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"Lemonade requires a significant amount of sugar. Otherwise, you've just made lemon juice."
Tennessee followed that up with a 10-3 win Saturday and then won a 4-3 nail-biter Sunday to sweep the series. The Vols never trailed. I don't get why they're only ranked #5. I expect that to jump tomorrowOriginally Posted by Sea Ray
Kingspoint (03-28-2022)
Very strange that Oregon State is the only team from the PAC-12 in the Top-25. Annually there are about 5 teams with 2 or 3 in the Top-10 and 1 or 2 reaching the College World Series. Might be tough this year just to get entries into the NCAA tournament. Oregon State looks like it's on it's way to hosting a Regional, and Super-Regional.
SeaRay, ever been to a regional or Super-regional? Tennessee will be hosting both this season, and tickets will be hard to come by.
"One problem with people who have no vices is that they're pretty sure to have some annoying virtues."
Never have. Sounds like fun. Waiting on the coach's poll (USA Today) to come out. If UT is atop their poll then it'll be a unanimous #1 for the Vols. They've now been #1 in the polls in baseball, football, basketball and women's basketball since 1998 at one point. No other school can say that. Florida was #1 in everything except women's BB so there's that.
The Vols baseball team looks super human right now. Great hitting. Great pitching. Fielding is their bug a boo
You can't win an NCAA World Series without pitching depth, unlike MLB, where only 3 are needed. You need 4 in the NCAA's and closers, and clutch hitters.
Are the Vols pulling out any come-from-behind wins? That experience will benefit them if they can get it. Could also be that U of M isn't that good (right now), has Starting Pitching injuries and/or hasn't played anybody good until they faced the Vols. No doubt TEN is way ahead of everyone at the moment, unusual, because Northern teams, and TEN is definitely one of those like Oregon State, have a much colder and wetter Winter and Spring and have a hard time getting games and practices in at outdoor stadiums, so they tend to start their season out slower and with less experience. It makes it even more remarkable what TEN is doing at this point of the year (and what Oregon State does every season, especially since they are a tiny school with very low funding). These two schools will improve at a greater rate than the schools from the warmer climates. I'd love to go to Omaha.
"One problem with people who have no vices is that they're pretty sure to have some annoying virtues."
Here's the best poll, baseballamerica....
Ten is #1, Oregon State is #2.
https://www.baseballamerica.com/rank...seball-top-25/
Oregon jumped into the Top-25 at #20 as it won a series against USC and a single game against the ranked Gonzaga Bulldogs.
Before the year is out, there may be a couple more Pac-12 teams in the top-25. (Guess I missed Stanford was #18, falling to #24 this week)
BA's comments on TEN:
"Tennessee made as loud a statement as any team over the weekend in sweeping a series at Ole Miss. In the opener, a six-run second inning that featured a two-run homer for leadoff man and left fielder Jared Dickey got the Volunteers off and running, and it turned out to be more than enough support for righthander Chase Burns, who gave up one run on two hits with 11 strikeouts in seven innings. In game 2, righthander Chase Dollander was excellent in throwing 6.1 shutout innings with 10 strikeouts, and center fielder Drew Gilbert and third baseman Trey Lipscomb both had three-hit days to lead the offense. Sunday’s game was a tight one, as Ole Miss got a three-run homer in the eighth to make it a 4-3 game, but lefthander Redmond Walsh threw 1.1 scoreless frames to make sure that’s as close as the Rebels would get. DH Seth Stephenson and right fielder Jordan Beck led the way offensively with three-hit games, and righthander Drew Beam was impressive, allowing one run on three hits in 7.1 innings. A series at Vanderbilt will be another SEC blockbuster series for the Volunteers."
BA's comments on the Beavers:
"Oregon State had to work for it, but it got a series win at California, and it was nearly a sweep, as the Saturday loss featured OSU scoring six runs in the top of the ninth to tie the game 7-7 (there's that come-from-behind type of game I mentioned, where it happens late, though Oregon State didn't quite finish it off...they are working on that, as their losses this year have come in the 3rd games of series...depth and closing out are something that improves as the season moves along,....again, Oregon State has the weather here as a negative factor for slow starts), only to have Cal walk off with a win in the bottom of the ninth. One constant throughout the weekend was the Beavers’ relentless offensive attack. On Friday, the lineup had 14 hits, with all nine starters collecting at least one hit and five players putting up two hits. Center fielder Jacob Melton and third baseman Matthew Gretler added home runs. On Sunday, OSU had 15 hits, including three-hit games for right fielder Justin Boyd, second baseman Travis Bazzana and shortstop Kyle Dernedde. The Bears made a late push in that game, getting to within 9-8 heading to the ninth inning, but catcher Tanner Smith broke it open again with a grand slam. A home series with Stanford this weekend will be a good challenge for an Oregon State team playing very well right now."
Oregon will improve a ton when they get two of their Starting Pitchers back, who have missed the last three weeks. Oregon, unlike Oregon State, has Phil Knight's money and others' money to give them an edge (like the SEC schools, though I imagine TEN hasn't traditionally spent it on baseball, but that's easily noticed if you look at the salary of their Coaches, how many assistants they have, their indoor facilities and their stadium, and number of scholarships).
BA's comments on the Ducks:
Despite being without starting pitchers Adam Maier and Andrew Mosiello for the last three weeks, Oregon continues to roll on. After collecting a good road midweek win against Gonzaga, the Ducks won a series against Southern California to run their Pac-12 record to 7-2 and put them alone atop the league standings. Friday’s win came thanks to the early work Oregon did offensively, as it scored all nine of its runs in the first four innings, with the pitching staff making it hold up the rest of the way. Five Oregon hitters had two or more hits, with DH Brennan Milone going 3-for-5 with a home run. Shortstop Josh Kasevich also had a three-run homer to his name. After dropping the middle game when USC scored the go-ahead run in the eighth inning, the Ducks fought hard to capture Sunday’s finale. Down 6-1 going to the bottom of the seventh, they scored two in the seventh on a two-run homer off the bat of center fielder Colby Shade and four more in the eighth, three on a three-run homer for catcher Josiah Cromwick and one on a solo shot for left fielder Tanner Smith. Each of the three Oregon starting pitchers gave up at least five runs over the weekend, and that will continue to be a concern going forward, but for now, the bullpen and the offense are doing enough to overcome it.
Last edited by Kingspoint; 03-28-2022 at 11:58 AM.
"One problem with people who have no vices is that they're pretty sure to have some annoying virtues."
Sea Ray (03-28-2022)
Somehow Louisville is up to #8 in that poll. I'm glad to see it, but the Cards aren't that good.
Someone explain to me how Dallas Baptist can be #1 in the RPI with 8 losses...Sounds like there's a problem with that algorithm
16 of their 23 games have been against Quad 1 opponents. And 19 of their 23 against Quad 1 or 2. #2 Tennessee, on the other hand, has played 12 of their 24 games against Quad 3/4 opponents. Those rankings will obviously change as Tennessee plays more SEC opponents and Dallas Baptist plays more Missouri Valley opponents.
The ELO ranking from WN has more to do with how good a team is (and less with how good their schedule is). There, Tennessee is #1 and Dallas Baptist #16.
Kingspoint (03-28-2022)
Well, Arizona is ranked 12th. I missed that, too. The reason I missed it was because this is the first time all year I looked at the Baseball America rankings, not having time to look them up. I was looking at the uneducated "D1baseballrankings.com".
"One problem with people who have no vices is that they're pretty sure to have some annoying virtues."
In fact, it was nice to see Dallas Baptiste, a baseball powerhouse, get back into the Top-25. It wasn't a matter of if, but when it would happen.
"One problem with people who have no vices is that they're pretty sure to have some annoying virtues."
I have no problem with saying DBA has the #1 SOS but you also gotta beat those teams. It shouldn't be enough to just play them
They're 11-8 against Quad 1/2.
The only team with a substantial nubmer of Quad 1/2 games that has way outperformed DB record-wise in those types of games is...Tennessee. RPI is goofy for sure, and Tennessee is by pretty much any objective measure better than DB. But for what RPI measures, DB deserves to be very high even if #1 is not quite right.
Last edited by Boston Red; 03-28-2022 at 12:17 PM.
By their own metric, DBA is 11-8 as you stated but by that same metric UT is 11-1. Tennessee is undefeated in every other game. This means somehow DBA is being rewarded for losing those 7 quad 1 games that UT didn't play. It's nutty. Computers are only as good as the formulas humans put into them and this one is screwed up
https://www.warrennolan.com/baseball/2022/rpi-live
Tennessee is being "punished" for now in that system for their 9 Quad 4 games. DB has only played 1.
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