Technical Difficulities

I'm in the process of making the switch to the updated version of Blogger. This has lead to a number of technical issues--things like this site not appearing. My apologies to all, especially both of my loyal readers and those making their initial visit courtesy of Skilton's Baseball Links.

I expect these matters to arise until the Blogger folks get a handle on the migration process and work out all the associated bugs. Thanks for stopping in and being patient.

The DQ Lineup

It appears the 2007 Dairy Queen Classic field has been set. According to the University of Arkansas' official site, The DQC will feature the Razorbacks, The Citadel, Mississippi and, of course, Minnesota. The Gophers host The DQ, one of the country's top tournaments, at the Metrodome from March 2 - March 4.

Indiana's 2007 Schedule

Here is Indiana's 2007 baseball schedule. The Hoosiers pre-conference slate isn't completely filled in, but that three game visit to Florida State seems daunting enough.

Kudos to the IU's sports information department for being the first university in the Big Ten to publish their '07 slate.

The Transfer Market

The Big Ten has a number of players opting to apply their craft elsewhere this summer. Baseball America has published the list of athletes opting to transfer and the Big Ten is far too well represented.

Perhaps, the most notable departure is Troy Krider leaving Michigan State. Krider has gotten plenty of playing time with the Spartans -- playing in all 56 MSU contests while batting .355 -- and I suspected he would be in the running for an All-Conference selection in '07. Alas, Mr. Krider has chosen to leave East Lansing, although he hasn't decided where he is headed yet.

The other player whose name jumped out at me is the previously invisible Cameron Satterwhite. The Indiana OF/DH is headed to Cincinnati after playing only briefly for the Hoosiers in 2006. Satterwhite was really starting to look like an offensive force when he suddenly disappeared from IU's roster in the middle of the conference schedule. This is the first most of us have seen or heard of the slugger since.

Also on the list of those transferring out of the Big Ten are Ohio State's Dan Barker (RHP) and Josh Hula (C), Indiana's Jon David and Jason Drew, MSU's pitchers Mike Takashima and Matt Trausch.

The only player heading into the conference is Josh Lindblom. Lindblom is leaving Tennessee and taking the mound for Purdue in 2007.

August's # 1

It's August. It's also about as far away from the start of the next college baseball season as you can get. However, what have I been thinking about? If I were a member of the voting media, who would I vote as the number one team in the country heading into 2007?

My answer is South Carolina. The Gamecocks impressed me last year and have a number of players returning in '07. I guess that makes South Carolina my pre-pre-season number one.

Cape League Complaints And My Solution

John Manuel, of Baseball America fame and fortune, writes that scouts weren't terribly impressed about the Cape Cod League All-Star Game. Seems a number of the quality arms in the league couldn't pitch due to a variety of factors. That left a series of less than top flight pitchers for the scouts to evaluate. Our scouting friends were so up in arms, pardon the pun, that they will probably complain back to their Major League employers who will take the summer wood bat league to task for not providing them with the talent they anticipated seeing.

My thought is that the scouts should complain about their employers as they are part of the problem. This is going to run over a sacred cow or two, but let me pose a philosophic question anyway. Do we really need the Cape League? Or wood bat summer leagues, in general, for that matter?

Yes, the college players do need a place to play during baseball's peak time of the year. From that perspective, I understand the need for all the summer leagues. Yet, why should MLB scouts get so up in arms over one all-star game? What has made these summer leagues so important? The reason is simple--wooden bats.

When the college kids leave campus, they leave all the metal bats behind. In the summer, scouts get to evaluate both hitters and pitchers in a setting that more closely resembles MLB action. Thus, when the kids they want to see play against each other don't participate, scouts get a bit edgy. They have a very small window to look at the nation's collegiate stars in this environment. When your livelihood comes from making proper recommendations, it's understandable that you get cranky when your opportunities to evaluate are hampered.

Let's also realize that MLB is footing a portion of the bill in many, if not most, of the summer wood bat leagues. MLB is helping cover the cost of the bats, presumably, so they can judge their prospective future employees in the optimum setting. Again, not having your best players play comes off as biting the hand that feeds you. Which leads me back, in part, to my original question.

What if MLB decided to stop funding the summer leagues and sent the money to the NCAA? What if, instead of a few weeks of wood bat action in the summer, college players got to play with wood bats all year long? I'm not looking to destroy the summer wood bat leagues, but I am curious why they can get money from MLB and the NCAA cannot? Even if their is some archaic rule in the NCAA that prohibits such a move (and who would believe the NCAA has archaic rules on the books?), if MLB offered the money, couldn't the NCAA really just re-write the rule?

Such a move would really be a win-win for both MLB and the NCAA. MLB would get several extra months, if not years, to evaluate talent using and facing wooden bats on a regular basis. Wouldn't this create plenty of scouting chances? Might proper evaluation lead to less drafting errors and save money--in theory anyway? (Hey, I'm selling a concept here, play along.)

The NCAA also gains as one of the biggest complaints I hear about the college game from general baseball fans is the "ping" of metal bats. It doesn't faze me, obviously, but it clearly keeps some from embracing the game. If attendance and interest rose in the college game, players in the NCAA might become more recognizable and fans might get more interested in things like the MLB Draft. Again, how this hurts anyone is beyond me.

(As an aside, I also figure some minor league teams might get a bit anxious at the thought of the NCAA using wood bats. Some kids, although not a significant amount, might opt for two years of college baseball (minimum) instead of heading off to the big league farm system straight from high school. From strictly a budgetary standpoint, would having fewer minor league franchises save MLB money? Again, this is just a thinking-out-loud moment.)

I realize that if MLB stopped funding the use of wood bats in college, the summer leagues prestige may fall. Some would probably fold. While I'm not looking to crush this cottage industry, I think it's time to take another look at this entire set-up. Clearly, the best case scenario would be one where MLB steps up to the plate and funds both the NCAA and the summer wooden bat leagues so they can evaluate the players from March until August.

Providing your potential future workforce with the tools of their job at a younger age? Expanding the game's popularity at lower levels? Getting more time to evaluate players? Why, again, is this not a good idea?

Update (8/2/06): I emailed someone with far more knowledge about this subject than I--which I realize could be just about anyone--and learned that one possible issue may be Title IX. The theory is that because of Title IX, if MLB tossed money at the NCAA and equal amount would have to go to women's athletics. That does provide a rather large obstacle. I'd say an unnecessary one, but that might get me in trouble.

There is also the matter of whether or not there really is enough wood bats out there to supply all of D-I. I'm going to be the last guy to encourage stripping our forests to make bats, so if it's even debatable, it's probably not a good idea. I would like to think that some of these companies are actually re-foresting (if that's the proper term for planting more trees), but I don't really care to ponder that, either.

The last point is one of the bat manufacturers and their "relationship" with the NCAA. I leave that statement for you to read between the lines.

An Indiana Stats Question

I received an email from fellow baseball fan Steve Guthrie. Steve has asked for some assistance. As I couldn't give him a definitive answer, I'm tossing this one to BTH readers. Here's Steve's query (with my editing the email into paragraphs at different points, as it didn't exactly copy and paste well; my apologies to Mr. Guthrie):

2006 is the second season I will have made a Big Ten card set available free to people for use on the APBA table baseball game. I get my data almost completely from team websites and have never seen anything like the way Indiana handled their 2006 stats.

The batting stats for three players are included in the 2006 Indiana team totals on their website but are not listed as individual players; hence the player totals don't add up to the team totals. I have never seen this kind of data expulsion done before. There are two pitchers left out of their pitching table, too. None of the five are listed on the fielding table on the Indiana site. (The Big Ten website has all players listed only in fielding tables - the five missing ex-Hoosiers are all listed there.) I did some work to dig up the data for the missing players in the Indiana boxscores.

These player situations really call out for explanations.1) Brett Sager batted 6th starting Game 1 as the Hoosier second baseman. He went 0 for 2, booted his first fielding chance, and was substituted for after six innings. He pinch-ran for the catcher in Game 3 and never appeared again. His stats are gone. 2) Steve Head started 35 of Indiana's first 43 games as their thirdbaseman. He made only one more appearance (in Game 47) going 1 for 2, scoring twice. He never appears again in the last nine games. His stats are gone. 3) Cameron Satterwhite didn't play until Game 16 but soon made an impact as the Hoosier DH. After the team's 37th game, Satterwhite was batting .386, slugging .516, and on base 42.6 percent of the time as the cleanup hitter. He never appeared in a game again. His stats are gone.

What happened to these players? Web searches turn up nothing. I will e-mail 2006 Indiana Batting and Pitching tables as Excel spreadsheets that include the five dropped players to anyone that might want them.

Again, I can't provide Mr. Guthrie with any solid information. I suspect there is a combination of youngsters that dropped out, were dismissed from the school or opted to transfer elsewhere, but that's all speculation. It's also doesn't explain the stats being erased from IU's records.

If anyone has an answer to Steve's inquiry, feel free to post it here or drop me an email. I'd leave Steve's email address, but it would just get filled with all the spam I get now. Thanks to any and all that can shed some light on this matter.

MSU's Grewe Profiled

Much to my amazement, there is a link to a feature about a college baseball coach on the ESPN.com homepage today. Even more astounding is the fact that the baseball coach profiled is from the Big Ten--Michigan State's David Grewe. It's the off-season and a Big Ten baseball coach gets a story on the Worldwide Leader's website? Go figure.

Regardless, it's great for the conference, in general, and for Grewe and the Spartans, specifically.

Cavagnaro's Texas Two-Step

Penn State's Matt Cavagnaro is tearing up the Texas Collegiate League. For the second week in a row, Cavagnaro was named the league's Player of the Week.

Penn State's New Yard

The New York-Penn League, via Minor League Baseball.com, takes a look at State College's new ballpark, Medlar Field at Lubrano Park. Penn State, which is sharing the new facility with the State College Spikes of Class A, begins playing at Medlar Field in 2007. I definitely hope to visit the new park next season.

Oregon State Raises The Bar

Oregon State's College World Series triumph should have ramifications in the Big Ten. Why? Because the Beavers' title run makes it that much more difficult for teams from the north to complain about their spot on college baseball's totem pole.

If the Beavers can play in consecutive College World Series and win one, why on Earth can't schools in the Big Ten? Or the Big East? The lament many--myself, first and foremost--point to in regards to the north's disadvantage in college baseball is weather. Why Corvallis isn't as rainy as we might think, they get less rainfall than Chicago according to the Corvallis Chamber of Commerce, it's not exactly the warm, enticing weather of the souths-east and west.

We always hear that high school players want to play in Texas, California and Florida because of the ideal weather conditions and the baseball tradition of college's super powers. Well, if kids are willing to go to Corvallis to play baseball, where the weather isn't perfect and their history is ancient to the average high school senior, they should be willing to try Columbus, West Lafayette or State College.

Then there's Oregon State's overall image. Ask anyone to name the best schools for athletics and I suspect that three Big Ten universities--Michigan, Ohio State and Penn State--would be mentioned before Oregon State by everyone who responded to the question. Another five to six Big Ten programs also might get the nod before the Beavers. That might not be an accurate portrayal of how Oregon State's athletics actually perform on the field, but it's a perception of success.

Again, if high school players are going to attend a state university to play baseball, there is no reason to believe that Michigan State, Penn State and Ohio State can't compete with Oregon State for recruits, if their image is better or equal to the Beavers, which I believe it is.

Consider revenue streams, as well. Does Oregon State have more money to spend in it's athletic budget than anyone in the Big Ten? Do they have more alumni to solicit funds from? Do they have more former or current pro players (in all sports) to hit up for cash than the schools in the Big Ten? It's difficult to argue finances when Oregon State's probably not bringing in the same capital that many Big Ten schools are.

The Beavers also overcame a disadvantage no one in the Big Ten has to--competition. Oregon State is playing in one of college baseball premier conferences. Pac-10 baseball powers Stanford, USC, UCLA, Arizona and Arizona State are regulars in the NCAA Tournament field. If the Beavers can climb to the top of the ultra competitive Pac-10 while playing in a less than ideal climate for baseball, there is no reason the Big Ten can't produce a few programs to compete with the nation's elite baseball teams.

Certainly, Oregon State does have some advantages over northern schools. Just showing up to play each week versus a fellow Pac-10 opponent increases their RPI. Win or lose, they get points. They also get to play three games on the weekends, not four like Big Ten programs do. And, yes, the weather isn't quite as bad as some might believe. (Even if it rains, that must mean it's too warm to snow, right?) However, there is no solid reason that several Big Ten programs can't match Oregon State's success.

For at least the last decade, only Ohio State has pushed the envelope, in baseball terms. In building Bill Davis Stadium, in pacing the conference in attendance, in hosting a regional, the Buckeyes have attempted to make the next step. Ohio State has slowly forced other Big Ten schools into keeping pace. I doubt if Penn State or Michigan would be making stadium changes if the folks in Columbus hadn't done so first. Now, Oregon State's emergence has raised the bar even higher for Big Ten baseball programs.

If Big Ten programs don't begin to rise as a baseball powers, it will simply be because neither the conference or the individual institutions have the will to do so. All the other necessary tools are at their disposal. Oregon State has set the bar, let's see if anyone in the Big Ten is willing to aim that high.

Thoughts On The CWS

Let me share a few random thoughts I have about the just completed College World Series.

* I admire the toughness of Oregon State, emerging from the loser's bracket and dropping the first game of the CWS Championship round, but is it too much to think that North Carolina's sloppy defense handed the title to OSU?

* At what point do college coaches have a responsibility to their pro prospects in regards to limiting pitch counts? As a Detroit Tigers fan, I was more than a bit concerned over the number of pitches (over 300) Jonah Nickerson threw over the two weeks in Omaha. Didn't he pitch on three or less days of rest twice?

Nickerson wasn't the only OSU hurler to get an excessive workload, but he seemed like the most visible. As kids like Nickerson harbor professional dreams, don't college coaches have some responsibility to make sure they can succeed in their careers like any other instructor would? Doesn't throwing that often increase the odds of arm injury and shortened careers?

* I like Mike Patrick and Harold Reynolds in the ESPN booth, although with their other obligations, I doubt they spend too much time prior to June 1 paying much attention to college baseball. As a result, they do stumble around a bit. In spite of this, Patrick's CWS work is far better than his football work. He seems much more at ease and his work more fluid. Maybe he broadcasted baseball originally?

I like Reynolds' personality, always have, but I can't get past his comments in 2003 about contracting the Detroit Tigers. He does a solid, if unspectacular job in Omaha. Like Patrick, you do get the feeling he likes the work and that's half the battle.

I'm a big Kyle Peterson fan. The ex-Stanford pitcher does cover the college game year-round and played in the CWS. I'd like to see ESPN expand Peterson's role. Studio host, perhaps? Maybe they have given him more responsibility on ESPNU, but, alas, my cable provider doesn't offer The U. Regardless, Peterson should get more airtime.

Erin Andrews is fine. Easy, boys, I mean she does acceptable work. I'm not thrilled about these in-game coach interviews--the college baseball equivalent of the worthless exchange with football coaches heading in/out of the lockeroom at halftime--but, it's not like Andrews came up with the idea. She's just doing her job. I'm just not crazy about sideline reporters, so I'm biased from the start.

* I'm sad to see another season depart, but Oregon State is a deserving champion.

Cavagnaro Grabs Honor

Penn State's Matt Cavagnaro was named the Texas Collegiate League's Player of the Week for June 22. The Nittany Lions' infielder is pacing the summer wood bat league in hits with 26 and is amongst the leaders in runs scored (13) and on base percentage (.522).

More CWS Posts

SI On Campus has a couple of posts on the College World Series this week. The first is entitled "Why You Should Watch The College World Series" and the second is "Field of Dreams" which gives you the feeling of the party surrounding Omaha this week. Brief entries, but worth reading.

Last week, SIOC, pondered the question that has befuddled millions, why isn't college baseball more popular? Some of the response are stereotypical--aluminum bats, lack of television coverage, quality of play, blah, blah, blah. However, solid observations were made, as well. Check them all out.

DeLucia Is Player Of The Week

Ohio State's Dan DeLucia was named the Cape Cod League's Pitcher of the Week. DeLucia is doing for Coltiut in the Cape what he does for the Buckeyes--win ballgames. DeLucia is 2-0 and has already tossed a complete game shutout while pacing the premier wood bat summer league in innings pitched. (Correction 7/1/06: According to the Cape's stats page, as of June 30, DeLucia does not have a complete game or a shutout. I'm fairly clueless in general, but I must have obtained that data from somewhere. However, that's twice in a week that I've flubbed something, so it must be me. Regardless, my apologies to Dan, his family, the OSU fanbase, Cotuit, the Cape League, myself and anyone else potentially offended.)

Other Big Ten stars playing on the Cape include Buckeyes' Matt Angle, Cory Luebke (1-0) and Eric Fryer. Michigan's Doug Pickens, Iowa's Travis Sweet and Minnesota's Cole DeVries (1-0). (I apologize if I missed anyone. Feel free to leave a post or email me if you know of any other Big Ten players in the Cape Cod League.)

CWS Championship Set

The College World Series championship will come down to a three game battle between North Carolina and Oregon State. Game One between the Tar Heels and Beavers is on Saturday night. I'll skip predictions--as I really have no idea who is going to win and I don't want to give the kiss of death to either program.

On The Dotted Line

Iowa CF Nate Price has signed a contract to play in the Chicago Cubs organization. Another former Big Ten star to sign on with the pros is Ronnie Bourquin. The Ohio State standout, and conference Player of the Year, was a second round choice of the Detroit Tigers.

Tennessee Transfer

Purdue University has announced that pitcher Josh Lindblom is tranferring from Tennessee. The West Lafayette native will be a part of coach Doug Schreiber's 2007 rotation.

Official Recaps

The Big Ten Conference has compiled a list of all the Big Ten players selected in the Major League Baseball draft. The only two I might have missed from my coverage were Michigan State's Jeff Gerbe (Detroit) and Ryan Basham (Toronto). I had heard Gerbe got picked, as I get plenty of Tigers coverage, but the Basham selection eluded me.

The official conference site also reviews the 2006 season. Northwestern University's stellar '06 Big Ten campaign is relived here.

Big Ten Television Network

According to a published report, the Big Ten will announce tomorrow the creation of it's own cable television network. The new network will begin in 2007 and it's coverage will probably be comprised mostly of non-revenue sports.

I think it's safe to assume this means Big Ten baseball might get some consistent air time. Of course, the baseball programs will be vying with softball and other spring sports, but it's still an opportunity for additional exposure.

I'm cautiously optimistic about this proposed network. I clearly excited about the possibility of getting to see some additional games without a road trip. It would make covering the conference easier. Of course, it might make the ol' blog obsolete, but only time will tell.

A big hat tip to Ian of Sweaty Men Endeavors who gave me the heads up on this one.