Wallace Award Watch List

The College Baseball Foundation has released its 2006 Brooks Wallace Award watchlist. A number of Big Ten players have made the pre-season list for the Wallace Award, given annually to the top player in college baseball. Jeff Kunkel, Michigan (C), Matt Lewis, Penn State (OF), Pat McMahon, Northwestern (C), Troy Krider, Michigan State (DH/ATH), Brian Blomquist, Illinois (P), Mitch Hilligoss, Purdue (SS), John Gaub, Minnesota (P) and Cory Luebke, Ohio State (P) all garnered nominations.

College Baseball Video Game

Much to my surprise, I stumbled across this article on the 2006 release of a college baseball video game. (Thanks to the Rosenblatt Report and Section B, Florida State's fan site.) EA Sports, a big name in the industry, is behind the project. I'm confident that the game will have some shortcomings, as it's an initial effort, however I am encouraged to see college baseball get more recognition.

Update: Here is press release about the game.

More 2006 Schedules Announced

Michigan State and Illinois have released their 2006 baseball schedules. The '06 season will be the first for head coaches David Grewe with the Spartans and Dan Hartleb at Illinois.

Recruiting News

Here are some press releases about the latest recruiting class at the respective university: Michigan, Michigan State, Illinois, Indiana and Minnesota.

Courtney Linehan, of the Daily Illini, offers this overview of Illinois recruiting class.

Michigan Names Captains

The University of Michigan baseball team announced it's 2006 captains. Click here to see the press release naming seniors Paul Hammond, Drew Taylor, Jeff Kunkel and A.J. Scheidt captains.

MSU Extends Olds Park Deal Thru 2010

Good news for Spartan baseball. Well, it's good news from my prespective anyway. Michigan State University and the city of Lansing have extended their agreement for the Spartans to play in Oldsmobile Park through the 2010 season.

This is the kind of deal struggling cold weather climate schools need. It's nearly impossible for a northern institution to build this type of facility for baseball, nor could they justify it at many schools, as baseball isn't a revenue producer. However, making this kind of arrangement with the local minor league franchise creates an opportunity for all.

The city gets more use out of their investment and the university's baseball squad plays in a tremendous park which almost has to help recruiting to some degree. Better recruits translates into better teams, which translates into better attendance, which creates more revenue, which makes me sound like President Reagan talking about "Trickle Down Economics", but you get the idea.