The college baseball season has ended and Florida finally wins a national championship 
on their 11th try overall and 6th try for Sully. Florida managed this with strong starting pitching, an equally strong bullpen (especially a top-notch closer), and good defense. Their offense was only so-so. The real key to their season I think was having a freshman pitcher step right into the starting rotation. They won a lot of one-run games and that's what strong pitching will do for you.
Although their offense wasn't great they were very adept at scoring off the other team's bullpen; the best way to beat them was with a 8-9 solid outing from a starting pitcher (e.g., Kyle Wright beat them 2-0 by tossing a complete game.) Like most all good teams they took advantage of other team's errors and walking/hitting batters.
Vandy's season turned out far better than most thought it would back in February/March culminating in a Super Regional loss at Oregon State after a Regional title on the road at Clemson. What we lacked were some of the things Florida possessed: freshman weekend starter, strong bullpen. Our offense was better than theirs. Our defense was on par with theirs. We SHOULD have won the series with them were it not for our bullpen's meltdown in game 1 where we led 5-2 with Raby in the game only to lose 10-6 when the bullpen yielded 5 runs in the 9th inning (Drew Hayes mostly.)
Many have voiced the opinion that we will not be very good next year as we lose 4 starters and a star starting pitcher. While those will be hard to replace it's possible they can be. As an example, look to Texas A&M this year. They lost virtually their whole starting line-up from last year and half their team and line-up were freshmen. They did return their #1 weekend starter. They started out slow (1-5 in the SEC) and then kept getting better and better as the season progressed. They ended up going to Omaha. And although they went 0-2 in the CWS they will likely be a pre-season Top 10 for next year. This blueprint is what Vandy needs to follow for next year and that's why our incoming freshmen class (which appears will be the #1 class in the country) must include some big contributors.
Critical things we need for 2018:
1. A starting weekend pitcher from among our incoming freshmen. Good news is that there are several candidates for this, one in particular, the lefty.
2. Two new starting outfielders. It would be nice if one of the freshmen could take either LF or CF and, fortunately, we have a few recruits that could very well do that.
3. New 3rd baseman. Again, there's a very good player coming in at that position and Harrison Ray is a returning possibility. It's also possible Infante could move to 3rd.
4. New catcher. Soon to be sophomore Ty Duvall can hit; can he provide the defensive skills is the question. We also have an incoming freshman, Philip Clarke of CPA, who could be very instrumental in next year's success. One of those 2 has to come through for us.
5. We need more from our returning juniors, especially the starters Kaiser and Paul. We had several sophomores this year who did not progress much beyond their freshmen year performance. They have to improve a great deal with their offense for next year to be a success.
6. Bleday must progress this summer and fall. JJ started pretty much all year and was solid, but not great. His hitting didn't seem to improve beyond what it was in February. Hopefully a solid summer and a new hitting coach will resolve that as he has the skills to be a star player.
7. We need a consistently strong bullpen. Our bullpen was unpredictable this year, sometimes strong, many times not. They lost about 8-10 games for us based on my feeble recollection. That can't happen next year. Our biggest need is a lock-down closer. Such a person is potentially already there: King, Gillis for example. If not, it needs to come from the freshman class. Brownie has his work cut out for him this fall to put this piece of the puzzle together.
So that's 7 things and that's a lot. If all 7 occur then I believe we'll get to Omaha, maybe even if just 5 of those happen depending on which 5. If none of the 7 occur we'll likely make a regional but we won't be hosting.
A lot can and will happen between now and next February. Summer ball results will tell us a lot. Fall Ball will be especially important this year to see how the freshmen develop.
As a result, I'll be counting down the days to when our fall intra-squad scrimmages start with great anticipation. That countdown begins at approximately 100 days, give or take 10, since the dates have yet to be set. Let's just hope they aren't canceled like they were last year due to nagging injuries which, in hindsight, might have foretold us what the 2017 season would be like.
on their 11th try overall and 6th try for Sully. Florida managed this with strong starting pitching, an equally strong bullpen (especially a top-notch closer), and good defense. Their offense was only so-so. The real key to their season I think was having a freshman pitcher step right into the starting rotation. They won a lot of one-run games and that's what strong pitching will do for you. Although their offense wasn't great they were very adept at scoring off the other team's bullpen; the best way to beat them was with a 8-9 solid outing from a starting pitcher (e.g., Kyle Wright beat them 2-0 by tossing a complete game.) Like most all good teams they took advantage of other team's errors and walking/hitting batters.
Vandy's season turned out far better than most thought
it would back in February/March culminating in a Super Regional loss at Oregon State after a Regional title on the road at Clemson. What we lacked were some of the things Florida possessed: freshman weekend starter, strong bullpen. Our offense was better than theirs. Our defense was on par with theirs. We SHOULD have won the series with them were it not for our bullpen's meltdown in game 1 where we led 5-2 with Raby in the game only to lose 10-6 when the bullpen yielded 5 runs in the 9th inning (Drew Hayes mostly.)Many have voiced the opinion that we will not be very good next year as we lose 4 starters and a star starting pitcher. While those will be hard to replace it's possible they can be. As an example, look to Texas A&M this year. They lost virtually their whole starting line-up from last year and half their team and line-up were freshmen. They did return their #1 weekend starter. They started out slow (1-5 in the SEC) and then kept getting better and better as the season progressed. They ended up going to Omaha. And although they went 0-2 in the CWS they will likely be a pre-season Top 10 for next year. This blueprint is what Vandy needs to follow for next year and that's why our incoming freshmen class (which appears will be the #1 class in the country) must include some big contributors.
Critical things we need for 2018:
1. A starting weekend pitcher from among our incoming freshmen. Good news is that there are several candidates for this, one in particular, the lefty.
2. Two new starting outfielders. It would be nice if one of the freshmen could take either LF or CF and, fortunately, we have a few recruits that could very well do that.
3. New 3rd baseman. Again, there's a very good player coming in at that position and Harrison Ray is a returning possibility. It's also possible Infante could move to 3rd.
4. New catcher. Soon to be sophomore Ty Duvall can hit; can he provide the defensive skills is the question. We also have an incoming freshman, Philip Clarke of CPA, who could be very instrumental in next year's success. One of those 2 has to come through for us.
5. We need more from our returning juniors, especially the starters Kaiser and Paul. We had several sophomores this year who did not progress much beyond their freshmen year performance. They have to improve a great deal with their offense for next year to be a success.
6. Bleday must progress this summer and fall. JJ started pretty much all year and was solid, but not great. His hitting didn't seem to improve beyond what it was in February. Hopefully a solid summer and a new hitting coach will resolve that as he has the skills to be a star player.
7. We need a consistently strong bullpen. Our bullpen was unpredictable this year, sometimes strong, many times not. They lost about 8-10 games for us based on my feeble recollection. That can't happen next year. Our biggest need is a lock-down closer. Such a person is potentially already there: King, Gillis for example. If not, it needs to come from the freshman class. Brownie has his work cut out for him this fall to put this piece of the puzzle together.
So that's 7 things and that's a lot. If all 7 occur then I believe we'll get to Omaha, maybe even if just 5 of those happen depending on which 5. If none of the 7 occur we'll likely make a regional but we won't be hosting.
A lot can and will happen between now and next February. Summer ball results will tell us a lot. Fall Ball will be especially important this year to see how the freshmen develop.
As a result, I'll be counting down the days to when our fall intra-squad scrimmages start with great anticipation. That countdown begins at approximately 100 days, give or take 10, since the dates have yet to be set. Let's just hope they aren't canceled like they were last year due to nagging injuries which, in hindsight, might have foretold us what the 2017 season would be like.
