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IU Baseball 2020


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Back to defend the title...

We lose a TON, but that's what good teams do in baseball a lot of times. We also bring back a lot of VERY good players and a couple of players who were drafted (Barr, Dunham, and Sharp). 

We have to replace the entire weekend rotation, which is also a good thing and a bad thing (obviously). Good because getting players drafted is the name of the name and we developed some players big time in a short amount of time. 

I believe Bierman has the inside track to be a weekend starter, and maybe Tommy Sommer, as well. I think in a perfect world you'd like to see someone like Reese Sharp, AJ Hacker, and Jack Walker handle the mid week duties along with maybe McCade Brown. 

Outside of Bierman and Sommer on the weekends, Braydon Tucker, Cal Kreuger, and Connor Manous could all start. The pen lack lefties, so I don't think Braden Scott would start, but maybe. We also added Zach Bierhmann as well as an early enrollee who was rated top 300 in the 2020 class. Pitching doesn't have a TON of experience, but I do believe it's a big time talented group. 

 

In the field... Barr will be at 3B, Dunham will be somewhere (LF or DH), Richardson will be somewhere (RF), Ashley will be somewhere (2B), Ethan Vecrumba will probably be the CF. I think Skrine will start at 1B or DH, Houston will probably be the SS or Macciochi a transfer from UK takes the SS role. I believe Fucci transfer from Samford will win the the 1B or DH spot along with Skrine. 

I have no idea will start at catcher: Combs or Voth at catcher. 

 

The recruiting in the future classes has REALLY picked up. We have multiple kids committed that are top 300 and even top 100. It's a good time to be an IU baseball fan. 

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  • 4 weeks later...

Solid start to the season. We have a MASSIVE week this week. Purdue on Wednesday, rivalry game... they're RPI 140 (not terrible, not great). 

The real prize is this week vs San Diego. They are RPI #24 and we get a 4 game series with them. They play @IN ST on Tuesday, so it looks like they'll be spending 5 days in the Hoosier state. 

They have beaten 3 B1G teams already (Iowa, Neb, and Minny). They are currently 9-2... 7 of those games have been at home, 3 in AZ, and 1 game at LBST. I would assume basically all of these games have been played in warm weather. Friday will be 40 here, Saturday 50, and Sunday 60. Maybe they have trouble adjusting to the cold? 

We go 3-2 this week then it's been a good week. 4-1 would be a stellar weekend. 

 

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17 minutes ago, btownqb said:

@rico

My IU baseball fandom has carried over to the gf, as well. lol She LOVES it. I coached my last JV game on Friday night, at halftime she was sending me updates via hand signals from the IU vs. ECU game!! 

Nice, love it.

Maybe between you and I we can get talk about IU baseball humming on this site?  LOL

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34 minutes ago, rico said:

Nice, love it.

Maybe between you and I we can get talk about IU baseball humming on this site?  LOL

Hope so... after basketball season ends, I will get this thread moved to the main basketball board. They've let me do that the last two years... 

The biggest problem is when people visit here, they only want to visit the main basketball board or maybe the basketball recruiting page. Sigh. 

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16 minutes ago, btownqb said:

Hope so... after basketball season ends, I will get this thread moved to the main basketball board. They've let me do that the last two years... 

The biggest problem is when people visit here, they only want to visit the main basketball board or maybe the basketball recruiting page. Sigh. 

Sigh. Is right.  Sadly .

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@rico

FYI... our recruiting in 2021 and 2022 for baseball has been absolutely absurd. 

2021

Luke Hayden- 1st in the state

Colson Montgomery- ranked 75th in his class, and Hayden is ranked higher. 2nd in the state

TJ White- ranked 133rd overall

Joshua Pyne- 7th ranked player in IN. 

Carter Mathison- 9th ranked player in IN

Ben Hess- 8th ranked player in IL

Couple other of kids that have solid offers. 

2022

Devin Taylor- 2nd ranked player in OH- 20th overall in the country

McKay Whitaker- 6th ranked player in OH

AJ Shepard- 6th ranked player in VA

Tyler Cerny- 80th or so overall in the country- 3rd ranked player in the country

 

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Lifelong IU basketball fan here. Over the past several years, I've become a big Ole Miss baseball fan.

Great game yesterday. The Rebels were fortunate to pick up a win against a probable regional team. Since you will want Ole Miss to do well to help IU in the RPI, here are some quick observations on the Rebel's prospects going forward.

- The offense has been a three true outcome offense thus far. They've made up for a poor overall team batting average through drawing walks and hitting home runs. Ole Miss led the nation in home runs coming into the weekend and hit several more in Greenville. I think this offense has the potential to struggle at times when the home runs aren't coming. Will be an interesting storyline to follow.

- The weekend rotation with Doug Nikhazy, Gunnar Hoglund, and Derek Diamond will be one of the best in the SEC as well as the entire country. The starters will need to aid a shorthanded bullpen by going deep into games. High end talent here.

- At this point, the bullpen appears to have at least 4 reliable arms. After that is a big question mark. Although Coach Mike Bianco often rides his top 3-4 bullpen arms as much as possible, we'll still need a few young guys to step up in the midweek and in spot duty on weekends. With the 5-2 lead on Sunday, Bianco took a chance on putting in some of the more inexperienced arms. It almost cost us the game, but it was necessary to see who can handle the stress of pitching in tough matchups.

- The SEC slate is brutal for the Rebels. Of the SEC East opponents, Ole Miss will not play Tennessee, Kentucky, or Missouri. These are generally three of the weaker teams in the league, although Tennessee has looked tough so far. 16-14 would be an achievement in SEC play.

 

As for IU, I think they have a talented and deep roster capable of winning the Big Ten and competing for a regional host spot. If not a host, they will be a tough out as a two seed in someone's regional. The success of IU's program has been remarkable. Even more impressive when you add that IU is a northern school and that the success has spanned three different head coaches. Hopefully, Coach Mercer sticks around for the long haul.

Like Archie Miller, Mercer seems to be employing an "inside-out" approach to recruiting, locking up many of the top players in the state. I'd like to see IU follow Louisville's model, as the Cardinals have become a national powerhouse and perennial Omaha contender on the backs of Midwestern talent.

 

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2 hours ago, Kendal22 said:

Lifelong IU basketball fan here. Over the past several years, I've become a big Ole Miss baseball fan.

Great game yesterday. The Rebels were fortunate to pick up a win against a probable regional team. Since you will want Ole Miss to do well to help IU in the RPI, here are some quick observations on the Rebel's prospects going forward.

- The offense has been a three true outcome offense thus far. They've made up for a poor overall team batting average through drawing walks and hitting home runs. Ole Miss led the nation in home runs coming into the weekend and hit several more in Greenville. I think this offense has the potential to struggle at times when the home runs aren't coming. Will be an interesting storyline to follow.

- The weekend rotation with Doug Nikhazy, Gunnar Hoglund, and Derek Diamond will be one of the best in the SEC as well as the entire country. The starters will need to aid a shorthanded bullpen by going deep into games. High end talent here.

- At this point, the bullpen appears to have at least 4 reliable arms. After that is a big question mark. Although Coach Mike Bianco often rides his top 3-4 bullpen arms as much as possible, we'll still need a few young guys to step up in the midweek and in spot duty on weekends. With the 5-2 lead on Sunday, Bianco took a chance on putting in some of the more inexperienced arms. It almost cost us the game, but it was necessary to see who can handle the stress of pitching in tough matchups.

- The SEC slate is brutal for the Rebels. Of the SEC East opponents, Ole Miss will not play Tennessee, Kentucky, or Missouri. These are generally three of the weaker teams in the league, although Tennessee has looked tough so far. 16-14 would be an achievement in SEC play.

 

As for IU, I think they have a talented and deep roster capable of winning the Big Ten and competing for a regional host spot. If not a host, they will be a tough out as a two seed in someone's regional. The success of IU's program has been remarkable. Even more impressive when you add that IU is a northern school and that the success has spanned three different head coaches. Hopefully, Coach Mercer sticks around for the long haul.

Like Archie Miller, Mercer seems to be employing an "inside-out" approach to recruiting, locking up many of the top players in the state. I'd like to see IU follow Louisville's model, as the Cardinals have become a national powerhouse and perennial Omaha contender on the backs of Midwestern talent.

 

And the FR class at IU is very solid. Next years class is solid as well... but what they have committed as JR and SO will rival the classes the SEC brings in. 

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McCade Brown gets the start tonight. Sort of interesting, he threw one inning this weekend (Sunday)... and about 30 pitches. We have 4 games this weekend, so I thought maybe we would want to throw someone new tonight. (Not me questioning Mercer, I just am always curious on who we are going to start). 

McCade STRUGGLED against Purdue last year, so maybe coach wants to give him some redemption. Either way, I only see him throwing 3-4 innings tops because of the extra game this weekend. I could see Krueger and Sloan pitching plenty tonight, as well, they have experience and didn't throw this past weekend. 

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Some updates..

We are currently #22 in the RPI. Great spot this early in the season and I've mentioned, if we can take 3/4 from SD this weekend, I expect that number to rise another 3 or 4 spots. There is a lot of movement in the RPI this early in the season, but we've played 1 game vs #2, #30 and 3 games vs. #15. This weekend we get 4 games vs. #44. 

** of quick note... to show how good the SEC is.... LSU plays 10 conference 3 games series, 8 of those are against ranked opponents. The other two are against UK and So Carolina, who are by no means weak.

Onto to last night... not a ton to say, Purdue is either awful or played absolutely atrocious or both. Fucci had 5 RBIs and is seeing the ball really well. Hunter Jesse continues to impress. 

Pitching was a bullpen night and played perfectly by Mercer- # of pitches thrown... Brown 39, Krueger 26, Platt 26, Bothwell 27, Sloan 14. All of these guys will be available on Friday except for probably Brown. 

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Just now, rico said:

I look at that one too, Hell you told me about it last year!  LOL  I have been keeping a close eye on it.  

Really an awesome website in my opinion. They just rescheduled the IU/Butler game for March 24th!! That's my spring break.. lets go!! 

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