Nuese back out to pitch the ninth, for OU. Texas leads with Cantu, batting righty. A liner to left is caught for one away. Gurwitz bats righty, with one down. Another fly ball to left and it dies at the track, for two gone. Kody Clemens bats lefty, with two away. He K's swinging, on the low hard one, to retire the side, a dozen K's now on the day for OU pitching. Bottom of the ninth tied 3
He SMOKED the ball.....like 200mph......hard to call it an E......just like he SMOKED the ball for a home run.
Connor Mayes comes in to pitch the ninth, after another outstanding job by Shugart, in the series. Wise leads off batting righty, for OU. He walks, for a lead runner. Thomas Hughes, who went in to play short, bats righty, with a man on. A 2-1 count brings out Skip, Mayes has been upset by some calls, but you can't do that here. He squares and fouls off the bunt attempt. He bunts a pitch at his feet, the sac goes 1-3, one out. Bottom of the order is Derenzo, with the winning run on second, one out. A high pop foul and Clemens misses it and it drops fair, ruled a double, two on. Hard luck for Mayes there, on the miss and that the wind brought it back fair. Harris bats lefty, at the top of the order, with two on. He is walked, to load the bases, and set up the double play and the force at home. Hollas bats lefty, with the bases loaded, one out. He singles to right, the run scores, game over. OU wins the game 4-3, the series 2-1, how deflating is that, back in a bit.
It was an error, right between his legs, called an E-6. You never see a ground ball between an infielder's legs not called an error. Your agenda has been noted.
All of the momentum we had was lost when Skip left Johnston in for 1 batter too many. Funny, ou uses the same pitcher for just over 8 innings....then puts in their short stop, who'd pitched Friday night....that pitching duo did in our array of bullpen pitchers. nuff said.
It was an error...Doesn't matter how hard or soft a ball is hit. If it is hit right at you between your legs, you should field it.
That pop-up was 6 feet into foul territory. The wind caught it, blew it 12 feet....and back into fair territory. Sad......amazing how ou can use the same pitcher for over 8 innings, put in their short stop who'd pitched all of Friday night's game, and we don't have a bullpen to compete with that???
Texas has trouble scoring runs, has for years, maybe that's why their bullpen can do that. Twelve strike outs in this game. Blaming the Texas bullpen shows your knowledge of baseball.
OU wins the series 2-1, after the 4-3 win today. It's a tough loss, that is going to be hard to overcome. The run scored in the ninth was a bad break, the pop up was wind blown, just one of those things, it's a 95 foot double, what can you do. The two unearned runs were the difference that tied the game. OU has a couple of really nice players. Neuse does it all and he gets the win in relief, pretty fitting actually, but they are not that good. Tech got 24 runs off this staff last week and Texas got nine off them this week, with the wind blowing out in Norman. It just won't get it done, in these conditions. I don't know what else to say.
I'm not one to lay blame on any of our players. Casy's saved us 50 outs in the last 2 years at 1st. The wind blowing the ball that far back was just unfortunate. And, the damage was all but done when we lost the 3-1 lead. Actually, I'm NOT blaming the bullpen. Like I said, I never blame players. That's just not right. I just feel out determination of pitching changes leaves so much to be desired. You seem to blame Augie for every single thing that happens (and have for years now). I tend to blame the pitching coach and his inadequate decisions. Skip's great at teaching pitchers. He's not so great at his decision-making on pitching changes. (what is this....the 10th game this year the changes/tardiness of changes/or lack thereof, have cost us the game?) A problem with this team, as we've all seen, is our inability to get those clutch hits when we need to. I keep thinking that the batting of a couple of our players is going to go up/get better. So far, it hasn't happened. Yes, I'm disappointed in our batting at clutch times during games. But I'm not going to blame ONE player or Augie. It's baseball, for Gawd's sake.....demon-ball. Our pitching coach can, however, determine opponent's hitters who are seeing certain pitcher's pitches and take that into account when deciding on when to make a pitching change, walk a batter, etc. (look at Neuse today). At the very beginning of the game, I said we should have walked him....2 outs....nobody on base....and he's been the hottest hitter around. We didn't....he hits a home run...turns out to be the difference in the game. Then we let him smoke another ball when we should have changed pitchers after that lead-off walk. And that's the ballgame. Those were coaching decisions, not player mistakes. Johnston pitched a great game overall.
I have blamed the hitting, who is responsible for that, it has gone on for years, you won't ever acknowledge that. It just goes on and on. It's always the hitting will catch up, but they never do. Why is this? I just want it to stop, I don't care who does it. The pitching has been the one solid part of the program during this time period. When it fails for even a portion of that long, I guarantee I will include it. The difference is I don't care what coach it is, if they are not doing the job, for a long time, I will say so. Why don't you knitpick the hitting, like you do the pitching? You would have a lot more posts if you did. If Texas could score some runs the outcome would be different, like I said Tech scored 24 runs last week against OU. This week, with the wind blowing out, Texas scores nine. It kind of makes a difference, this is the way of college baseball, even in normal conditions. They take bad at bats, strike out way to much, this is the main concern for the program, now also errors being made. I know you can't let a ground ball go between your legs, you have to stay down on it. It was hit directly at him, it's turf, it didn't take a bad hop, over his head. It has to be at least knocked down. He came up on it, it went between his legs, the error was correctly called. This is baseball 101. Texas has numerous players playing out of position, in an attempt to try to score more runs. It's been desperation mode trying to score runs, for way too long. Cantu is being beat to death behind the plate, because Barrera no longer catches, trying to get both bats in the line-up. Problem is that Cantu isn't hitting his weight, I don't doubt that being beat up game after game has hurt his hitting. I can't help but talk about what it there plainly to be seen. I do have some experience in this game, in many ways. If this is wrong, then maybe somebody else should do these threads.
What a sucky read though not your fault NB, thanks as always for these even when they are tough to read.
NB, even though there aren't that many posters on your threads, there are lurkers who are appreciating your efforts. Thanks.
Pitching coach or not, Garido is accountable for the pitching changes. He is accountable for all aspects of the program. The program is in dire straits, therefore ...
