The UIC Flames come to town for a cold weekend series. No word yet on whether they are bringing their Mascot with them
but I’m sure we could use the warmth it could create. I’m currently in an intense negotiation with ADCSL in hopes she’ll allow us to start some bonfires on the concourse or, at a minimum, barrel fires scattered throughout The Hawk.
Temps for game times are 39°, 49°, and 50° and falling to 29°, 43°, and 47° by the end of the game. Saturday will be full sun, however, but Sunday will be cloudy with a slight chance of a stray shower or two. It's the wind, however, that's the real killer for me.
Personally, I’d prefer cancelling the Friday game and playing 2 full on Saturday (or 2 seven innings, either is fine.) I’m calling Tim as we speak to see what he thinks but so far he has yet to take my call for some odd reason.
UIC is 0-4 after dropping all four games in Auburn last weekend. Two games were relatively close, however, the other two were blow-outs. Game 1 pitcher went 6 innings and kept it very close against Tanner Burns, scores of 3-3 and then 3-4. The Game 3 starter went 4.1 innings and yielded 6 runs; not great, but not horrible. Auburn scored 4 in the first inning, then led 7-0 before the Flames got 3 in the 9th off the tail-end of the Auburn bullpen.
Looks like they “might” give us some trouble in game 1, but after that I see us scoring many runs, maybe 5 or more (my definition of “more” this year is 5, last year it was 20.)
Team stats for UIC:
Batting .192 (2 home runs)
ERA 10.74 (starters 14.85)
Pitchers 5.5 K/gm and 5.5 BB/gm
OBA .368
These are all horrible numbers but keep in mind Auburn is considered to be a CWS-worthy team by most. If nothing else, however, it'll give us a chance to make a second-hand comparison of the Tigers versus the Dores based on how we do against UIC.
Fielding .976 (3 errors) -- not bad, certainly better than us (but 0 errors on Tuesday and Wednesday so that's a good sign)
Three kids hit over .300, but everyone else is .222 or lower. Like many mid-majors, if you can get through their 3-4 good guys you likely can handle them pretty easily. We’ll see.
In 2017 they came in to The Hawk and took the series 2 games to 1 against us with both wins in extra innings after two of our many bullpen melt-downs that year (Snider in one, Rupp in the other.) They were a scrappy bunch as I recall with 2-3 good players who gave us fits. That was Fellow’s freshman year when he was the Sunday starter. That’s the year we started out 6-5, losing a series the next weekend to Cal State-Northridge as well, now known as CSUN for some strange reason. I thought that was the name of a conference, not a single team. Apparently I am wrong.
So, bundle up, take advantage of the free hot chocolate I’m sure they will dispense in the stands and let’s sweep these suckers!
Btw, their hashtag is #FireUpFlames. I think it should be #FlameOn. But they didn’t ask me. Nobody ever does. Which is smart of them, come to think of it.
Temps for game times are 39°, 49°, and 50° and falling to 29°, 43°, and 47° by the end of the game. Saturday will be full sun, however, but Sunday will be cloudy with a slight chance of a stray shower or two. It's the wind, however, that's the real killer for me.
Personally, I’d prefer cancelling the Friday game and playing 2 full on Saturday (or 2 seven innings, either is fine.) I’m calling Tim as we speak to see what he thinks but so far he has yet to take my call for some odd reason.
UIC is 0-4 after dropping all four games in Auburn last weekend. Two games were relatively close, however, the other two were blow-outs. Game 1 pitcher went 6 innings and kept it very close against Tanner Burns, scores of 3-3 and then 3-4. The Game 3 starter went 4.1 innings and yielded 6 runs; not great, but not horrible. Auburn scored 4 in the first inning, then led 7-0 before the Flames got 3 in the 9th off the tail-end of the Auburn bullpen.
Looks like they “might” give us some trouble in game 1, but after that I see us scoring many runs, maybe 5 or more (my definition of “more” this year is 5, last year it was 20.)
Team stats for UIC:
Batting .192 (2 home runs)
ERA 10.74 (starters 14.85)
Pitchers 5.5 K/gm and 5.5 BB/gm
OBA .368
These are all horrible numbers but keep in mind Auburn is considered to be a CWS-worthy team by most. If nothing else, however, it'll give us a chance to make a second-hand comparison of the Tigers versus the Dores based on how we do against UIC.
Fielding .976 (3 errors) -- not bad, certainly better than us (but 0 errors on Tuesday and Wednesday so that's a good sign)
Three kids hit over .300, but everyone else is .222 or lower. Like many mid-majors, if you can get through their 3-4 good guys you likely can handle them pretty easily. We’ll see.
In 2017 they came in to The Hawk and took the series 2 games to 1 against us with both wins in extra innings after two of our many bullpen melt-downs that year (Snider in one, Rupp in the other.) They were a scrappy bunch as I recall with 2-3 good players who gave us fits. That was Fellow’s freshman year when he was the Sunday starter. That’s the year we started out 6-5, losing a series the next weekend to Cal State-Northridge as well, now known as CSUN for some strange reason. I thought that was the name of a conference, not a single team. Apparently I am wrong.
So, bundle up, take advantage of the free hot chocolate I’m sure they will dispense in the stands and let’s sweep these suckers!
Btw, their hashtag is #FireUpFlames. I think it should be #FlameOn. But they didn’t ask me. Nobody ever does. Which is smart of them, come to think of it.
