FIRST TEAM
1B – Mike Dufek, MICH
SP – Chris Fetter, MICH

SECOND TEAM
OF – Ryan LaMarre, MICH

THIRD TEAM
No one

ALL-FRESHMAN TEAM
No one

SPORTSMANSHIP AWARD HONOREES
Kenny Fellows, MICH

I’m don’t think there was anyone who was skipped over in this list.  Lorenz stood no chance against Penn State’s Steranka for All Freshman third basemen.  McLouth had no chance against Freshman of the Year Dickerson of Indiana.  Cislo wasn’t as good this year.  Fellows probably just missed being on the third team. Berset missed too much time and would have needed a strong full campaign to overtake the 3rd team catcher.  None of our pitchers deserve all conference representation.  It was a down year, here’s hoping next year will be better.

I’ll work on getting a end of season post out tomorrow. I’m furiously packing for a trip to New York next week.  I’m also contemplating taking a couple days to float the river north of San Antonio.  So it’s probably good Michigan didn’t make the tournament, I’d be out of posting capabilities for way too long.

On what they would take from “The Fish” as a memento…

Cislo: “This plasma TV” (laughter)

Kalczynski: “I would take my locker. I have had some of the best conversations with my teammates at this locker and that is something I would love to have.”

Wilson: “I want one of these couches (large blue leather couch with a M logo embroidered in the middle cushion)… these things are so comfortable.”

Jenzen: “I would either take the ping pong table or Kim (athletic trainer Kim Hill).” … (loud laughter)

Go read it now. Make it out to the last BigTen weekend series of these Michigan Men™. Go Blue.

Side note:  I guess this means Ben Jenzen won’t be returning after a medical redshirt season.  Bummer, he was a great pitcher.

Despite the no hitter, Michigan still managed a few base runners. Twice they were erased because we tried to hit and run with 2 strikes on a batter. Both times Wimmers threw a pitch way up out of the strike zone leading to a strike’em out-throw’em out double play. Burkhart gunned Fellows again in a later inning and should have had Cislo before the strike’em out-throw’em out but the shortstop dropped the ball. So if you’re keeping track at home, we walked 4 times and reached on an error, we left only one man on base.

Its also worth noting that the middle infielders for Ohio State saved this no-no twice. Kovanda made a full extension diving catch to steal a hit from LaMarre and Engle at shortstop made a diving play to turn a single from Nick Urban into a double play. Both were awesome plays.

The offense tried to make up for it in game two knocking 10 hits, but they were no match for the Buckeye and their 15 hits. Tyler Burgoon got the start, wasn’t helped by his defense, and didn’t help himself after getting into trouble either. Burgoon gave up 6 earned runs in 1.2 innings of work. Nick Urban, playing his originally recruited position of second base, also lead to an unearned run.

Mike Wilson was the first reliever and had a good outing compared to his norm. He only gave up one run in 1.1 innings pitched, but he did walk 2. Chris Berset committed an error to advance a runner, but it didn’t affect the score as the runner would have scored on an ensuing hit anyways.

Kolby Wood was the highlight on the mound for the game. He lasted 4 innings of scoreless baseball giving Michigan a chance to comeback. Comeback they did as they rallied to bring the game back to 6-7.

Matt Miller came in to close out the 7th and pitch in the 8th. In the eighth he started the inning with a walk and a hit by pitch. Two sacrifices and a single later, 2 runs would cross the plate to give OSU the final 9-6 lead. The BigTen’s best closer, Jake Hale came in to shut us down and earn his 11th save of the season.

Kevin Cislo didn’t play in this game and I’m not sure why. If anyone has any ideas, let me know in the comments.

I’ve got a trio of exams on Monday, so this will be my review of those two games for now. I may have a better recap of things later in the week.

Highlights via BTN (ignore “Josh” Lorenz, Jake “McLooth,” and Chris “Burst”):

Don’t be surprised if the embed doesn’t work. I think Paul has the settings to where an admin has to post embeds. If it’s not here now, we’ll get it up soon.

Katzman looked shaky in his one inning of work, walking the lead off batter and then hitting Golden Tate with a pitch to start the game.  After a strikeout and another walk, he managed to escape the inning without a run.

Kolby Wood threw the long relief; he was originally scheduled to start.  Over his 4 innings, he only gave up 2 runs on 6 hits, 2 walks, and 2 Ks.  He worked into a bases loaded jam in the 2nd and induced a double play, then again, in the 5th, he got a critical double play to preserve the lead.  After giving up a single and double to open 6th, Wood was pulled for…

Tyler Burgoon.  Burgoon managed to get a fly ball on the first batter, but it was deep enough to score a run.  Groundout, RBI single, double, groundout and we were out of the inning, but Wood lost the chance for the win.  Burgoon did pick up the win in the top of the 7th.  He’d close out the game with a pair of strikeouts and a groundout for the finish.  So while his first inning was a bit rough, he looked really good to finish.  Hopefully that shoulder isn’t affecting his pitching too much.

Game two started with Mike Wilson… and he wasn’t half bad.  He went 4 innings giving up 4 hits, 3 walks, and 3 strikeouts.  His toughest inning was the second; he started by giving up back to back singles and a walk.  He worked his way out with a pair of strikeouts and a ground ball.  That’s the type of situtation Wilson hasn’t performed in well lately.  It was a real promising start.  After giving up only a hit in each of the 3rd and 4th inning, Wilson started to lose command to start the 5th.  He walked both batters he faced, opening the door to the bullpen.

Travis Smith came in and wouldn’t record an out.  The defense set the tone for his outing, with a John Lorenz error on the first batter Smith would face.  The next batter would single in two runs.  A hit by pitch and walk later, Notre Dame would score again.

Matt Miller would take over from here (still 0 outs in the 5th).  The first batter he faced flew out to Alan Oaks in left, plating a run on the sac fly.  Miller then struck out 4 of the next 5 batters to finish the game.  Miller was damn impressive.

Offensively, Coach had a chance to move some people around.  Ryan LaMarre was given the night off to rest; this was his first set of games to sit out.  Cislo also sat out most of the second game, coming in to pinch run in the last inning (and get caught stealing).

Despite the shakeup, Michigan was back to its favorite past time in game one – strikeouts.  The Wolverines struckout 10 times, lead by the hat trick of Kenny Fellows.  The left on base stat was also a little high, but about average for Michigan at 8.  Lorenz owned half of those, but I will point out that at least he didn’t strikeout this game.

The good came from Coley Crank.  Coley went 3/5 on the day with a double and a solo homerun.  Anthony Toth also went 3/6 with an RBI.

Defensively we had 2 errors on the game.  Berset had a throwing error that didn’t lead to a run, but should be at least noted.  Lorenz had the error (previously mentioned during the Travis Smith escapade) that lead to a run.  His defense has been suspect lately, but he did earn some props from Kolby Wood in game one:

“I came in and tried to aim the ball when I was first throwing and got into a jam[...] There were a couple of tough plays, and then John Lorenz, our third baseman, made a really nice play and picked me up. That gave me a lot of confidence.”

So at least he’s got that going for him.  The kid is still a freshman and will struggle.

In the long run, this doubleheader doesn’t mean much of anything.  It was good to see Michigan keep its composure in game one.  I was also glad to see we hit a pair of lefties around a little bit.  We’re facing two really good lefties this weekend from Indiana.  So hopefully this was good practice leading up to that.

First game Friday is at 6:35pm at the Fish.

I’m going to focus on pitching for these two recaps, as they were the obvious focus.  Several bench guys saw playing time and the lineup was shaken up a little bit to accomodate for those guys.  I’ll touch on offense quickly at the end.

Game one of the twin bill was a close one, seeing Michigan jump ahead, fall behind, then seal the win with a late inning comeback.  Coach Maloney took the doubleheader as an opportunity to get in as many pitchers as he could, starting with Matt Miller.  Miller looked good, going 2 innings with no runs, 2 walks, and a strikeout.

Kolby Wood came in to pitch in the third inning and got himself into and out of trouble.  After hitting the leadoff batter with the pitch, he then threw away a pick off attempt past first baseman Garrett Stephens.  He eventually would strand the runner at third.  In his second inning of work, Wood would also give up a solo-homerun.  The outing wasn’t that bad for Wood.  He did get into some higher counts (41 pitches, 25 strikes), but that’s kind of been his norm.

Enter Mike Wilson, exit Mike Wilson.  In just 1/3 of an inning, Mike induced a pop up, walked a batter, then gave up a two run homer, tying the game.  Short leash for Mike, but the team was in to win.  Wilson’s still nowhere near his 2007 form.

Brandon Sinnery came into mop up the inning, giving up a hit, but not allowing the runner past first base.  His second inning saw some trouble.  After the EMU second baseman reached on a fielding error by Mike Kittle (playing second), Sinnery walked the next batter.  He would strikeout the next EMU hitter, but was pulled for Burgoon.

Burgoon, in his first game back from the minor shoulder injury, did well.  He induced a fly out on 2 pitches to end the 6th, and ran into trouble to start the 7th.  He’d hit the lead off hitter.  The next batter tried the sacrifice bunt, but was unsuccessful, bunting the ball hard back toward Burgoon who wheeled and went to second.  The final batter would then ground into a double play.  Burgoon would get the win.

Want pictures? OK:

Game Two’s pitching didn’t go so hot.  The first clue should have been that Jeff DeCarlo was announced as the starter.  While I harp on Mike Wilson sometimes for his lack of success, DeCarlo is quite a bit lower on my “trust him to make outs” ladder.  Jeff’s struggled a bit the last year and a half.  He’ll see spot appearances, but he doesn’t seem to be threatening to make too many legitamate starts any time soon.  This game was just a continuation of his struggles.  His 1/3 of an inning went like this: homer, groundout, single, homer, single. His ERA jumped from 17.18 to 24.75… yikes.

Travis Smith then came in to try and stop the bleeding.  At that point, only 3 runs had scored.  Smith would give up another single to put runners at first and third.  A wild pitch later and Michigan was down 4-0 after just half an inning.  Smith’s next inning went smoother, allowing just one walk.  Michigan tied the game in the bottom of the second, just to see the lead disappear on a Andrew Marshall solo homerun for the Eagles (his second of the game).  Smith gave up two more hits that inning, but wouldn’t give up another run.

Only two pitchers had a higher ERA than Jeff DeCarlo heading into this game, one was Kevin Vangheluwe (the other is team high 27.00 by Losorelli in one appearance).  He would come in relief next.  He, like DeCarlo, wouldn’t make it out of his first inning of work.  His inning:  single,  bunt single, 3-run homer, walk (I think I’d pull him here?),  single (definitely here, bullpen slow to warm up?), fielder’s choice, strikeout, single.  Five of his baserunners would score, one of his -luckily?- scored because of an error making it unearned.  The ERA jumped from 19.18 to 23.63.

Speaking of that error, it was the first batter Matt Gerbe would face, grounding a ball to shortstop.  Toth couldn’t field it cleanly, leading to a run.  Matt did get the team out of the inning with another ground ball on the next batter.  Gerbe would finish the game (3.1 innings), including two 1-2-3 innings in the 5th and 6th.  In the 7th, Gerbe allowed of a leadoff single then walk.  After a sacrifice bunt and a hit by pitch, he would induce two groundouts, one of which scored a run. Michigan lost 11-5.

So this game went much worse from a pitching perspective, but I think if you’d told me DeCarlo was starting and Vangheluwe would throw in relief, I would have expected some bad to happen.  Take away their 8 earned runs, and this is a totally different ball game.  It’s hard to defend the home run ball, and EMU had 4 in this game, accounting for 7 runs.  Those hurt.

Offensively, game one was really bad.  We managed 5 hits, 2 by Fellows, 2 by Toth, and one homerun by Mike Dufek. Beside those three, the rest of the bats never got going.  The good news was we only struck out 3 times in the game, a season low (previous season low was 4 Ks at EMU in the second game of the season series).

Game two went a a little bit better, but still wasn’t great.  No one really stood out as above the average, eight different Wolverines each registered one hit.  LaMarre had a home run, and Chris Berset had a double of his own.  Toth stranded 3 runners; LaMarre had 2 (team total of 7).  We also struck out only 6 times, which is two below the season average.  I’ll take that.

Burgoon and Berset both returned to the team in this doubleheader, and it couldn’t come at a better time.  Burgoon restores a little bit of order to the bullpen, giving us a solid option to close or set up a closer.  I think we’re headed to a closer by committee.  No one has really dominated since early in the season.  Berset brings better play to the catcher’s box and into the lineup.  He went 1/4 this weekend with a double and a walk.  As I said in the CMU recap, I think this is Berset’s team to take over.  He has the chance to create be the spark over the next few weekends to turn around the poor play.

Other Notes:

• Kevin Cislo sat the doubleheader out, just making one pinch hit appearance.
• Non-everyday players Garrett Stephens (1B), Mike Kittle (2B), Nick Urban (RF/2B), Coley Crank (RF), Tim Kalczynski (3B) all made extended appearances on defense
• Coach Maloney on the season (I’m becoming less hopeful on the pitching):

“I think game one here today is an indication of what I thought this team would be. Coming up with a clutch hit like Dufek’s home run, making some great defensive plays and scrapping together some runs when it mattered most to win a ballgame. What I didn’t anticipate from this team was the way we played in game two and that has been all too familiar a scenario for us this season. We have not pitched well enough. I am still hopeful, as crazy as it may sound, despite watching us that we will turn this thing around. I know that these guys are better than that. I am hoping that at some point, they just let go of themselves so they can compete like I know they can.”

• The Daily – Live Blog.
• Tim & Paul in the Trike-ening.  Paul didn’t center his weight over the front tire, therefore reducing his normal force and decreasing the coefficient of rolling friction (You sound like you were a Michigan engineer – Paul).  Timmy Kal let him know his flaw, but it was too late.

The crowd is nuts here thanks to Spring Game overflow.  You’d think Tate Forcier was making a special appearance in the 7th inning stretch.

And on to the recap.

Game 1

W – Chris Fetter (5-1)   L – Haig (3-2)   Sv – None

BTN Coverage (hopefully embedding this works):

If the embed doesn’t work for you, visit the BTN.com highlight here.  I didn’t catch the game, but just judging by the post game wrap up, I doubt I could have put up with either of these guys calling a game.  People thing Joe Morgan is bad…

The story of this game was Chris Fetter. In his second complete game of the year, Chris struck out 13 batters (about half the outs in the game), including 7 hitters that went down looking. Fetter was economical with most hitters, only throwing 136 pitches (the exact same number as his last complete game against Penn State). He only allowed 6 hits and two walks. Great game overall. Something I’m interested to keep an eye on is how these back to back complete games affect his pitching down the stretch. Fetter has been quoted by the WBCN crew during the IPFW series that he is shooting for only 120 pitches per game. I can’t blame Maloney for letting the kid get his complete game wins, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Fetter left some games sooner just to protect his arm.

On offense, we scraped to get the runs we did. In the second inning, we managed to avoid a fielder’s choice by utilizing the hit and run, we (unofficially) sacrifice flied a runner from second to third, and got the timely singles to score 2 runs. For the go ahead run in the 7th, we used the sacrifice fly to plate the run.

The positive on offense was sticking to single digit strikeouts and getting baserunners on every inning. The bad was we left runners on base every inning as well, including 4 in scoring position. If there ever was an inning to describe Michigan’s season it has to be the 6th:

Michigan 6th – Toth doubled down the lf line (0-0). Lorenz out at first 1b to 2b, SAC, bunt (0-0); Toth advanced to third. Kalczynski struck out swinging (0-2 FFS). Cislo struck out swinging (2-2 KBBSS). 0 runs, 1 hit, 0 errors, 1 LOB.

We get pressure on the other teams early then fade down the stretch. The metaphor works for the season as well. We come out with power, but the power fades as we go along. Sigh…

Notable Stars

• Chris Fetter – CG, W, 6 H, 13 K, 2 BB, 2 ER
• Anthony Toth – 2/4 2 R, 3B, 2B
• Ryan LaMarre – 0/0 R, 4 BB (in 4 at bats, he saw 26 pitches, impressive)
• Fan Attendance: 1056… best this year.

Notable Goats

• This was solid game… everyone gets off the hook

Other Notes

• Other Chris’s daughter caught a fly ball in the Michigan win, quoted to have said this: “This is one of the best days of my life! And if Michigan wins, it will move into the top ten.”
• CollegeBaseballToday.com – Chris gets an Honorable Mention in the Big10 Pitchers segment…”When Chris Fetter is on the mound, Michigan becomes one of the best teams in the nation. But beyond him?…”
• The Daily – Liveblog Redacted. If I find where it went I’ll relink it here. Update: now linked.
• SID Release – Coach Maloney Moves Toth up to 7th in the order: “He was huge for us today. I moved him up in the order to try to keep what we consider our seven best hitters in a row, and he really came through big for us tonight.” This appears to be an attempt to limit the LOB in the middle of the order.

Game 2

W – Zerrusen (2-0) L – Kolby Wood (0-1) Sv – Strack (1)

So remember when I said this:

Katzman has done well lately, but that just means he’s due for a less than stellar start as well.

That happened. While Katzman didn’t have a horrible start, he certainly didn’t have the same stuff he’d had the last two weeks. He worked into a little trouble in the first with back to back singles to open the frame, but managed to eek his way out. He wasn’t so lucky in the fourth inning. Katzman loaded the bases to start the inning (sac bunt in the middle of that). He then hit a batter to force in a run, followed by a 2 RBI single from Bonadonna.

Kolby Wood would enter in relief of Katzman and get a quick out to stop the bleeding. In Wood’s first full inning of work, things started off shaky with a fielding error by Anthony Toth. With two outs and a runner on third (the one to reach on the error), Wood gave up a two run home run (both runs unearned). The next inning started similarly, but this time with a throwing error by John Lorenz. Wood then gave up back to back hits, scoring a pair of runs (one unearned). Miller would relieve him but struggled as well giving up a walk, back-to-back doubles, and a single before striking out the next two batters in the inning. This would put the Illini up 10-6, and their offense went into cruise control to the finish.

The offense was surprisingly good in this game, knocking out the Big10’s top pitcher after just one inning. Ben Reeser, the Illinois starter managed just 1 inning with 3 hits, 3 runs, and a walk. Coley Crank was the only starter without a hit, but 5 starters (Cislo, Fellows, LaMarre, Oaks, Toth) had two a piece.

If you were to tell me Michigan was going to score 8 runs on 13 hits while only stranding 8 and striking out 7 times, I’d feel pretty good about that game. Unfortunately the pitching didn’t hold us in the game. The Illini hit the big inning in the 6th; it was too much to recover from.

Notable Stars

• Ryan LaMarre – 2/3 3 RBI, 2 R, 2 SACF, 2B
• Kevin Cislo – 2/3 2 R, 2 BB, SB, 2B
• Alan Oaks – 2/5 Solo-HR
• Anthony Toth – 2/4 BB
• Kenny Fellows – 2/4 R, 2B, SACB
• Mike Dufek – 1/5 2B (off the top of the Brick Monster to steal a HR)
• Attendance – Woo Spring Game crowd: 1942!
• Coach Maloney – Ejected (see the note below)

Notable Goats

• Toth & Lorenz – The errors to lead off the 5th and 6th innings lead to 3 unearned runs… more than the difference in the game.

Other Notes

• Maloney was ejected in the 6th inning arguing on behalf of Kevin Cislo. There was a close safe call made at second base and the crowd didn’t like it, Cislo didn’t like it, Maloney didn’t like it. He made his way out to the umpire (I believe it was veteran umpire Bruce Doane) to make his case. According to Daily staff writer Ryan Kartje, he went “all “Lou Piniella” on the ump to waves of support from the crowd. No dirt kicking as of yet. But regardless, Maloney gets tossed from the game and the crowd loves it.” I like the move by Maloney to go for the ejection. Sometimes it can light a fire under the team. It didn’t work this time, but hey, sometimes you’ve just got to do that as a manager.
• Daily Live Blog – as linked above in the Maloney note, Kartje live blogged the game. I really like this from the Daily. It definitely supplements the box scores really well.

Game 3

W – Roberts, B (3-0) L – Alan Oaks (0-1) Sv – Martin (2).

Keeping along with our recent Sunday streak, our pitching staff struggled most of the game. This game was back and forth as the scoreboard above shows, but the key came when Alan Oaks out-stayed his welcome. After already throwing 53 pitches, a career high, he trotted out to an eighth inning he wouldn’t make it out of; he gave up 3 singles and a double to start what would be a four run inning for the Illini.

In defense of Oaks, he pitched very well in the 4 innings leading up to this point, giving up just one unearned run in 4 innings of relief of Travis Smith. Speaking of Smith, his start was disappointing as well. He gave up the first 5 runs (4 earned) to the Illini in just over 3 innings of work. We really need someone to step up and earn this starting spot, whether it be Smith, Wilson, Sinnery, Vangheluwe, Wood, or someone new.

Speaking of Wilson and Sinnery, they closed the game out fairly well, throwing 2 innings while giving up only one unearned run.

Offense was top heavy – top of the lineup that is. Fellows, LaMarre, and Dufek each had a pair of hits including a homer and double by Dufek – the only extra base hits of the game. Dufek’s two hits drove in all four Wolverine RBIs in the game, and his grounded into double play also drove. Toth, Lorenz, and Kalczynski each added a hit a piece from the bottom of the lineup, but lead to no runs scored or driven in.

Notable Stars

• Mike Dufek – 2/4 4 RBI, R, HR, 2B
• Ryan LaMarre – 2/3 2 R
• Kenny Fellows – 2/3 R, BB
• Attendance – 873

Notable Goats

• Alan Oaks (at bat) – 0/4 3 Ks, 1 LOB
• DH/PH (Crank, Urban, & Kittle) – 0/4 K
• Fellows & Lorenz – Errors leading to a pair of unearned runs

Other Notes

• The Daily – Relief pitching dooms M. I respectfully disagree. Timely hitting mixed in with a lack of consistency from the bullpen and the defense behind them. There were quite a few errors to start innings for bullpen pitchers.
• The Daily – Live Blog Game 3 is more good stuff. I love how the only comment is by “S. Toth” appealing Kartje’s notion that the team doesn’t turn too many double plays. While we may not be the Big10 leaders, we do turn our fair share of them (.82 per game as of 4/5/09)
• Daily Illini – Haig’s start was disappointing as Fetter was great, but the Illini won the weekend series
• Illinois Baseball Report – Dittman carries Illini this weekend

Wrap Up

While losing 2 of 3 is never a great thing, I don’t think this was too bad of a weekend for the team. Illinois is one of the better teams in the conference this season, especially in the pitching department. There were a few lapses though, especially on defense. After the great effort in game one, we had two errors in each of the last two games leading to four unearned runs. We’ve got to cut those down.

After this weekend’s action, Michigan is now 7th (tied with PSU, but Nittany Lions have the tie breaker) in the Big10 at 4-4. Only the top 6 teams make the BTT, so we’ve got some ground to make up. That starts this weekend with Michigan State. We play in East Lansing at their new ball park on Friday and Sunday, but play the middle game of the series at the Fish. All indications are that Michigan should sweep the Spartans, but they have a pitcher in Nolan Moody who poses quite a challenge.

As for the mid week, we face Toledo on Tuesday and have the rubber match with EMU in Ann Arbor on Wednesday. Toledo could be a challenge, but I don’t expect much from their mid week starter. As for EMU, we’ve already seen what they can do. I can’t see our guys taking the same “oh, its just EMU” mindset as last time.embed>

The game featured 7 Wolverine pitchers making a trip to the mound. Coach Maloney was seeking some sort of spark from the starting rotation and started freshman Kevin Vangheluwe, but, as many other things with Michigan baseball lately, when it rains it pours, completely dousing any chance of a spark to happen. Kevin couldn’t make it out of the second inning, giving up 4 runs while only recording 2 outs.

Things never got much better after that. Wilson gave up a run in 1.1 innings, Matt Miller gave up 2 runs (1 earned), and Brandon Sinnery gave up 3 runs in 0.1 innings. The good news is Travis Smith looked good in the short 1.1 inning appearance, as did Kolby Wood and Alan Oaks throwing a perfect 2.2 innings to finish the game.

Defense wasn’t much prettier. Along with a throwing error on a double play chance by Toth and a throwing error on a bunt single by Lorenz, there were several reported brain lapses on the field. Nick Urban was pulled from third base after failing to cover third base, allowing a pair of runners to advance. Five(!) balls hit to the outfield should have been caught but weren’t. One I give Fellows a break for as he slipped on the turf that was still wet from the snow last weekend, but the other four could – and most probably should – have been caught, including the play in this picture from Liesa Thompson at the Ann Arbor News:

That's a catch that should be made.

We didn’t do well behind the plate either. Kalczynski had his 9th passed ball of the year. He bobbled another transition on a base stealing attempt, dropping the ball. He would eventually be replaced by McLouth during the middle of that same inning during a pitching change. That pitching change? It was on an 0-2 count when Maloney pulled Sinnery. Pulling a pitcher on 0-2? What’s going on?

The offense was anemic this game. Despite Alan Oaks great outing on the mound, his plate appearances were atrocious. He went 0/4 with 2 Ks, a foul out to second base, and a 4-6-3 double play. He stranded 4 runners on base to end innings.

The 6 hits Michigan mustered came from 6 different players. Fellows, Cislo, LaMarre, Dufek, Crank, Kalczynski each had a hit-a-piece, Cislo and LaMarre’s being doubles. The team only managed multiple hits in one inning, the 8th, where they scored just one run. The run in the 9th came by walks and errors on behalf of CMU.

If you want a positive in all this, we only stranded 6 runners (would have been 2 more if not for a pair of grounded into double plays) and we only struck out 7 times… only 7 times….

In defense of some of the hitting, Coach Maloney made an attempt to stir up the lineup in this game. The starting lineup looked like this:

• Fellows, Kenny lf
• Toth, Anthony ss
• Cislo, Kevin 2b
• LaMarre, Ryan cf
• Dufek, Mike 1b
• Urban, Nick 3b
• Crank, Coley dh
• Oaks, Alan rf/p
• Kalczynski, Tim c

Some of this makes some sense. Toth has raised his average to a point where he would look attractive in the 2-hole. Fellows is getting on base enough and has the ability to steal bases; he’s alright for a 1-hole, but not the most attractive choice. Alan Oaks dropping down makes sense with the bottom of this line up, too. Kalczynski makes sense in the 9-hole as well as he has been doing a little bit better about getting on base.

What’s Going On?

Michigan isn’t the same team its been the last few years. We lost the best team we’ve had since the CWS runs in the 80s. We have a group of 5 walk ons that lead the team. Two of them were either cut or virtually told to go elsewhere for playing time:

Coach Rich Maloney cut Kenny Fellows from the University of Michigan baseball team during his freshman-season tryout. Two years later, Maloney told Tim Kalczynski he could transfer if he wanted playing time.

We have several players playing out of their original positions. Urban was a walk-on middle infielder turned outfielder who is occasionally thrown into third base. Kalczynski was once a walk-on outfielder playing catcher and occasionally third base.

Add in our youth and inexperience, and you’ve some problems. Lorenz is a true freshman who didn’t even play his senior year of high school ball. McLouth and Crank are making the best they can of their early playing time, but neither has been that consistent. They’re freshman.

Once you start looking at the scholarship players, many of them are just in their first year of starting as well. Michigan lost Nate Recknagel, Adam Abraham, Jason Christian, Leif Mahler, and Zach Putnam this off season from the offensive starting lineup. Berset, Dufek, and LaMarre contributed a lot, but they weren’t the leaders. They will hopefully be that one day, but right now they are just sophomores and juniors.

Kevin Cislo is the player I’m looking to right now to pick up the team. Maybe this is why Coach Maloney moved him to the three hole. Put him right in the middle of everything and see what happens. Let him try and spark the team. Let him lead. The problem with this is Kevin isn’t a three hole hitter. Unlike Iowa who can throw Toole in the center of the lineup to generate offense, Michigan doesn’t have the same team build. We have power hitters, they need runners on in front of them who can move themselves into scoring position to be hit in.

Pitching isn’t much different than the offense. We don’t have experience. What experience we have in the starting staff is either very good (Fetter) or meh (Wilson). Katzman is in his first season as a starter. Smith hasn’t had a full season of starts yet and he’s just a sophomore. In relief, we don’t have that dominate guy. As much as I hoped Burgoon would be that guy, he’s not.

We’re a young team; we’re an inexperienced team. We’re a not that great team. It is what it is.

How Do We Fix It?

This is the toughest question on Maloney’s mind I’m sure. I think we have two options at this point.

1) We need an upperclassman to step up and really take over this team. He needs to call a players only meeting and say all those right things, but more importantly, he needs to back it up with his play on the field. He needs to be the enforcer, not Coach Maloney. He needs to be the one picking up guys. He needs to be the one getting on a guys case when he’s out of position.

During the preseason, and even into the first few weeks of the season, I thought Chris Berset was going to be the one to do this. I thought this was Chris’s team to take over. Maybe its the catcher in me that makes me feel this, but the catcher that runs much of the show. Sure its probably coincidence that we went from 7-2 with Berset to only 11-9 without him. I think his value to our lineup cannot be matched from Crank and Kalczynski, neither can his leadership. I’m not sure when he’s due back, but its not soon enough.

2) Our hitting coach (whether that be Maloney and Ust) has to step up his game. Something has to be done about our strikeout rate. Something has to be done about moving runners into scoring position and knocking them in.

The worst thing that can happen now is the team starts putting too much unnecessary pressure on themselves. That will just force more bad habits.  As Coach says:

“They may even be trying more than they should be trying. I don’t know. But right now it’s more psychological than it is anything else. It’s not the opponent – we are the opponent. We’re beating ourselves.”

We’ll see how we do against Illinois this weekend.  Wake up boys, its time to produce.

Poll Watch

As you can see Michigan dropped out of the Writer’s poll finally and the RPI took a hit, too.  The Coaches Poll still manages to get Michigan votes, but why – I just don’t know.  This team is playing nowhere near the caliber of play to deserve a ranking.  Some of these coaches need to do nothing more than look at our 8 losses.  As for RPI, our soft schedule and poor showing lately have left us now in the bottom half of Division 1.  There is no way to make the tournament without winning the BigTen title now.

Links From Earlier in the Week

Michigan Daily Sports blog “The Game” named Kenny Fellows athlete of the week for his performance on Sunday.  Apparently they didn’t pay much attention to the rest of the weekend

The Daily also featured a column by Tim Rohan about needing to play more small ball.  I think article dances around the subject a lot, but I agree that we need to move the runners around a bit more.  The strikeouts are worriesome, so are the pickoffs.  Coming into the mid week games, we’ve been picked off 11 times.  In comparison we’ve only picked off 6.  The national average is a shade below 6.

Timmy Kalcyznski did a liveblog-ish type post over the weekend at Iowa.  Bus trouble was rampant, crazy antics everywhere, veterans treating rookies like rookies.  Very entertaining read.

Dufek, Cislo, and Fetter all make the BigTen Hardball All Weekend Team.  Fetter’s complete game only earns him the #3 starter, and rightfully so.  There were plenty of complete games in the BigTen this weekend.  Iowa had 3 pitchers make the team.

Bowling Green

W – Gerdeman (1-2) L – Brandon Sinnery (1-2)  Sv – Hawk (2)

Thank goodness for automatic bids to the NCAA; it is our only chance to make the dance now.  I was lucky enough to be working during this game, as the box score looks ugly as I don’t know what.   Michigan lost every aspect (pitching, offense, baserunning, and defense) in this game.  It was just all around ugly.

We’ll start with the offense.  Michigan had 5 hits in this game, 3 of them came in the 7th. Dufek opened the frame with the longball, scoring the first run of the game.  After a McLouth walk, Oaks followed up with a homerun of his own.  Toth knocked a single (his second of the game) with two outs, but he was caught stealing.

That’s pretty much it.  Fellows had a double in the 6th with 2 outs but was stranded.  Three runs against a team that ranks 232 out of 288 NCAA teams ranked in ERA?  Striking out 9 times against a team that only averages 5.7 a game?  Ouch.

On the mound, things didn’t fair much better.  Brandon Sinnery threw four innings, and I’m not entirely sure why.  His pitch count was on 66, and judging by the play by play, he had really settled down nicely after the rough first inning.  The first inning saw Brandon give up 3 runs on four hits and a hit batsmen.  He followed up by retiring 9 for the next 11 batters.

Matt Miller came in to relieve Sinnery and started things off by giving up a lead off home run.  Great start. He gave up a single right after that, but managed to work his way out of any further damage.

The 6th inning run can be placed squarely on Lorenz.  With one out and a runner on first, Lorenz fielded a ground ball and went for two.  This was the throwing error of the inning, allowing the runners to advance to second and third.  During the next at bat, Lorenz was charged with a fielding error on a pick off attempt at third base allowing the run to score.

Bowling Green added another run charged to Miller in the 8th.  After giving up a walk in a bunt single, Miller was removed for Dufek who gave up a sacrifice bunt and fly to score the run.  Dufek would give up one more earned run in the ninth from a double and single back-to-back with two outs.  On the same single, LaMarre misplayed the ball allowing runners to advance, including one run to score (unearned).  Another run would come in on the next batter as he singled to right – that run also unearned.

Just ugly everywhere.  As said at the outset of this recap, it’s BigTen Tournament title or bust for this team now.   The rest of the mid week games mean absolutely nothing.

Notable Stars

• Anthony Toth – 2/3  hitting streak at 10 games
• Dufek/Oaks – All 3 RBIs on a pair of 7th inning homeruns, Dufek’s hitting streak is 15

Notable Goats

• John Lorenz – 2 Errors in an inning leading to a run
• Ryan LaMarre – Error lead to two runs (this may be less of a problem if it was wind induced, but I haven’t heard the game yet, somebody leave a comment if they have details)
• Offense as a unit – 5 hits? Really?
• Kevin Cislo – 0/4  First time he hasn’t reached base in 68 games

Other Notes

• Michigan Daily – We got outplayed, got to be consistent
• Sentinal Tribune (Bowling Green local) – Michigan gives BGSU coach his 500th victory

Oakland

W – Eric Katzman (4-2)   L – Welke (2-3)    Sv – Dufek (2)

Wow, wow.  This game was ugly.  Just how ugly?  Let’s let Ann Arbor News writer Kevin Ryan tell you how bad it was:

The victory, which put Michigan at 16-7 on the season, came after 3 hours and 57 minutes of play. The game needed 14 pitchers, featured 10 doubles among 29 hits, 48 base-runners and had more foul balls than fans in the stands at 6:30 p.m. (there were 94 on-lookers, to be exact).

In all fairness to the fans, the game started with 694 fans at the game when it was still sunny and warm out.  Both teams looked pretty horrible for large stretchs of this game driving down attendance.

I’m not going to try and recap all of the game, but we’ll walk through a couple key points, starting with pitching.  It started really badly.  Kolby Wood showed signs of rust in the 2nd and 3rd innings, the latter he would never escape from.  Reliever Jeff DeCarlo was worse.  He only gave up one hit in his 1/3 of an inning pitched, but he did manage to walk 3 and hit a batter while giving up 4 runs.  In all, he threw 23 pitches, 8 were strikes.

Gerbe came in to finish the third inning, but the damage was pretty much done already.  He worked himself in and out of a few jams, allowing an unearned run in the 6th (Lorenz throwing error).  He lost control to start the 7th and would eventually be credited with a pair of earned runs.

Burgoon came in here and couldn’t get out of the inning.  He ended up leaving early with an yet undisclosed injury.  Katzman came in to stop the bleeding and pitched 1 1/3 innings allowing only one baserunner via hit by pitch.  Dufek asked for the ball on short rest to close out the ninth.

Offense went a little bit better.  Four batters (Fellows, LaMarre, Dufek, and Kalcyznski) each had multiple hit games.  Six starters had multiple RBIs, four had multiple runs scored.  Out of the 15 hits, 9 were doubles.  Mike Kittle, filling in for the supposedly injured Cislo, was the only batter without a hit in the game, but even he walked once.

Notable Stars

• Ryan LaMarre – 3/3  3 R, 3 RBI, 2b, 2 BBs (5/5 on base)
• Mike Dufek – 3/5 R,  3 RBI, BB, 3 2bs, BB (hitting streak 16 games)
• Kenny Fellows – 3/5  2 R, 2 RBI, 2 2bs, BB (hitting lead off)

Notable Goats

• Fellows and Lorenz – each had an error, neither lead to runs though
• Jeff DeCarlo – 1/3 IP, H, 3 BB, HBP, 4 ER;  honestly I never expect from DeCarlo, but this was just pretty bad.

Other Notes

Cislo was supposedly hurt coming into this game and was held out of the starting lineup.  He did make an appearance as a defensive replacement in the top of the 9th inning making a pretty good bare hand play to get a ball deflected off the pitcher Dufek’s glove.   The injury hasn’t been disclosed to any media outlet I’ve seen; hopefully he’s back to 100% by the weekend.

Speaking of injury, I missed the exit by Burgoon, so I’m not sure what happened there.  MGoBlue.com generally has a day or so lay over before you can go back and listen to games, so if anyone heard the call or has the information, leave a note in the comments.  Hopefully its something minor and we’ll have him back by mid weekend.

And while this game may be one of the few higher scoring ugly games we see all season, at least it was close unlike this 49-1 routing of Kentucky State by Eastern Kentucky.

Headed to the Weekend

Penn State comes to Ann Arbor this weekend for the home opener of the Big10 season.  I hope to get out a preview sometime tomorrow night late.  Tomorrow is my day to catch up on everything before another busy weekend.  I’ll miss the first two games of the series as I head over to Austin for a little tourism in Hippie Land.

I’ve had a really busy weekend full of umpiring and school related things, so this was pushed back a day.  Just a reminder, Michigan is at home today (Tuesday) and tomorrow (Wednesday) at 3:05pm for a pair of mid week games again Bowling Green and Oakland respectively.  Get out and support the baseball team! –FA

Game 1

W – Chris Fetter (4-1) L – Schatz (1-1) Sv – None

The team sputtered out of the game, collecting several hits, but never having the big inning. In the first inning, Iowa start Nick Brown went 1-2-3 through the top of the order on just 13 pitches.  Cislo, who is ranked nationally for fewest strikeouts per at bat, and Fellows both K’d to start the game, and LaMarre was robbed of a single by Brown who showed he can also field his position well, grabbing a line shot right at him.  Chris Fetter even came out in this game looking a little shaky.  Fetter gave up 3 hits (one double) and a walk in the inning, allowing 3 runs – all earned.  Iowa came out swinging but Michigan wasn’t going down without a fight.

In the top of the second, Michigan answered right back, capitalizing on a Hawkeye error to open the inning.  The tone was set on the opening pitch of the inning when Mike Dufek lined a hard grounder at the first basemen, who couldn’t come up with the ball.  McLouth followed up with a single and Oaks walked to load the bases, setting up John Lorenz with a big RBI opportunity.  Lorenz fell short of the RBI, but in name only.  Dufek would score when Lorenz grounded into a 6-4-3 double play (double plays negate RBIs).  Timmy Kal closed out the scoring in the 2nd with an RBI single to score McLouth.

Fetter also came out more focused in the second inning.  Over the next 8 innings (yes, he threw a complete game), Fetter would allow only 2 more base runners, both from singles; one of those base runners was caught stealing, therefore only causing Fetter to face 25 batters in 8 innings.  Fetter was absolutely dealing.  He struck out 9 batters on the day while inducing 10 ground ball outs.  That’s a pretty solid total.  He’s definitely the player of the game.

Michigan got the go ahead run in the 8th after starter Nick Brown was relieved by Schatz.  Schatz didn’t give up a hit in the inning, but he did have two hit batsmen and a walk, allowing Kevin Cislo to fly out just deep enough into center to get pinch runner Nick Urban in safely.

I think Coach Dahm at Iowa explained it least best:

“We didn’t make many mistakes tonight, but the mistakes we did make they (Michigan) capitalized on them.

Yeah Coach, that makes a ton of sense.

Notable Stars

• Chris Fetter – 9 IP, 3 ER, BB, 9 K, CG, W
• Mike Dufek – 2/3 RBI, R, 2 BB

Notable Goats (stretching for these)

• Kenny Fellows – Only player not to reach base
• Jake McLouth – Stranded 4 runners

Other Notes

• Iowa Press-Citizen – Iowa put up a fight but was no match for Fetter
• The Gazette (Cedar Rapids, IA) – Iowa played tough and is getting better, still not good

Game 2

W – Turnbull  (1-0) L – Eric Katzman (3-2) Sv – Schurz (3)

The weather went cold and so did the bats.  This game was a pitchers duel from start to finish, with neither team appearing particularly loose.  Michigan had their chances, stranding 1st and 3rd in the 2nd, being picked off at third with a runner at first in the 3rd, stranding runners at 2nd and 3rd in the 5th, and stranding runners at 1st and 3rd in the 7th for a total of seven left on base.

It seemed like Michigan could never get going unless there were already two outs in the inning.  Of those innings where we stranded multiple runners (or were picked off in the 3rd), all 6 runners reached base with two outs.  Only in the 7th were we able to string enough hits with two outs to score a run.

Two players were charged with 6 of the total LOB, Toth (4) and Kalcyznzki (2).  While Kalcynzski will do this from time to time, Toth generally doesn’t leave that many on base.  Part of what contributed to this problem was Coach Maloney moving him back into the 2-hole, reversing the switch from the Akron game.  It appears with the recent success Toth has had, and the slight slump Fellows was facing going into this game, Maloney wanted to try and spark the offense.  So much for that idea, huh?  FWIW, Coach did switch them back in game three, the results of which are forthcoming.

On the mound, Katzman had a pretty damn good game.  He went 6 1/3 innings, givnig up 5 hits and 2 walks while striking out 9.  That is a little bit better than your normal Katzman, so Coach has to feel good about that.  Matt Miller and Tyler Burgoon came in relief of Katzman.  Miller only faced one batter, walking him.  Burgoon then came in, walked a batter, then threw a wild pitch, allowing the second run of the game to score (Katzman’s runner).

For Iowa, their starting pitcher, the freshman Hippen pitched a great game.  The lefty has the build to be a good starter, especially if he can get some support around him.  We’ll be seeing much more of him in the next 3 years.

Notable Stars

• The Pitching Staff (Katzman, Miller, Burgoon) – 8 IP, 2 ER, 6 H, 4 BB, 5 K

Notable Goats

• The offense – 6 H, 1 R, 12 K
• Toth – NEVER END AN INNING GETTING OUT AT THIRD BASE

Other Notes

• BTN.com – Iowa played well today, Hippen will be good

Game 3

W – Travis Smith (4-2) L -Freie (2-2) Sv – Burgoon (3)

The good news is we won and the top half of the order decided to make up for the lack of production in game 2 with a huge effort in game 3.  The bad news is the radio broadcast was cut out due to technical difficulties. Blast – but I’ll take the win, even if its with a temporary snow fence in the outfield:

Because of the snow, and how it affected the non-covered warning track, a temporary blue construction-like fence was put in place to eliminate the warning track from the field of play, shortening Banks Field anywhere from 14-18 feet.

Mike Wilson started this game, but couldn’t make it out of the 3rd inning.  His first inning was solid, his second inning he escaped trouble, but things fell apart in the third.  In the inning he allowed three hits and a walk for a total of three runs.

Travis Smith entered here and did very well.  Over the next 4 1/3 innings, he’d only give up one unearned run on 2 hits, a walk, and 3 strikeouts.  I’m wondering if the last two appearances won’t get him a bid back into the starting rotation.  He’s done fairly well in the long relief behind Wilson, but the fact we are forced to go to long relief behind Wilson may signal the end of Mike’s stint in the Sunday starter role.

Burgoon also made an appearance in this game, working the final two innings to earn the save.  Burgoon did pretty well despite the run scoring.  He gave up a lead off double followed by two ground outs, the second of which scored a run.  He induced 5 ground balls and struck out a batter.  You can tell Burgoon is on by the higher ground ball to strikeout ratio.  He tends to have a bit more bite on his slider and keeps it down, while his fastball cuts downward slightly.

On offense, Coach Maloney switched Fellows and Toth back into the 2 and 9 hole respectively.  I think Fellows got the message from Maloney that he needed to produce.  Kenny went 4 for 5 on the day with 3 runs and 2 RBIs.  Monster game for Fellows.

Cislo consistently set up Fellows in the right situations, going 2 for 4 with a walk and 3 runs.  LaMarre followed up nicely after Fellows going 2 for 4 with a walk, and Mike Dufek did some cleaning up… in the clean up spot… with a 3 for 5 day and 3 RBIs.  Other than Toth’s 1 for 4 with a run, the rest of the lineup was silent.

Something I found peculiar was Alan Oaks being pulled from the game in the second inning.  He had just struck out (0/2 2 Ks), so I’m not sure if he was being pushed to the bench for his recent lack of offensive production or if he hurt himself.  I sent a quick email to the booth, but they weren’t quite sure what happened either.  We’ll see what sort of playing time he gets the next two days, then we’ll know for sure.

Between Oaks, his replacement Aspinwall, McLouth, Lorenz, and Timmy Kal, the bottom middle of the lineup went a combined 0 for 18 this game.  Toss in Toth and its a whole 1 for 22.  So… Is Nick Urban still sick or what?  Berset can’t get that hand healed fast enough.  We definitely need a kick in this area of the lineup.  It’s been plagued with inconsistency.

Notable Stars

• Top 4 in the Lineup – 11/18 6 R, 5 RBI, 2B, 3 SB
• Travis Smith – 4.2 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 3 K

Notable Goats

• Mike Wilson – 2.1 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 2 BB, 2 K
• Defense – 3 errors? are you kidding me?
• Anthony Toth – Unearned run from a fielding error, separate throwing error

Other Notes

• Michigan Daily – Weekend Recap, we’re scrappy, glad the running games going.  I fully expect anyone who reads that article to make a comment about David Eckstein.

Wrap Up

So we finished the weekend 2-1 which has us tied for 2nd place in the BigTen behind Illinois and tied with Ohio State.  That’s a pretty good start.  I think we really needed to sweep this weekend though.  I don’t think it will cost us a spot in the tournament by any stretch, but every win will be important this season with the stiff competition forming.  Iowa probably wont finish any higher than 7th in the BigTen this year, and that may be generous.  I pegged them for 8th before the conference season began.  Like I said, we really should have swept, but the stranding runners and making meh pitchers look great caught up to us again.  Blame the cold weather, the bus trip, whatever.  It’s gone now and all the boys can do is continue to work hard to win more games.

Next weekend we get a step up in competition with Penn State at home.  The Nittany Lions are a middle of the road BigTen team, I’d place around 5-7th place range.  They have some quality pitching, but don’t quite have the hitting prowess.

As for today (Tuesday), we face Bowling Green at the Fish at 3:05pm.  Tomorrow (Wednesday) is Coach Maloney’s former program Oakland.  I’ll try to get some sort of preview out by the game, but I’ve been swamped by things the last two days (hence this being late as it is).

Getting ready to board the bus for Iowa and hoping the weather man is wrong about the 2 inches of snow there Saturday!

As a last little bit of information going into the series, I’ve compiled all our current players past performances against the Hawkeyes.  The chart after the jump is listed first by Michigan Hitters, then followed by Michigan Pitchers.  The player order is by first appearance.  So for example, Cislo was the only player to appear in the 2006 series, so he shows up first on the chart.

I’m not sure if I’ll have this for each Big10 opponent, but I’ll try to get it out.  It’s time consuming to gather it information and then chart it all out.  I had planned to do the Purdue team against Michigan, but yeah… no.  Besides, who cares about them anyway?

A few of the stand outs:

• Cislo is batting .500 for his career against the Hawkeyes with 8 runs and 14 hits in just 11 games.
• Chris Fetter is 1-1, but has a complete game (7 innings) with 18 Ks in 19 innings.
• Ben Jenzen is 2-0 in 3 appearances, pitching 5 innings while giving up 4 runs (only one earned).
• Burgoon earned his first career win against the Hawkeyes in an extra inning game last year, going 2 shut out innings striking out 2.
• As a team (just current players), we are 11-1 against the Hawkeyes.

Full Chart after the jump

W – Sikora (1-0) L -Brandon Sinnery (1-1)

Well, the Mid Week bug struck early, as Michigan loses to Eastern Michigan at home. Chantel Jennings at the Daily had a chance to interview Mike Dufek before the game and Coach Maloney before and after the playing, it seems the guys might have been a little too overconfident.

“We know that we are supposed to win,” [Mike Dufek] said. “It’s only a matter of us focusing and playing well.”

“I even talked to the team before the game,” Maloney said. “I said, ‘Let’s understand that anyone can knock you off.’ Maybe this will be a lesson learned for later days.”

Ouch.

by Leisa Thompson, The Ann Arbor News

I was working during the game and have had trouble getting MGoBlue’s media player to load, so straight box scoring on this one. While Michigan did out hit the Eagles in this one, we were stranding runners and getting killed on the base paths again. Michigan left 10 runners on base, and had another 4 either picked off or caught stealing. The running game had been fairly solid for us of late after a shaky start.

Sinnery didn’t have too poor of a start. Yes, he did give up the 2 run home run, but those runs were the only ones he gave up in the first 5 which is an decent start. The last run came after he was pulled in the 6th inning. With runners on first and second, EMU manufactured the run by using the sacrifice bunt two times in a row (one being a suicide squeeze). It’s a tough way to give up a run, but it happens.

On offense, we got on base quite often, but we couldn’t get anything going. Along with the base running problems mentioned earlier, we also weren’t hitting well with runners in scoring position. The team went 0/5 with runners in scoring position, and 0/3 with an RBI with a runner on third. The one RBI came from a Cislo ground out that allowed Kalcynzski to score. Poor base running and no hitting when runners are in scoring position means you have to live and die by the long ball. No extra base hits today. Death.

Notable Stars

• Anthony Toth – 2/4
• Bullpen (Miller/Burgoon) – 4 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 4 K

Notable Goats

• Cislo/Fellows/LaMarre/Dufek – Each left 2 runners stranded
• Cislo/Fellows – picked off trying to steal (caught stealing)
• Kalczynski/Urban – picked off not trying to steal

Side Note

• Fellows moved to right field for this game, supposedly for defensive purposes as it was rather windy at the Fish yesterday. This is not expected to be a permanent move.

Extra Reading

• The Daily – Overconfidence Hurts
• MLive – Great Showing by EMU
• MGoBlue – Standard SID recap

Michigan Insider Podcast

Coach Maloney continued his Michigan Insider Podcast on WTKA. They touched a lot on the recent news of Barry Larkin and Branch Rickey entering the NCAA College Baseball Hall of Fame. Coach said they are working on improving the baseball history portrayed in the lobby of the Fish. They are working on getting more pictures and history up on the walls to show just how rich the history of the program is.

Maloney also walked through the Big10 season. He tabbed Iowa as a scrappy team that always takes games from us when we don’t expect it. The weather may be an equalizer to help them. He expects Minnesota, Ohio State, Indiana, and Illinois to all compete for the Big10 crown without anyone really running away with it. Our lack of experience may cause problems, but he’s hopeful it won’t show its ugly head too often.

Other News

Chicago MLB Wolverines

As Brian@mgoblog linked in mgo.licio.us, Chris Getz and Clayton Richards both made the Chicago White Sox roster for the season. While Brian says this should make all you Chicagoland fans White Sox fans, I will offer you Cubs fans a bone. Jake Fox is one of the first call ups for the Cubs if anyone in their outfield is injured. He won’t be starting like Getz will, but at least its something.  Also, there is some speculation that Getz’s starting is just temporary as the White Sox are preparing for a bigger prospect to take his place.  These two, and potential third, combine with J.J. Putz, ex-closer for the Mariners now with the Mets, and Rich Hill, pitcher with the Orioles, to be the four Wolverines on MLB rosters to start the season.

Hall of Fame

Going back to what was mentioned in the Michigan Insider Podcast, Michigan has two guys making the list of inductees this year. Branch Rickey was not just a great player at Michigan, but also was the general manager who brought Jackie Robinson to the major leagues to break the color barrier. His bio via the College Baseball Foundation:

Among the 2009 Hall of Fame class is one Vintage-Era inductee and the first “small school” inductee.

Branch Rickey, player and coach from Ohio Wesleyan and Michigan is the Vintage-Era inductee. The Vintage-Era designation is for those who played or coached prior to 1947.

Barry Larkin is probably the more notable inductee to most of you. Larkin was a long time staple at the Cincinnati Reds, but before that, he taking Michigan to the College World Series:

Michigan’s Barry Larkin was a two-time first-team All-American shortstop. He was the first two-time Big Ten Player of the Year and in 1983 he was the Big Ten Postseason Tournament MVP. He twice led the Wolverines to the College World Series and finished his career with a .361 batting average.

Iowa Game Time Changed

The opener to the Big10 season is Friday at Iowa. The game has been moved from 6pm to 4 pm CDT (7 to 5pm EDT). The weather looks to be windy and rainy.

Game 1

W – Chris Fetter (3-1) L – Walker (0-1) Sv – Burgoon (2)

For my initial reactions, visit my post from Saturday. The story of this game was pitching. Chris Fetter, despite the pretty stat line, had a fairly weak start for him. He admittedly claimed he was just missing his spots, but from the sounds of the radio crew, perhaps he was getting squeezed a little on the corners. Either way, as mentioned, his stat line was still really good. Fetter lasted 6 innings, giving up 2 runs (both earned), 7 hits, and 2 walks while striking out 5. I’d take that out of any pitcher any day of the week, it just happened that this was Fetter on an off day. He’s just that good.

Following Fetter was Tyler Burgoon for a rare 3-inning save opportunity. Burgoon only gave up 1 hit and three walks, but did allow three base runners with 2 outs in the 8th. After a brief talk with Coach Maloney, he struck out the last batter of the inning on 4 pitches. The rest was a cake walk for Tyler.

On offense, Mike Dufek was the champion in this game, and really, the whole weekend was a Mike Dufek hit-a-thon. In this game he got the scoring started with a big 2-out double off the wall to plate Cislo and LaMarre. Dufek would finish the game 2/4 with 2 RBIs.

Notable Stars

• Mike Dufek – 2/4 2 RBI, 2B
• Tyler Burgoon – 3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 3 Ks, Save
• Alan Oaks – 2/4 HR
• Kevin Cislo – 3/4 R, RBI
• Fan Attendance – 731 is a solid number for opening day in 40 degree temperatures. Paul tells me they got to sit right next to former baseball center fielder Rick Leach (yes, that Rick Leach).

Notable Goats

• Kenny Fellows – Despite getting a hit and walk, he stranded 4 base runners. More on stranding runners in the coming days.

Game 2

W – Eric Katzman (3-1) L – Herrold (1-1) Sv – Miller (2)

This game probably would have bored half of the casual fans to death. Outside of the 2 innings, this game was an exercise of either offensive futility, or as I like to call it, good pitching and defensive excellence. Again, check the Saturday Reaction post for my initial thoughts.

Michigan jumped out to a quick 3-0 lead in the first following a pair of singles by Cislo and Fellows and a Ryan LaMarre sacrifice fly. Two batters later Mike Dufek continued his hit parade with a bomb to right field. The hit even rattled a few people out of Dance Marathon as the homer hit the indoor track building where DM was taking place. Huzzah for uncounted attendance watching through the fence!

In the top of the second, Eric Katzman did his best sabotage effort. After giving up a lead off single, he then committed a throwing error on a pick off at first. The ball got away far enough from Dufek to allow the runner to second. Later on in the at-bat, Katzman balked the runner over to third. The explanation was hazy from the announcers as they didn’t see it either, but they believe he didn’t come to a full pause in the set position. He followed this up by giving up a sacrifice fly. If you ask me that’d be an earned run as it was all Katzman for letting him score, but baseball rules say its unearned.

The rest of the game Katzman was straight dealing. While he still was fairly inconsistent in hitting the strike zone, he managed to be just controlled enough to garner 10 Ks (!), a career high. Katzman was coming at the batters with many off speed pitches, including breaking balls and change ups. They were left just off balance by the several balls in the dirt that they were guessing most of the night.

Katzman was by no way economical with his pitches. Over his 6 innings, Katzman threw 100 pitches, only 61 of which were strikes. Ideally, he’d be hitting the century mark somewhere late in the 7th inning. Just for the sake of comparison, the IPFW pitcher threw all 8 innings and only threw 105 pitches. This trend of high pitch counts and early exits appear to be the normal thing for Katzman.

After Katzman left, Matt Miller entered the game for another 3-inning save opportunity – not so rare I guess. Miller picked up right where Katzman left off, striking out 5 in his 3 innings. He only allowed one hit and one walk in that time as well.

Offense for Michigan after the 2nd inning was horrendous. Not once from the third to eighth innings did Michigan ever get more than 3 batters up to the plate. Alan Oaks ended two innings with ground ball double plays. LaMarre got doubled up on a line drive back to the pitcher, which I can feel alright about as that’s just the luck of the draw. In another inning we got picked off at first. I can’t say we wasted opportunities, but we sure didn’t make the most of our base runners in this game.

Notable Stars

• Eric Katzman – 6 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 10 K, 2 BB, W
• Matt Miller – 3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 5 K, Save
• Mike Dufek – 1/2 2-run-HR, BB
• LOB – 0 runners left on base?

Notable Goats

• Eric Katzman in the 2nd inning – 1B, E1, Balk, SAC FLY
• Alan Oaks – 2 inning ending double plays

Game 3

W – Travis Smith (3-2) L – Baatz (0-1)

IPFW had every chance in the world to take this game, but Mike Wilson and Travis Smith became master escape artists every time the pressure was put on. They did just enough to get out of a couple of jams, and the offense finally started to roll by the 6th inning.

Mike Wilson continued the “wildly effective” pitching routine portrayed by Eric Katzman the day before. Despite throwing first pitch strikes to 13 of his first 18 batters, Wilson quickly fell behind batters and was forced into making hitters’ pitches. When it came to crunch time, Wilson locked down and made his pitches. He stranded 8 base runners on the afternoon in just 5 innings of play.

Wilson did give up one run in the third inning. After a lead off double and two quick outs, Wilson gave up back to back singles. I guess there just wasn’t enough pressure on him, so he tried to get runners on first and third so he could pitch better?

The run gave IPFW a short-lived 1-0 lead, their last lead of the game. Mike Dufek answered in the bottom half of the third with yet another home run, his second in as many games. The home run also extended his hitting streak to 10 games. According to the broadcasters, the ball landed in the Alumni Stadium, the softball field, well past the fence of the Ray Fisher Stadium. Wow.

Travis Smith came in with a 2-0 lead at this point and was throwing gas. His control wasn’t quite there, but he also managed to work himself out of jams. Smith stranded 4 base runners in 3 innings of work. He did allow one run to score in the 6th, leaving Wilson with a no decision. Kalczynski was crossed up on a pitch which lead to a passed ball. This moved a runner to second, who then would score on an ensuing single.

With the score tied at two in the 6th, Michigan came back to answer in the bottom of the inning. John Lorenz had the big hit with two outs, a home run to left field. This sparked the offense as Toth and Cislo (career high 15 game hit streak) both followed up with singles setting the stage for a Kenny Fellows double off the right field wall. Unfortunately Fellows thought he was a little faster than he was, getting caught trying to stretch it into a triple. Michigan was then up 5-2 and would never look back.

Michigan would add another in the 7th following a Dufek double and Alan Oaks single. Yet again, we had a batter runner thrown out trying to stretch for an extra base. Oaks wasn’t nearly fast enough to stretch it into a double. I appreciate the aggressiveness from Oaks, but just because he scored on a suicide squeeze in game one doesn’t mean he can barrel into second on a shallow hit to the outfield.

Michigan added two more in the 9th. After back-to-back singles by Kalczynski and Lorenz, Cislo went to sacrifice bunt. The pitcher fielded the bunt poorly then made a hurried attempt to second which skipped to the bag. Everyone was safe. Fellows followed that with a single to score two runs. LaMarre then hit a soft pop up between the center fielder and the second basemen. The ball popped out of the second basemen’s glove as the two players collided. Both players were alright and stayed in the game. Cislo scored from third on the play, but Fellows was forced out at second as it wasn’t clear if the ball was caught. He stayed close to first in case he had to tag. Tough out, but at least the two outfielders were okay.

Mike Dufek came in after this and closed out the game. Michigan won the game and it’s first home series of the year. Things were good and “Celebrate Good Times” was played.

Notable Stars

• Kenny Fellows – 2/5 4 RBI, 2B
• Alan Oaks – 3/4 RBI
• Mike Dufek – 2/4 2 R, 2 RBI, HR, 2B
• John Lorenz – 3/4 2 R, RBI, HR
• Kevin Cislo – 15 game hitting streak

Notable Goats

• Ryan LaMarre – Only starter without a hit, hitless all weekend

First Inning Shenanigans

For those of you who didn’t listen to the game, there was a bit of a commotion in the top of the first inning. With runners on first and third, Wilson threw a pitch toward the plate that was well low and inside. The pitch bounced in the front of the batter’s box and bounced off toward the IPFW dugout.

Kalczynski didn’t hustle right after the ball, which sent the runners going. The runner from third scored easily, and the runner from first came all the way around as none of the players on the field knew where the ball went to… or did they? Comes to find out the umpire didn’t see the ball hit off the batter.

The umpires conferenced after Coach Maloney and Timmy Kal made their case. They made the ruling that the batter was hit by the pitch. Both runs were taken off the board and the batter was given first base without even arguing. I know if I was hit but they gave me the choice of first base with the bases loaded and one out or 2 runs in and me still at bat, I’d be hollering in that umpire’s ear that there was no way I was touched by the pitch. IPFW didn’t even attempt to argue, which worked out really poorly for them. Wilson struck out the next two batters stranding the bases loaded. The crises was averted and Michigan didn’t have to worry about being down 2-0 right out of the shoot.

Lineup Shuffling

Coach Maloney has been shuffling the lineup frequently of late. With Alan Oaks now available after missing the first month with sickness and with Chris Berset still unavailable after I believe a broken thumb, there have been a couple attempts to balance out the lineup. Most of the activity has been centered around Jake McLouth at DH, Oaks in RF or at DH, Urban in RF or at 3B, and Lorenz at 3B.

Jake McLouth has been cooling off since my initial inquiry about him switching with Dufek in the lineup. I took another look at the stats before game 3 of the weekend to see how the two had been doing. I don’t think it’s worth going into deeply here, but long story short, Dufek has caught fire. His current 10 game hitting streak started the day the change took place. Coincidence? Yes, probably. Good for the team? Of course. So do I care that much? No. I don’t see the two switching in the near future, but if McLouth doesn’t keep producing, he may be run out of the DH spot.

Who would take it you ask? That would be Alan Oaks. Oaks returns after a bit of an illness to start the season. Last year, Oaks made several starts at third base doing pretty well. Alan offers some major power and appears to be getting hot right now. This weekend he hit for a .545 clip with 2 runs and an RBI. Not bad for hitting in the 6/7/8 holes.

The other alternative to Oaks in the DH is to place him in right field, where he is a slight drop in defensive prowess. Moving him here forces Urban either to the bench, such as in Game 3, or to play third base, such as in Game 2. Urban came to Michigan as a second basemen, so he does have infield experience. I’m not sure what to expect of him at third, but it probably couldn’t be too much worse than Lorenz has been there.

Lorenz hasn’t been too poor defensively at third base, but his .895 fielding percentage does leave a little bit to be desired. He’s been our best option there so far, and I don’t think he’s done too poorly at the hot corner. The first few weekends he wasn’t really tested too much and had a couple early season mental mistakes. He’s become pretty solid there over the last 2 weekends, flashing some great leather. His hitting has been his week point, despite his performance in Game 3. From what I can see (read: my opinion), Lorenz has great potential, he just will only show flashes of it this year, and not be very consistent at the plate. He’ll be really good in a year or two.

Final Thoughts on IPFW

IPFW is a good team that will knock off a few good teams this year. They just ran into a more talented team this weekend. They should compete with Centenary and Oral Roberts for the Summit League Championship this year. I at least hope so, as with their current RPI, sweeping them didn’t help us that much with our own RPI. We have moved from 134 as of Tuesday to only 117 on Sunday morning. EMU helped even less as they are currently about 20 spots lower in RPI than IPFW.

Speaking of EMU, it’s just one game left before we start the conference season. We finish the home-and-home with EMU on Wednesday at 3pm. Right now the weather says 51 degrees and a 40% chance of rain. We’ll see if the game isn’t bumped up earlier in the week or if they try to play it then.

Slight note, for the full box score, click the yellow ‘Box Score’ in the score charts.  I’m experimenting still with ways to save space and get more information out. Anyways, on to the recap.

Game 1

W – Guilmet (2-1)   L – Chris Fetter (2-1)   Sv – Stoffel (4)

The story of game was runners left on base. Eric Sorenson, formerly of CSTV – back when, you know, they covered college baseball – now of collegebaseballtoday.com, sums it up like this:

You can look at this one of two ways, if you’re a Michigan fan it’s a case of blown opportunities and near-misses. If you’re an Arizona fan it’s a case of bearing down and coming up clutch when it mattered.

Either way, the fact remains that Arizona enticed Michigan into stranding 11 base runners on the night, eight of which were in scoring position. This frustration led to the UofA picking up a much-needed 2-0 win on Friday night in temperate Tucson.

Frustration indeed. Michigan stranded 5 runners at third, 3 at second, and three at first. The Wolverines also grounded into 2 inning ending double plays, both by Dufek. Those might have hurt the worst as it stranded one in the 1st and 2 in the 7th. The rally killer in the 7th was the end of the day for Michigan bats, which were actually fairly productive for not scoring a run.

Michigan spread out 9 hits and 4 walks on the night, and lead off several innings with hits. The runners just couldn’t be moved around. Outside of those double plays, the other major culprit was strikeouts. Michigan struck out a dozen times, earning everyone in the stadium a free Slurpee (actually they earned the free Slurpee after the ninth strikeout of the day in the 8th). Speaking of that particular strikeout, it was Alan Oaks’ fourth of the day, making him the second recipient of the golden sombrero this year for the Wolverines. Ugly.

Kevin Cislo and Anthony Toth both had multi-hit games, but after that, there wasn’t much else to talk about. Cislo went 3/5 with a double and Toth went 2/4 with a double. Both did, however, get caught stealing. I can’t blame Cislo too much for his, as it was a hit and run with him on second and Fellows on first. Ryan LaMarre struck out swinging at a pitch above his hands, leaving Cislo out to dry. Even Toth’s was tough luck as Arizona pitched out on the play. Our rock, their scissors.

The outfield wall did come into play a few times both on offense and defense. Fellows knocked a ball to the wall that lead to his first career triple. LaMarre ripped a high hard one to deep left, but between the wind and the fence, it just couldn’t make it past the warning track. I had the booth confirm that the hit would have been way out at the Fish. Tough luck for Ryan.

On defense, we had a mess of fly balls giving the outfielders trouble. Balls were consistently flying over their heads and off the wall. Kenny Fellows made a pair of “web gems,” one going back into the wall and the other sliding in foul territory. Kevin Cislo also had a great diving stab going toward first. He was at full extension on the backhanded grab of a sharp liner off the bat of Valenzuela. Good defense all around for the Wolverines in this game.

Chris Fetter didn’t have his best day on the mound, but you wouldn’t be able to tell that by his final line. Chris went 7 1/3 inning, giving up 8 hits and 2 runs, only one of which was earned. He worked into a jam here and there, but managed to get himself out of nearly every sticky situation. The run in the third came from a single, sacrifice bunt, and single, while the unearned run in the 5th came from a lead off single and a passed ball right through Kalczynski’s legs. The runner probably would have scored later in the inning as two batters later, a double went off the wall.

Let us never get shut out again?

Notable Stars

• Kevin Cislo – 3/5 2b
• Chris Fetter – 7.1 IP, 2 R, 1 ER, 2 K, 0 BB, 1 HBP
• Matt Miller – 0.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R

Notable Goats

• Alan Oaks – 0/4 4 Ks
• The 8 hole – Combined 0/4 with 4 Ks, stranding 5 base runners. To be fair I guess I should mention Aspinwall never batted despite being in the lineup in the 8 hole. Lorenz, McLouth, and Crank are the guilty party.
• Jake McLouth – Not really a goat, but he tweaked his ankle and only pinch hit in this game. We could had used his bat otherwise.

Game 2

W -Simon (2-1) L – Matt Gerbe (0-1) Sv – Stoffel (5)

This game saw Michigan finally push runs across the board, but their big inning was immediately eclipsed by that of Arizona. Eric Katzman started shaky and it only got worse to start the third inning. He hit 3 batters and walked four while not giving up a hit and striking out four. He walked the bases loaded in the 3rd and was pulled for Matt Gerbe.

Gerbe walked in the first run, then gave up a pair of singles, allowing all of Katzman’s runners to score. He left after only getting two outs, he was pulled for Tyler Burgoon. Burgoon also inherited the bases loaded. He gave up a double to the first batter he faced, scoring all three of Gerbe’s base runners. Michigan would never retake the lead.

Burgoon gave up another run in the 6th from back to back hits to lead off the inning. He gave up another 2 on a Dillion Baird 2-run-homer. Mike Wilson came in to stop the bleeding in the 8th and pitched 2 innings of shut out ball.

On offense, Michigan had a pretty good game, it just wasn’t enough to recover from the 6 run third inning. The Wolverines out hit the Wildcats 13 to 10, but pushing runs across the board was the problem. Michigan stranded 9 in this game, including 4 at third base and one at second (it was second and third and 1 out). Finishing innings just wasn’t happening.

In the third, Urban tripled to knock in runs 2 and 3, but he was followed by back-to-back strikeouts and a ground out. In the 7th, after Timmy Kalczynski sacrificed himself to move the runners to second and third and one out, Oaks struck out in a pinch hit opportunity and Toth grounded out. It was just tough luck there.

The middle of the order had a great game. McLouth returned from the tweaked ankle to go 3 for 5 with 3 RBIs and 2 runs. Mike Dufek did well going 3 for 4 with two doubles, a run and an RBI. LaMarre and Cislo both kept their hit streaks alive, currently at 10 games. LaMarre went 2 for 4 with 2 runs, while Cislo went 1 for 3 with 2 walks and a run.

This was a solid loss. The strikeout numbers, while high, weren’t as bad this time around. Stoffel is nasty and I find it amazing he hasn’t flown to the professional ranks yet. They guy throws in the mid 90s with accuracy. His breaking pitches had Michigan looking like deer in headlights. He struck out all 5 batters he faced this game. The guy is just good.

Notable Stars

• Jake McLouth – 3/5 3 RBI, 2 R, K
• Mike Dufek – 3/4 2 2B, 1 R, 1 RBI
• Ryan LaMarre – 2/4 2B, 2 R
• Mike Wilson – 2IP, 1 H, 1 BB

Notable Goats

• Eric Katzman – 2+IP, 3 ER, 4 BBs, 3 HBP, 0 H,
• Matt Gerbe – .2 IP, 3 ER

Game 3

W – Bandilla (2-1)   L – Travis Smith (2-2)

Game 3 of the series wasn’t even close. Michigan was shut out… again. This time the culprit wasn’t strikeouts, but rather double plays. Michigan stranded 9 in this game, but grounded into a crippling 3 double plays. While the first two games of the series might have come off as solid losses, this one was just a flat out pantsing.

We’ll start with pitching. It was bad. Moving on… okay, fine, unlike BigTenHardball, I guess I have to address it… pitching. Travis Smith has kept his pattern of good start bad start alive. A week after throwing 6 innings with 8 Ks and 2 earned runs, Smith collapsed early, giving up 9 hits and 7 runs (all earned) in just 2 1/3 innings of work. After Smith gave up a home run to clear the bases with one out in the third, Wood came in to stop the bleeding, but gave up a walk and an RBI double. It was 7-0 after three, and the game was pretty much over.

Matt Miller pitched a pair of scoreless innings in the 5th and 6th, by far the bright spot on the mound for Michigan. Vangheluwe and Dufek closed out the game with an inning a piece. Vangheluwe gave up 4 hits and 3 runs while Dufek gave up 3 hits and 2 runs.

Arizona was just on fire this game. They were consistently hitting the ball deep to the outfield. Our outfield recorded 11 put outs, several balls made it past our right fielders. Urban and Oaks are definitely in the game for their offensive prowess and not their speed or jumps on fly balls. A couple balls landed just outside of their reach, some bouncing all the way out to the fence.

Fellows on the other hand continued his great defensive performance this weekend. In a weekend with such poor results, it would be easy to miss his glove, but it definitely saved a few runs in each game this series. He had another catch at full extension to save a double and a run in this one.

At the plate, Michigan had trouble even getting on base. Arizona starter Bandilla combined with relievers Doyle and Roach to shut down the Wolverine bats, allowing 6 hits with 3 walks. Bandilla also hit two batters, but it didn’t end up affecting the score.

The closest Michigan came to scoring was in the first inning. Cilso lead off with a double, and Fellows followed that up with a single up the middle just past the shortstop. Cislo had to hesitate to make sure the ball made it past the infielder, and that was just enough to allow the Arizona center fielder to gun him at the plate.

Unlike previous games where strikeouts were the problem, grounding into double plays were the culprit here. With one out in the third and runners at first and second, LaMarre ended the inning on a 4-6-3 double play. With a runner on first and one out in the 5th, Urban ended the inning with a 4-6-3 of his own. Toth ended the 5th with a 6u-3 double play. So that was the 3rd, 4th, and 5th innings all ending in double plays.

The double play in the fifth inning was the final dagger in Michigan’s coffin. The only hit after this would come in the 7th on a Mike Dufek lead off single. By the 8th, Kittle and Stephens had both entered the game for “garbage” time.

Positives from the game? For the beat down we received it only lasted 2 hours 47 minutes. We didn’t have to face Stoffel again. We don’t have to worry about Arizona for the rest of the year.

Notable Stars

• Matt Miller – 2 IP, 0 R, 1 H
• Kenny Fellows’ Defense – Along with his 5 put outs, he had at least one catch that saved a run, and several more that prevented extra bases.
• Only 5 team strikeouts?

Notable Goats

• Travis Smith’s consistent inconsistency – Despite the record, he’s had good start/bad start/good start/bad start this season, this one is 2 1/3 IP, 9 H, 7 Rs, 2 Ks
• Relief pitching outside of Miller – 3 2/3 IP, 10 H, 7 R
• Ryan LaMarre – Hitting streak ends at 10 (this really isn’t a goat, everyone has nights like this)

Series Thoughts

Stoffel is a Beast

Collegebaseballtoday.com released his thoughts on the game two. It includes the following two descriptions of Stoffel:

I was going to write a clever opening to tonight’s entry here, but Jason Stoffel leered down at me from his pitching mound, gave me a cross look and nearly scared the bejesus out of me. So I’ll just drop that.

See, I just got done watching Arizona pull the rug out from under Michigan for the second night in a row, mostly on the strength of a reliever who is a wicked flamethrower that comes in breathing fire like an angry Gene Simmons.

and….

Five batters. Five strikeouts. Five saves. I’ve got five words for you: Stay away from Jason Stoffel.

The kid is ridiculous. Thank goodness we won’t have to face him for the rest of the regular season.  He will probably be the best reliever we face all season.

Where This Leaves Michigan

As for what Arizona means to the season, it doesn’t mean too much. I think we have a hard time making the NCAA tournament without some major muscle flexing in the Big10 conference season or winning the tournament. We’ll have a chance to make up some of our RPI during the conference season, something that generally isn’t true. Ohio State and Illinois are both in the top 50 in RPI right now, but even theirs will drop as they face the Northwesterns and Iowas of the Big10.

I think it is important to remind all of you, as it even escapes me sometimes that Michigan is built to win the Big10, not compete with the top programs in other conferences. JJ in the comments was nice enough to remind me of this the other day. We’re a mid major. We win our conference tournament and try to surprise people when it comes NCAA time. We’re not out there dominating the Rice’s and the Texas’s in the regular season. We earn our bid and move along.

Stat Tracking

I posted some general thoughts on strikeouts over the weekend.  I’m working on refining those statistics for better comparisons.  I also am looking into runners left on base and ability to move runners over with less than 2 outs.  Those updates may or may not make it up this week as I’m ordering a new stat tracking  software package against my better judgment (why am I spending $20 on this?  because I’m too lazy to figure things out on my own…) to help me stay on top of things, and make it easier to present to you.

Heading to the Home Opener

For those of you who didn’t click the link in Game 3, it takes you to a scoreboard update by BigTenHardball. In it, there was one other score that really caught my eye. IPFW 1, Purdue 0. We play IPFW in our home opener on Friday. I definitely didn’t think I’d be worrying about losing to the Mastadons, but now I’m second guessing our chance at a home sweep this weekend.

Over the last couple weeks, something that has really stood out to me as I watch the Michigan baseball team has been the rate at which we strike out. Strike outs are obviously the worst form of put out out side of the double play (or triple play, although much less common). Strike outs do not test the defense. They, statistically speaking, are subject to much less chance of error for the defense. Unless the batter swing at a pitch in the dirt with no runner on first, the batter is out. Even if the ball is in the dirt, there is still slim chance that the runner beats out a throw to first.

For the season, we have played 13 games, and we have struck out 116 times. That works to an average of 8.9 Ks/game. For the sake of continuing with tempo free statistics to balance out games in which we are home and don’t bat in the 8th inning and games in which we have gone into extra innings, we have hit a total of 114 innings, placing our strike out rate at 9.16 Ks/9-innings, or just 1.018 Ks/inning. That rate is obscenely high, and has killed several run scoring opportunities.

You can click on that graph to see it a little bit larger. You can pretty much ignore Safara, Bircher, and Arbor as they have one plate appearance or less this season. Really, outside of the normal starters, you should still probably reserve judgment, as Oaks, Aspinwall, Kittle, and Stephens all have far fewer plate appearances than the regulars. Crank is teetering on meaningful.

Looking at just the starters, 3 players stand out from the bulk, that is Lorenz, Fellows, and Cislo. Lorenz is currently striking out at least once in every three plate appearances, ~1 K in 2.67 PA. On the other side of the graph is Fellows and Cislo. Fellows is doing fairly well, striking out at a rate of .13 per plate appearance, or one in every 7.57 plate appearances. Cislo is by far the best on the team, striking out at a rate of .04, or once in every 16 at bats.

The rest of the team falls between .20 (McLouth) and .25 (Toth), meaning they strike out at about once per 4 (Toth) or 5 (McLouth) plate appearances. This generally means at least one strikeout per game per batter. Not good.

It gets worse when you look at it in terms of how that effects run scoring opportunities. By having the strike outs spread throughout the whole team, there is no way to really adjust the lineup to get the hitters together. Coach Maloney has already changed the order to adjust for the Fellows and Toth strike out rates, as well as Dufek and McLouth. There isn’t really anything he can do from a game management standpoint. It is up to the hitters to go out and do their thing.

Update

Commenter Other Chris pointed out that it may or may not be good to compare last year’s numbers to this year’s, at least for the players who had considerable plate appearances last season.  I went back to look and came up with the following.

While we are only a little ways into the season, some of these numbers are quite different from last year to this.  While LaMarre’s numbers don’t appear to be a big change, he’s averaging at least one more strike out per week.  LaMarre is almost always up to bat with runners on base, so those outs do affect whether or not we put up runs.  Dufek’s is even more drastic, averaging another strike out every other game, but that’s also why he’s dropped in the batting order.

I’ll be keeping an eye on these as the weekend and the conference schedule go along.  The pitching seems to be a strength with some of the other contenders, especically Penn State and Macy.  Go Blue.

I was checking out the CSTV Game Tracker for the live stats and probable starter for Arizona about 30 minutes before pregame today and noticed something pretty interesting about the Wildcats. So far this season they have averaged 0.7 triples a game. After some quick math, I find that is 11 triples in 15 games, which seems really high.

I went to do some investigating, and the first stop was a google search for their home stadium. Jerry Kindall Field has a very descriptive wikipedia page. I can tell you that the groundskeepers “overseeds the field in November with a Perennial Rye, Arnold Palmer II, to prepare it for the season.” Interesting.

Looking at the dimensions, part of the reason may be the length of the foul poles. It’s a paltry 360 feet down each line, about 30-35 feet longer than most parks. This long line, particularly down the right field line can lead to more opportunities. Left handed hitters, such as their Bobby Croyle who has three triples on the season, can pull pitches down the line and send them to the far corner for extra bases.

Looking at the stats provided by ArizonaWildcats.com, the GameTracker was slightly off, as the Wildcats only have 10 triples on the season, which is still impressive. Hunter Pace and Matt Presley also have a pair of triples each, but ArizonaWildcats.com doesn’t provide their handedness. I’d bet at least one of them is a lefty.

Bryce Ortega has one as well, but I can see through GameTracker that he is indeed right handed. With his high batting average, I’m going to guess he’s one of those that sprays the ball around the field, including the soft shots down the right field line. Its the sign of a good hitter when you can take the outside pitch where it wants to go.

Childs and Valenzuela each have a triple, but like Pace and Pressley, I’ve got no clue if they bat from the port side or not.

It’ll be interesting to see if Cislo, Fellows, and Dufek can garner a few triples this weekend – well at least Cislo and Fellows. I don’t see Mike Dufek stretching too many doubles to triples, but then again, he’s not that slow either. I don’t expect homerun numbers to go down that much either. The gaps and dead center are the same as most other parks we’ve played in to date. There just may be one or two to straight away right or left that would normally clear but don’t.

Hitting

The hitting stats are becoming more refined as batters are starting to accumulate at-bats. Our current at-bat leader (40 ABs) is Jake McLouth, who newly moved into the clean up position, has still yet to draw a walk this season. Cislo and Fellows pull up the rear with 31 ABs. I left Berset and Lorenz out of those numbers as they are replaced fairly consistently and have about 2/3 less the number of plate appearances as Cislo and Fellows.

The batting average didn’t quite make the jump you’d expect after winning a game 21-3 with 19 hits. Last week we ended with a .288 batting average; this week we end with a .291 average. Not much improvement right there.

Week 2

As you can see, on-base-percentage also didn’t make a jump either. We actually lost .003 points down to .406 this week. This kind of comes off a little bit weird. I would have thought the Jacksonville 19-hit affair would have raised the percentage, but as they say, one game doesn’t make the season.

The rest of our games have been pretty abysmal in terms of hitting, and it shows in the following graph. What we have here is average hits (H/9), runs (R/9), walks (plus hit by pitch, BB/9), and strike outs (K/9) per 9 innings of hitting.

It’s encouraging to see our runs per nine innings going so high. It would be pretty high even if you took our 21 run game and made it 8, our current average, it would still have us scoring about 6.67 runs per game. That’s should be enough to compete well in any league… at least if our pitching keeps up their side of the deal.

I’d also like to point out the strike out’s per nine innings. That number has continued to grow as we’ve gone along, which is a definite problem. We’re currently averaging over a strike out per inning (9.11/9-innings). It’s killing several of our innings.

Lineup Changes

As mentioned in the weekend recap, we had a few lineup changes this weekend. Let’s take a little bit at a look why, just so you out there get a better idea of what’s going on. First, let’s look at McLouth vs Dufek.

Note: McLouth's BA is the same as his OB%

On the left, we can see McLouth is hitting leaps and bounds above Dufek. Dufek is .182 points behind in average alone. In the slugging category, McLouth is averaging .279 more bases per at bat. In more basic terms, McLouth averages an extra single every 4 at bats he takes. That’s a very sizable gap.

This move places a better hitter behind our best player, Ryan LaMarre. By doing this, pitchers cannot pitch around and walk LaMarre without fear of giving up more runs. With Dufek struggling behind LaMarre, we may lose a few runs each game that his struggles continue.

The second move by Coach Maloney was to switch Anthony Toth and Kenny Fellows. Toth mainly batting in the 2-hole, as we can see in the graph below, was getting on consistently, but he was not able to put the ball in play and move the runners on base around or gather many RBIs.

Fellows vs Toth Stats through Week 2

Looking at the two players’ production, the on base numbers are currently very consistent, and both are rather good. The difference is the hitting, which Fellows has done better and more consistently better. Fellows is currently hitting .387, as compared to .250 for Toth.

By switching the two batters, Maloney is hoping that Toth will still continue his pace with walks, setting the table for the top of the order. The hope for Fellows is that he continues to hit and get on base, driving in more runs, moving the runners a head of him into scoring position, and still get on base to score for the heart of the order behind him.

The ideal inning would start with a Toth walk, a Cislo single on a hit and run putting runners at first and third, a Cislo steal right before a Fellows RBI single. LaMarre either walks or hits a double, followed by a McLouth double, and then either struggle through Dufek and Berset to try to eek out a last run before Lorenz comes up, as he’s statistically an out. That kind of inning is 5-7 runs, which are the kind of innings that win college baseball games.

Leader Board – Offense

Pitching

And here’s where things get fun. Instead of showing trends, which don’t help much over 2 appearances or less than 15 innings, I think I’m going to look through some of the team statistics. This process may be adjusted to individual pitchers by the time the conference season rolls around.

Opponent Hitting

Here we see the opponent batting average, on base percentage, and slugging percentage. The opponent batting average is currently .306, the on base percentage is .343, and the slugging percentage is .442 for the season. The on base numbers aren’t too bad, which surprises the heck out of me. Its amazing how such a bad weekend can make you forget how great a weekend the BigEast/Big10 Challenge really was on the mound. Opponents are out hitting us and out slugging us this season, which is never a good sign. We should be looking to get that opponent average down into the .290s or less. On base percentages need to drop to the .310s at the highest, and slugging… well it has a lot of room for improvement.

In this chart we have the “per 9 innings” stats of our opponents accumulated through the season. This just breaks down the previous chart into reasons why we are getting out hit. Opponents average an extra .5 hits per game, which isn’t much, but we average about 1.5 more walks per game. We also strike out about one more time per game than our opponents. I would put ideal numbers to be at to be H/9 ~ 8, K/9 ~ 9, BB/9 ~ 2, and ERA around 4.00. Right now the ERA is pretty close to what we would want in a season, but we should never just settle. We should always strive to improve the numbers.

Leader Board – Pitching

*This is the only stat Sinnery can claim he’s doing well in right now.

Next week I’ll look at some of these same stats and hopefully have some better news on the pitching front.  I plan on working into some more advance statistics as the season moves along, I’ve just been bogged down with other things.

The game started out pretty ugly.  Fetter was roughed up early, giving up 3 runs in the first two innings.  Baserunning was another area we looked pretty bad in.  We were picked off twice by USF starter Randy Fontanez, and we should have been picked off in the 8th, but two bad throws lead to the game tying run coming across the plate.

Things worked out well though.  The bullpen looked good, only giving up 2 runs in 4 innings.  Jake McLouth (brother of major leaguer Nate McLouth) knocked his first career home run in his first career at bat.  The corner outfielders (Urban and Fellows) went 5/6 at the plate with several RBIs, even Lamarre in center added a key RBI single.

All in all, we looked damn good.  I’ll recap the whole weekend on Monday, and take a look at some of the stats a little more in depth.  Now we wait until tomorrow when we face Purdue at 11am.

The Varsity Blue crew kind of threw me off by posting the USF preview so early, so I’m going to continue that pattern with this preview. I’ll have the Cincy post tomorrow with a general post on the Challenge and what it means to Michigan baseball, as well as college baseball in general. This being a conference opponent, there is a little bit more detail in this than normal. It will hopefully get a little more specific once we get to the actual conference season, when games really start to count.   Wordpress is also giving me formatting issues, so bear with for the time being.   –FA

Image from purdue.edu

Purdue*

*not a conference game
February 21, 2009 11:00am
Naimoli Complex
Clearwater, Fla.
Media:  Audio and  Stats

Home Team: TBA
Probable Pitchers: TBA vs Kolby Wood (RHP, 0-0)
M Record vs Opponent: 129-52
Last Series/Game: Michigan won 2 in the Big10 Tournament, last regular season match up was the 2007 series Michigan won 3 games to 1.

Overview

As stated above, this game, despite being against a conference opponent, is not a true conference game. Due to Louisville choosing to play Florida is a better venue than the Challenge, each Big10 team is playing one game against a conference opponent. The way the Big10 schedule works out, Big10 team misses out on one conference opponent per season, much like football does with the two opponents rotating off the schedule every two years. So, for a second year in a row, Michigan does not face Purdue during the regular season. To make up for the differing number of teams from each conference, the Big10 teams opted to face the conference opponent they would not be facing during conference season.

Purdue is coming off a very successful 2008 in which they finished 2nd in the Big10 regular season and was the last competitor to lose in the Big10 Championship. This year they are expected to rival, or even usurp Michigan as the winner of the Big10. Purdue may have lost stars Ryne White and Josh Lindblom, but they return nearly every other player on the team. They are by far the most experienced, and perhaps the best team on paper. That being said, as far as winning the Big10 is concerned, Baseball America puts it this way: “The Boilermakers last won a Big Ten title about the same time the Cubs won a World Series, in 1909.”

Michigan holds a fairly sizable lead in the historical series, as seen above. When we shorten the spectrum to the last 10 games, Michigan leads 8-2 spanning back to 2006. The two losses came closing out the 2006 series and opening the 2007 series (one at school’s home field).

Full preview after the jump…

Stars

Image from Purdue Sports

The second most hyped offensive player this year in the Big10 appears to be junior, switch-hitting, third basemen (and backup catcher) Dan Black. Black had a break out season last year knocking 18 home runs (2nd in Big10) and 70 RBIs (2nd in Big10) while batting .320 overall. Black also had 15 doubles to add to his 131 total bases (3rd in the Big10). On defense, Black is a meh third baseman. He committed 13 errors last year for a .936 fielding percentage. That’s not great, but his bat created far more runs than his fielding gave up. Look for Black to be hitting three hole.

In the outfield, Purdue returns top hitter Brandon Haveman. Haveman had a batting average of .379 last year as the leadoff man. Haveman isn’t you’re prototypical leadoff man who is a singles machine. Haveman also had his fair share of extra-base hits with 16 doubles, 5 triples, and 2 home runs. He is also a threat on the bases, taking 12 of 18 attempts last season. On defense, he is pretty solid in the outfield. He is shifting from right to left field this year, but I doubt that change has much impact on his play. Haveman didn’t have the arm of a right fielder, so this should help by opening up right field for a new player.

Completing the top of the lineup in the two hole is senior second basemen Ben Wolgomat. Wolgomat started last year as the backup second basemen then exploded when given the opportunity to bat second behind Haveman. Wolgomat ended the year batting .368 with 44 runs in 45 starts.

Other Starters

Image from Purdue Sports

Jon Moore is the returning center fielder for the Boilermakers. The senior will be making his third season a full time starter. As a junior last year he saw his average go up from .275 the year before to .321, providing much more protection for the heart of the order ahead of him. Moore came alive in the Big10 Tourney last year batting .462. His defense is also pretty solid, having 5 outfield assists and only 3 errors.

Junior shortstop Nick Overmyer also returns to the field this year for Purdue. Overmyer wasn’t all too impressive last year, hitting only .280 at or near the bottom of the order consistently. This year he is expected to have some stiff competition coming from freshman Barrett Serrato ($, Baseball America).

The starting catcher for the third season in a row is Eric Nielsen. Nielsen is one of the more Academic All Big10 players but holds his own behind the plate. His .288 batting average isn’t too exciting. His 40 strikeouts on the season last year is a big reason why. Unless we draw a lefty for this game, I imagine we’ll test his arm early and often. Nielsen only caught 12 of 52 stolen base attempts last year.

Alex Jaffee appears to be slated for right field this season after fully recovering from foot surgery last off season. Jaffee missed most of the 2008 season in rehab, but did manage 17 starts late in the season. He and Jonathon Lilly may be competing for that slot as well as the DH position. Neither has had huge success at the plate, but both have seen their fair share of game experience (over 115 games each).

Pitchers

Unfortunately, Purdue hasn’t announced probable starters yet, so we’re going to breeze through a few of them with limited stats.

Matt Bischoff is a beast. As a freshman in 2007 he earned Big10 Freshman of the Year honors. As a sophomore last year, he was First Team All Big10. The kid has great talent. He will start this year as Purdue’s ace. I doubt we see him as he will most likely start in their first game against Cincinnati, so we’ll skip over the important stuff. Just know we will see this guy in the Big10 Tourney in 4 months.

Image from Purdue Sports

Behind Bischoff is a trio of left handers in Cook, Jansen, and Sestak. If I had my guess on who starts against us, it’d be Matt Jansen. Jansen was 4-3 last year with a 5.44 ERA in 16 appearances (9 starts). He generally occupied the Saturday opener last year. He’s had success against Michigan, all two innings he’s pitched. Last year he ended the year with a .309 opponent batting average and a 24:23 walk to strike out ratio in 51 innings. Jansen has however shown some flashes of brilliance, including his 8-0 shutout win over OSU last April.

My second choice of starter would be Kyle Cook. Cook had slightly better success in 2008 going 5-3 with a 4.65 ERA in 13 appearances (8 starts). His walk numbers were a little lower than Jansen’s, but still weren’t great.

Neither of these two pitchers went that deep into ball games. Jansen could routinely make it into the 5th inning. Cook tended between 3.5 and 6 innings per start with no consistency. As Saturday starters, that’s not a horrible thing, but with the end of Saturday double headers and this being a nine inning game, watch to see how much stamina the starter might have, especially this early in the season.

Relief

Purdue lost their top reliever/closer Josh Lindblom this past off season, so it is one of the few question marks on their roster. The leading candidate to close is junior Kevin Cahill. Cahill is a hard thrower, but he hadn’t quite grasped location as of last season. In his 14 appearances, mainly as the set up man, he posted a 4.25 ERA over 27.1 innings pitched. He did have 22 strike outs over the year and a .229 opponent batting average.

Reports out of Purdue expect Drew Wurdack to step in as the set up man. Wurdack pitched only 20.1 innings over 12 relief appearances last year. The numbers weren’t pretty either, including a 5.25 ERA.

Charts

Once we get to conference season, I’ll be breaking down batters vs. individual pitchers, but since this doesn’t quite carry the same importance, we’ll stick with just batters vs team pitching. At this point, Michigan has only seen 9.1 innings of returning Purdue pitchers anyways due to the Boilermakers not being on our schedule during the past season.

What’s notable here is Cislo’s .476 batting average against Purdue pitching. LaMarre’s .333 average isn’t including that many at-bats, but he does have a home run. Berset struggled in the Big10 tournament last year. This was part of the reason Recknagel took over some of the catching duties in the NCAA tournament. The other four batters all made a defensive substitution in a Saturday game during the 2006 season. None of these guys were regulars then, and both teams let their scrubs play since Michigan had such a commanding lead.

This table goes to show the depth of experienced upperclassmen Purdue has returning this year. They have nearly three times as many at bats against us as we do against them. Something else this chart says is how good of pitching we’ve had the last few years against Purdue. Purdue has averaged a strike out nearly once in every 4 at bats. That is a great number for Michigan and a testament to Zack Putnam, Chris Fetter, and Adam Abraham (whom have logged the most innings against these Purdue batters). It’ll be interesting how our pitchers go after the middle of their line up. Outside of Arizona and the Mets, this may be the best line up we face in the nonconference.

This chart gives us a more of what we already know. Michigan has been good against the Boilermakers. Chris Fetter has flat out owned them. He has an 1.50 ERA in three starts. Combined, the returners sport a nice 2.80 ERA and 6.62 Ks/9 innings.

The Purdue pitching staff hasn’t seen much of Michigan due to the year without playing. I wouldn’t put too much stock in those ERAs outside of Cook. The others were short relief appearances.

Semi-Relevant Links

Purdue Weekly Release (pdf)