What Even is a Crimson Tide?
It was so fun sweeping our "rivals" even though you can't even call it a rivalry in baseball when it's not even a series. LSU was practically in control the entire weekend except for a few moments... well every game. But the point is we won the game, every game. And we're still and will remain #1. I just wish Alabama was ranked 25 or something because I would like to believe that we would have broken the attendance record again. Imagine breaking the attendance record twice in one season.
Paul Skenes once again had a very impressive game going 6 innings, striking out 9, and only surrendering 1 run. He also didn't walk anyone. His pitch count was 109 which I would have liked to see less. It is only a matter of time before he loses velocity by the postseason and he can't lose his velocity; it's what he relies on. You expect starting pitchers to lose velocity by the end of their outing, but only by a couple MPH. Skenes is losing almost 4 MPH by the end of his outing. He goes from almost 102 to 97 MPH. That is not a good sign. This would be a completely different conversation if he only touched 99 MPH by the end, but he's barely even touching 98 MPH. In the 2nd inning Tommy White hit a solo thank to get the offense going and then Dylan Crews hits a 3 run missile to extend the lead to 4-0. Skenes gave up his only run in the 4th and our lead cuts to 4-1, but the offense uses the 6th inning to create separation and use the 7th inning to tack on 1 more; the lead is now 8-1. You would think at this point that the game is over; a 7 run lead in the 8th and Griffin Herring, who has been nails, in the game? Game over. Right? Wrong. Griffin had a clean 7th, a decent 8th, giving up only 1 run. Now we're heading into the 9th inning with an 8-2 lead. This isn't even a save situation, this should be easy. But why would LSU make anything easy? In Griffin's next 0.2 innings, he allowed 4 runs, all earned on 3 hits. It doesn't actually seem as bad as it was. The worst part about it was that most of Alabama's damage was done with 2 outs. To make matters worse, a lot of it was done in 2 strike counts. Let me run down how it went: strike out, walk, walk, strike out, double, single, single, Collins relieves Herring, single, strike out. 4 hits with 2 outs, but only 3 drove in runs. I was hoping that with Garrett Edwards down, that Griffin Herring would be our saving grace in the bullpen, but maybe not. Maybe he just threw too many innings/pitches, or maybe he's cooked.
Saturday was a bit more stressful, but a different kind of stressed. It wasn't the kind of stress that arises from almost blowing a 7 run lead. This stress arose from Ty Floyd (and Sam Dutton) s****ing their pants. Ty Floyd only went 2.2 innings allowing 6 hits and 4 walks for a total of 6 earned runs. This man had a 3.75 WHIP for the game. That is absolutely crazy. This was by far his worst outing of the year pitching the least amount of innings, but giving up the most amount of runs. Sam Dutton didn't help either. He gave up a run over 1 inning. We were down 6-1 mid 3rd and we started climbing back. Tommy White hits a 3 run tank to make it 6-4. However Alabama would answer by extending their lead to 7-4. But it was the bottom of the 6th when the cardiac cats were reborn. It feels like every week I'm saying that, but here we are. LSU would take the lead and not give it back. We would win the game 12-8 to lock up a series win.
The series finale started way game 2 started- with Alabama scoring first. I don't know if people are blaming Tre Morgan for the dropped fly ball that allowed a run to score, but here's the thing- the run was scoring anyway. The ball was hit deep enough that the runner on 3rd could have scored without much of a contest from Tre. It only would have mattered if that hitter came around to score, which he didn't, so no harm, no foul. Christian Little didn't have the worst day. He gave up 3 earned over 3.1 innings. Nate Ackenhausen, who I thought was pretty reliable up to this point, also s*** his pants by allowing 4 runs, only 2 earned, over 1.2 innings. Same with Blake Money, 2 runs, 1 earned, over 1.2 innings. Bryce Collins surprisingly didn't give up a run. Mostly because he walked and hit a batter without recording an out and Riley Cooper had to clean up his mess. If Collins stays in that game, those runs are definitely scoring. But Riley Cooper also gave up 2 over 2.1 innings. Despite all that, it was the 6th inning that revived the cardiac cats for the second time this series. If LSU wins the College World Series, this is the inning that they're going to show on the season recap video. All I really have to say about this inning is that EVERYONE in the lineup either got on base or drove in a run scoring a grand total of 6 runs. It felt like a merry-go-round. Let me just run through the inning really quickly- error, walk, walk, single, single, walk, walk, sac fly, walk, single, strikeout, pop out. 5 walks and 3 hits; none of which were even extra base hits. I also realized that once Paxton Kling pinched hit for Josh Pearson, 8 out of the 9 batters in the lineup today were batting over .300, the exception being Jordan Thompson who is batting in the high .280s.
With all that being said, our problem is clearly our pitching staff and the fact that we don't have a real one. We don't have a real Saturday starter, a real Sunday starter, a real midweek starter, and we're running our Friday starter into the ground. And don't even get me started on the bullpen with Edwards down. Our 3 starters not named Paul Skenes have a combined ERA of 4.68. The bullpen is even worse. Our relievers not named Garrett Edwards have a combined ERA of 5.89; and it's only that low because Nate Ackenhausen has a 2.51 ERA. I don't even want to know what it is if I took him out. Only 3 of our 10 relievers have an ERA below 4.50- Nate, Guidry, and Griffin. Could you imagine how dominate our team would be with the 2023 offense and 2021 pitching staff of a healthy Jaden Hill, Landon Marceaux, AJ Labas, and Ma'khail Hilliard. If I had to sacrifice Paul Skenes for an above average rotation, I would do it in a heartbeat.
Notable stats from this series:
Dylan Crews went 6-for-11 (.545) with 2 missiles. He is now slashing .490/.639/.860 for a whopping 1.499 OPS. He also now has 1.14 walks per game meaning he is drawing more than 1 walk a game. And a 0.15 K rate. Dylan Crews is now leading the nation in batting average and OBP.
Tommy White went 5-for-14 (.357) with 2 tanks. He is now slashing .368/.434/.757 for an OPS of 1.191. Tommy is now leading the team in homeruns.
10 of our batters have an OPS above .900 and 7 have an OPS above 1.000.
The series MVP is clearly Dylan Crews again.
Hit by pitch counter:
Series- 7
Season- 90
