For those of you with a better feel for this than I, Who is in what position? Starting pitching: Cole G., Taylor and ? Brandon Loy at SS After this I'm clueless. I can't wait til baseball season starts, help me with my fix.
I would say Sheppard starts at 1st, Etier at 2nd, Loy at SS, and Lusson at 3rd. Walsh will probably start at either catcher or in the outfield. Walla should be a lock in CF. After that I don't know. Those are my best predictions.
Walla will be a stud at the plate. I think Loy and Sheppard probably hit about the same as last year, maybe a little better. I wouldn't be surprised to see either Lusson or Etier have a breakout year at the plate. But we will have to see. I don't know anything about any of the freshmen we have this year so I can't comment on them at this time.
I can tell you right now, if we have Loy, Etier, and Lusson as infield starters...they better pick it up with the sticks. The middle defense was solid, but the lack of hitting cost us substantially. You can't have 3 of your starting infielders hitting below .265 and expect to be a strong, relatively consistent offensive team. My guess is at least 2 of those guys will make strong improvements in hitting. Also, I expect new blood to be littered into the lineup this year just like last year. Alot of young talent showing up, and lotta borderline production coming back. Leads to new faces getting playing time on the reg. This team becomes a solid offensive team by May and we are in serious business, considering our pitching assets.
TXThorn- you are thinking the same thing I'm thinking and what scares me even more are the bat changes for college this year and how Augie feels what direction he should go on his hitters because of those changes.
Thanks Doc, I found those interesting. I'm not sure I really have a problem with it. It makes DFF all that much larger, and our best teams have always been the ones who know how to use the gaps.
A coworker's son plays on one of the local premiere select teams and the dad knows several of the UT players. They told him that very few balls ever get out of the infield and don't even think of seeing a home run during a game. Guess we will see a bunch of low scoring games this year.
Another thing I noticed were the difference in the sound that the bats made. Some had a very loud shrill ping and some sounded just like a wood bat.
