota. Wanamaker has already faced Indiana once this season, pitching a complete game (7 innings), giving up 1 run on 7 hits. Wanamaker is also one of the few pitchers to dominate Phegley this season holding him hitless with two strikeouts. Behind Wanamaker, the Nittany Lions feature two quality relievers in Paul Hawkins (3-3) and Dan O’Neil (0-1, 11 S). Both relievers have 25 appearances each; nearly double the next closest reliever on the Nittany Lion roster. O’Neil is up for all conference honors this season as he has tied the Penn State record for saves in a season. His 0.71 ERA leads all Big Ten Pitchers with at least 5 innings of work.

Penn State coming in as the higher seed may actually be the underdog in this game. Indiana has the definite edge in the offensive department, and appears to have a slight advantage in the starting pitching. Penn State does have the upper hand in the relief-pitching department.

My prediction is a low scoring affair, which benefits Penn State, but not enough. Indiana 4, Penn State 2.

Players to Watch:

Penn State:
Brian Ernst CF – 2/3, R vs Bashore
Dan O’Neil RP – 11 Saves, 0.71ERA, .174 OBA in 25 appearances this season
Wes Borden 3B - .296 BA, 42 R, 17 RBI, .407 OB%, 13 SB this season

Indiana:
Josh Phegley C - 0/3, 2K vs Wanamaker
Jerrud Sabourin 1B – 3/3, 2B, R vs Wanamaker
Andrew Means CF - .365 BA, 65 R, 29 RBI, .421 OB%, 30 SB this season

Bumped from the Fanposts is this excellent preview of the upcoming baseball game between PSU and Indiana. Also, I'm lazy today and there is no football news to speak of. Enjoy.

-BSD

Thought I'd post this here as well with the game coming up on Wednesday. So if there are any PSU baseball fans out there, this game won't be televised, but should be a good one.

Preview:

My prediction is a low scoring affair, which benefits Penn State, but not enough. Indiana 4, Penn State 2.

Players to Watch:

Penn State:
Brian Ernst CF – 2/3, R vs Bashore
Dan O’Neil RP – 11 Saves, 0.71ERA, .174 OBA in 25 appearances this season
Wes Borden 3B - .296 BA, 42 R, 17 RBI, .407 OB%, 13 SB this season

Indiana:
Josh Phegley C - 0/3, 2K vs Wanamaker
Jerrud Sabourin 1B – 3/3, 2B, R vs Wanamaker
Andrew Means CF - .365 BA, 65 R, 29 RBI, .421 OB%, 30 SB this season

Baseball Tournament (Games 1 & 2)

formerlyanonymous — Mon, 19 May 2008 03:05:36 -0000

Had to bump this to the Front Page. I love me some baseball and Uber Commenter FormerlyAnonymous put together this awesome, awesome preview of the first two games of the Big Ten Baseball Tournament. You can get game times and ticket information of the Main MGoBlue website or by clicking here. Again, a massive hat tip to FormerlyAnonymous for his outstanding preview. Looking forward to more! - MnB Dave

As Dave pointed out (and thank you for giving the Baseball some side space), Michigan is hosting the Big10 tourney this week at the Fish. For those of you who haven't seen the renovations yet, its worth the $7 for tickets. Michigan is currently a top 20 team in the country and vying for a Regional Hosting opportunity in the NCAA tournament. This goes a long way with recruiting and national exposure in general. We are a flagship program of northern college baseball. Ticket information can be found here.

As for Wednesday's games, neither feature the Wolverines, but the outcomes of both will affect who we play. The lowest seed to win takes on Michigan at 7pm on Thursday. So since hardly any of you have background on those teams, I've gone and created some updates for you.

In my eyes, we get Indiana. They split with us during the regular season. I'll probably post up a breakdown of how I expect that game to go in the next day or two, plus some alternate scenarios and those match ups.

Preview Game 1:

This match up brings us the epitome of offense versus pitching. Ohio State, like last year, has the best overall depth at pitching in the tournament. It will be interesting to see how they set up their rotation. Jake Hale appears to be their Game 1 starter for the tournament. The top two pitchers outside of Hale down the stretch, J.B. Shuck and Dean Wolosiansky both started on Saturday, meaning Wednesday would be short rest of both. Hale has struggled down the stretch, including a game against current foe Illinois two weeks ago. Against Illinois, he went 5.2 innings giving up 7 runs, 3 earned on 9 hits, 3 walks, and 2 strike outs. Over the whole season, Hale owns a 5-3 record over 70 innings pitched, and a 4.50 ERA. Ohio State’s bullpen is also strong. They have two long relievers available in Armstrong and Edgin. Both have seen several starts over the season, primarily on weeknights. Best is one of the top relievers this year with 8 saves. He has been very consistent over the last few appearances, allowing just one run in his last 9.2 innings pitched.

The Buckeye offense has struggled at time this year. Ohio State ranked 5th in the Big Ten this year in runs scored. First basemen Justin Miller has lead the attack for most of the season. His .405 batting average leads the team, as well as his 61 RBIs. J.B. Shuck has been a force to reckon with not just on the mound this season but also on offense. Shuck is currently batting .371 and has 22 stolen bases. Buckeye coach Bob Todd has kept Shuck out of the lineup on days when he has pitched during the season, which may happen in the tournament as well.

Illinois on the other hand is all about the offense. The Illini hold the top league batting season batting average at .338 as a team. Lead off hitter and centerfielder Kyle Hudson leads the team with a .411 batting average and .511 on base percentage. Hudson is also second in the Big Ten with 39 steals in 48 attempts. Shortstop Brandon Wikoff (.381 BA) is the primary RBI producer on the team with 59 on the season. Daniel Webb (.387 BA) hitting in the fifth position in the line up and playing right field is second on the team with 45 RBIs.

Illinois explosive lineup has carried them much farther than their pitching has this season. During conference play this season, the Illini ranked 8th out of 10 Big Ten team in earned run average (6.46). Kevin Manson heads the rotation up and is expected to start in Game 1. He is 7-2 on the year in 10 starts. In 65.2 innings, Manson has accumulated a 6.17 ERA and a .319 opponent batting average. If he gets in trouble early, watch for relief pitcher Mike Sterk to enter the game. Sterk closed out many of Manson’s starts this season already. Sterk owns a 4.05 ERA, which is the best on the team with at least one full inning pitched. He also has three saves on the season. Sterk is not the primary closer, however, as that job has been delegated to Ben Reeser. Reeser has 5 saves on the season and has the next best ERA on the team after Sterk with 4.24. Both relief pitchers have an appearance against Ohio State this season. Sterk went three innings allowing two runs to close out a Manson victory. Reeser was less fortunate lasting .2 innings allowing 5 runs, 4 earned on 3 hits and 2 walks.

Ohio State may have the depth in the pitching department, but Illinois’s Manson has been better down the stretch. My prediction is Illinois’s offense will be too much for Hale to handle. Illinois jumps out to an early lead and holds off a late Buckeye comeback. Illinois 8, Ohio State 5.

Players to Watch:

Ohio State:
Zach Hurley RF– 3/3, 2B, 1 R against Manson this season
Eric Best RP– 2 appearances for 3 innings, 3 hits, 2 BB, 1 K vs. Illinois this season
Justin Miller 1B- .467 BA, 3 R, 9 RBI vs. Illinois this season in 3 games

Illinois:
Kevin Manson SP - 6 innings, 6 hits, 2 runs, 1 earned, 1 K, 0 BB vs. OSUKyle Hudson CF – 2/3 and 2 runs vs. Hale
Craig Lutes OF- .500 BA, 3 runs, and 1 RBI against OSU this season

Preview Game 2:

In the second game of the day, we have Penn State versus Indiana. Penn State swept the four game season series in mid April, but since then Indiana has been one of the hottest teams in the Big Ten. The Hoosiers are winners 12 of their last 16 conference games, including two from 1st place Michigan, three from 2nd place Purdue, and a sweep on the road of Michigan State.

Offense has not been a problem this year for Indiana. The leader on offense this year is probably Big Ten player of the year candidate Josh Phegley. Phegley is the regular season Big Ten batting champion with a .436 average. He also holds the regular season crown 71 RBIs. Phegley ranks in the top 3 in slugging percentage (.733), on base percentage (.514), runs scored (63), hits (88), doubles (17), and home runs (13). Indiana as a team finished second in the Big Ten overall with a .337 batting average.

On the other side of the spectrum is Penn State. Penn State finished second to last in the Big Ten in team batting average, posting a .291 overall. Leading the way for Penn State are the three, four, and five hitters in the line up DH Joe Blackburn (.341 batting average, 41 RBI), C Rob Yodice (.291 batting average, 49 RBI), and CF Brian Ernst (.356 batting average). Blackburn, Ernst, and LF Ryan Boonie are the only hitters in the starting lineup currently batting over three hundred.

This is good news for the Hoosier pitching staff that has come out red hot in the second half of the season. Opening the tournament for Indiana is Matt Bashore. Bashore (7-3) currently holds the third highest ERA at 3.16 and the lead in strikeouts with 86 (25 looking). His last loss came at the hands of the Nittany Lions just over one month ago. Bashore pitched 5.1 innings allowing 6 runs, 3 earned, on 7 hits, 4 walks, and 3 strikeouts in the loss. Since that game, Bashore has pitched four straight complete-game victories.

Going up against Bashore for Penn State will be Mike Wanamaker. Wanamaker is fourth in the Big Ten in ERA with a 3.69 mark and holds a 5-5 record overall. Wanamaker’s low winning percentage has been more a case of bad luck than it has poor pitching. Wanamaker has lost two games this season when giving up only one earned run. He also ran into a hot Miami (FL) team, ranked #5 at the time, early in the season. He has really only pitched poorly in two games this season, including his most recent outing at Minnesota. Wanamaker has already faced Indiana once this season, pitching a complete game (7 innings), giving up 1 run on 7 hits. Wanamaker is also one of the few pitchers to dominate Phegley this season holding him hitless with two strikeouts. Behind Wanamaker, the Nittany Lions feature two quality relievers in Paul Hawkins (3-3) and Dan O’Neil (0-1, 11 S). Both relievers have 25 appearances each; nearly double the next closest reliever on the Nittany Lion roster. O’Neil is up for all conference honors this season as he has tied the Penn State record for saves in a season. His 0.71 ERA leads all Big Ten Pitchers with at least 5 innings of work.

Penn State coming in as the higher seed may actually be the underdog in this game. Indiana has the definite edge in the offensive department, and appears to have a slight advantage in the starting pitching. Penn State does have the upper hand in the relief-pitching department.

My prediction is a low scoring affair, which benefits Penn State, but not enough. Indiana 4, Penn State 2.

Players to Watch:

Penn State:
Brian Ernst CF – 2/3, R vs Bashore
Dan O’Neil RP – 11 Saves, 0.71ERA, .174 OBA in 25 appearances this season
Wes Borden 3B - .296 BA, 42 R, 17 RBI, .407 OB%, 13 SB this season

Indiana:
Josh Phegley C - 0/3, 2K vs Wanamaker
Jerrud Sabourin 1B – 3/3, 2B, R vs Wanamaker
Andrew Means CF - .365 BA, 65 R, 29 RBI, .421 OB%, 30 SB this season

Date	Time	Opponent
Friday April 3	4pm	vs Penn State
Friday April 1	7pm	vs Illinois
Friday May 1	7pm	@ Ohio State
Saturday May 2	1pm	@ Ohio State
Sunday May 3	1pm	@ Ohio State
May 20-24		ENTIRE Big10 Tournament

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