End of Line or Deja Vu?
This is the time during the playoffs when 'Pitching Staff' temporarily takes over from 'Ace' in baseball. Unlike football and basketball, where you can keep using your quarterback or point guard game after game, baseball requires a new face to get a school to the finals. Can you imagine Marist pulling Logan Silver out of the starting QB spot in the quarterfinals? The one and done nature of Oregon baseball playoffs and the 72 hour rule has already killed off 6A Southridge, ranked number two in both RPI and the Coaches Poll. Southridge features OSU bound Jace Fry on the mound. Fry pitched five on Monday. But, whoops, Southridge lost to West Salem on Wednesday. West Salem is now 15-13 on the season. Southridge finished the season 23-4. Ouch!
North Eugene used up 7 of Andrew Moore's innings in the 5-0 win over Milwaukie, so it's not likely we'll see him Friday on just a days rest. So,who throws for North tomorrow (Friday)? Does North throw their catcher, Kyle DeHaven? Or lefty first baseman, Chris Clayton? Or Boehm, or Harpole?
Wilsonville is in a similar situation. Their official number one is Jackson Luby, who has pitched the last two outings for the Wildcats. Spencer Cumiford, 5-2 on the season, is their number 2. Both are seniors. Luby won Monday, with a 11 strike out four hitter. So it's bound to be Cumiford vs ? at Swede.
I like this round in the bracket, because this is when teams get rewarded for deep pitching staffs, great fielding and pressure hitting. The way Wilsonville has been pounding teams in their last four games, the favorite role might tilt towards the Warriors a little. If whoever starts for North keeps the ball on the ground, the Highlander defense will keep North in the game. I think it will be close. North needs to get some offensive production out of their entire order for this game. It was a good sign Wednesday against Milwaukie when #8 hitter Cory Shuster doubled and #9 hitter Toby Woods singled him in.
This year's playoff set up is similar to North's run last year, except North had to play one more game in the playoffs last year to get to the quarterfinals. Hopefully, you remember North's "#2" last year was Garret Mills during the playoffs. Mills beat Corvallis 13-2 in the round of 16 and beat West Albany 11-1 in the semis. The Highlander offense took some short breaks during their 6-0 win in the sub round, their 3-2 quarterfinal win behind Moore and the 3-0 win over Ashland on Moore's 3 hit, four strike out craftsmanship. Obviously, the Highlander defense was merciless throughout.
If the Highlanders beat Wilsonville Friday, then Moore could go next Tuesday and again Saturday for the championship, providing North wins in the semis. Interestingly, North had that same option last year. Did coach Nicholsen use Mills in the semi's because Moore was just a young sophomore? I don't think so. Mills had been sidelined for part of the season and was a bit of an unknown to other teams. He could rule the strike zone as he did in his one hitter in the semi's. Does coach Nicholsen know who can pull a Mills again this year?
Tune in Friday.
Cunningham's 17 k's verus Barlow
A lot of old geezers like me probably were chuckling after Cunningham faced a few batters in the Barlow game. It was obvious that the Bruins weren't ready for Cason's 85 mph fastball. (A Duck had the radar on Cunningham. The Duck clocked Moore at 88 Wednesday). Cunningham's delivery gives his fastball an 'X' factor. If you've seen some of my photos, Cason tilts so far backwards, the batters can only see his legs and feet. Can't see his head, can't see the ball, cant see his arm.... just that right foot, his legs and the underside of his cap bill. Then whoosh, he explodes, and the ball is on you. The Bruins batters were loading up and starting their swings a wee bit early, which didn't help their situation.
A bunch of Sheldon fans, including myself, were jawing with the first base coach. He said their league only had three pitchers who could throw in the 80's, and Barlow had two of them, so they weren't prepared for Cason's heat. I thought that's odd. This is probably outlawed by some rule now, or maybe it turns the stomachs of today's coaches, but why wouldn't you practice against your own pitchers? I know back in a by gone era, some coaches would take two pitchers and have them throw full throttle against their own players. 21 pitches at a time and rotate. That's equivilant to 6 warm up pitches in an inning plus a 15 pitch inning. Do that a couple of times a week during the off season and you'll make men out or boys, and they'll think 80-85 mph is normal. (The pitchers did hide behind screens, the coaches weren't crazy.)
McMinnville 12 Thurston 1
Not the way we want an MWL team to go out, but I'm already looking forward to watching the Colts next year. And let's not forget, Thurston moved up from 5A ball this year. I didn't see Thurston as much as I wanted to this year. The expansion of the MWL from six to nine teams made it hard to get around as much as last year. Why am I excited about the Colts for next year? I was expecting good things out of junior catcher Jarren Goddard and sophomore Kyle Watson and got it. My big bonuses as a spectator came from Stefan Drake, who wasn't on my radar, as he hammered the ball a lot and frosh Aaron Clift, who was good on the mound and looks to have a better future ahead of him. I think I brought good luck to juniors Joey Urness and Aaron Hoover, as both of these guys pounded the ball when I saw the Colts. My thinking is that if Watty takes that big leap on the mound to his junior year, as sophomores often do, and Clift gets better, the Colts are looking more than good for next year. All six of these players made all league, which should make the Colts the favorites for MWL champs next year.
Non-seniors
Non seniors should go watch as much playoff ball as possible and study the players and the team attitude. You can't go to a quarterfinal game where at least one team isn't really focused. There is a lot of down time in baseball. Down time between pitches, downtime between hitting, downtime between innings. It's easy to lose focus. Teams that know how to focus - each pitch and each practice play and each lift or run - are the ones left standing in the semi's and finals. And besides, you get to see some great baseball.
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Sunday, May 22, 2011
5A MWL play-in Stinkeroo
5A Play-in Stumble
With the MWL's success in the state playoffs the last four years, the 1-4 record in the second round of play-in games came as quite a surprise to many. I know I'm in that crowd.
I thought North Eugene and Marist were locks, although I was concerned about Marist having one of their defensive blow ups, which they did . I figured Churchill had a good chance with Lessel on the mound. Springfield was a long shot, but not an impossibility, while Willamette suffered a horrible draw against Ashland and had little chance.
It could have been worse. North Eugene's bats were silent against a Woodburn pitcher who threw a lot like Churchill's Lessel. North was down 1-0 going into the bottom of the fourth and there wasn't any reason to think North would be scoring a lot. North didn't score a lot, just enough to secure a 3-1 win.
I think our showing has a lot to do with our league's pitching this year and somewhat to do with the youth in our league. There weren't a lot of 'shut down' pitchers this year. Moore, of course, was ridiculous with a 0.30 ERA in league. Opponents knew they had to shut out North or hold them to one run every time they saw Moore. Lessel was another pitcher who was money game in and game out. Thurston's Tyler Johnson was someone teams definitely didn't want to see take the mound in relief. TJ seemed to turn into the 'Intimidator' in relief.
After Moore and Lessel, we had a few pitchers who could shut someone down on occasion as starters, but opponents could at least hope for an off day or anticipate the pitcher getting tired. These guys were good. TJ as a starter, Eyster, Watson, Cunningham, Schindler, Nielsen and Haskin quickly come to mind. That's leaving out Bates and Waggoner. I was fortunate to see some real gems by Moore, Lessel, Eyster, Cunningham, Nielsen and Schindler. Either I didn't see the others in a start or I caught one of their off games.
I probably missed a couple of pitchers who are very good on a given day, but after the guys I mentioned, the pitching fell off for almost all teams. There just weren't a lot of number two pitchers who could get to a 2 to 1 strike to ball ratio, much less a 3 or 4 to one ratio. Obviously, it isn't good for a team to be without a true ace or two. But it also wasn't good for MWL batters as the hitters didn't see consistently good pitching. The good news is that next year a lot of good pitchers and potentially really good pitchers return: Moore, Lessel, Schindler, Watson, Nielsen, Clift and Waggoner . Others with quite a bit of experience in league who have the potential to shine - Toby Woods, Chris Clayton, Malik Evans and Cooper Stiles. Let me know who I missed. I didn't get to see everybody. Imagine what a great year it would be if a few more of these guys become 'Dominators'.
The youth excuse. I don't like to use the youth excuse because a lot of state finals teams have only four or five seniors. But I think we can use this excuse to some degree. With the exception of Marist, the senior night ceremony was very brief. Not only that, but we had several teams that were heavy with freshman and sophomores. These young players were decent, but don't compare with seniors. Why are seniors important? Senior starters are usually bigger, stronger, more experienced and more baseball savvy than the underclassman. Plus, they've likely seen most of the pitchers they will face. Were most frosh, sophs and juniors anywhere near as good as TJ, Kristian Smith, Bryson Jones, Pomeroy, Silver, Swindling, Eyster, Innouye, Britt, Boehm, Harpole, DeHaven, Herr, Cunningham, Leung, Bates, Helfrich, Dudley, Craig, Larson, Dunlap, Svennson, or Concannon? A few, but not many underclassmen could play like these guys. And these seniors bring a maturity and focus that the underclassmen don't.
So, as spectators, we thought our league was tough. But in effect, we were watching a bunch of young teams developing this year. Next year will be much different. Churchill brings back 6 juniors who played extensively, including Lessel and DeZarn. North brings back 5 heavily experienced juniors and hopefully a healthy Toby Woods on the mound. Sheldon brings back three juniors who were regulars and four sophs who started or got significant experience. Thurston returns five juniors who started or had lots of playing time, plus junior to be Watson and Sophi to be Clift. South returns a lot, but may still be too young next year! Axemen Giland and Morrison will return for their senior year, Schindler and Wectawski will be juniors and four frosh who started or played a lot will be back. Springfield and Marshfield might be facing the same situation as South - more experienced next year, but still too young. Marist bucked the trend, having had 12 seniors on their team.
I'm a little melancholy that the season is winding down too fast. It has been fun watching all of the young teams grow, and it was great fun to watch the 5A MWL teams compete nose to nose with the MWL 6A teams. The MWL season has at least through Wednesday in post season play. I hope we can stretch it to another championship game on June 4.
Photos
New photos are up for several teams since the last post, and I think they were all on sunny days. Sheldon-Redmond, NE-Silverton, Churchill-Corvallis games. Click on the year '2011' on the following page to get to your teams photos. Photos
With the MWL's success in the state playoffs the last four years, the 1-4 record in the second round of play-in games came as quite a surprise to many. I know I'm in that crowd.
I thought North Eugene and Marist were locks, although I was concerned about Marist having one of their defensive blow ups, which they did . I figured Churchill had a good chance with Lessel on the mound. Springfield was a long shot, but not an impossibility, while Willamette suffered a horrible draw against Ashland and had little chance.
It could have been worse. North Eugene's bats were silent against a Woodburn pitcher who threw a lot like Churchill's Lessel. North was down 1-0 going into the bottom of the fourth and there wasn't any reason to think North would be scoring a lot. North didn't score a lot, just enough to secure a 3-1 win.
I think our showing has a lot to do with our league's pitching this year and somewhat to do with the youth in our league. There weren't a lot of 'shut down' pitchers this year. Moore, of course, was ridiculous with a 0.30 ERA in league. Opponents knew they had to shut out North or hold them to one run every time they saw Moore. Lessel was another pitcher who was money game in and game out. Thurston's Tyler Johnson was someone teams definitely didn't want to see take the mound in relief. TJ seemed to turn into the 'Intimidator' in relief.
After Moore and Lessel, we had a few pitchers who could shut someone down on occasion as starters, but opponents could at least hope for an off day or anticipate the pitcher getting tired. These guys were good. TJ as a starter, Eyster, Watson, Cunningham, Schindler, Nielsen and Haskin quickly come to mind. That's leaving out Bates and Waggoner. I was fortunate to see some real gems by Moore, Lessel, Eyster, Cunningham, Nielsen and Schindler. Either I didn't see the others in a start or I caught one of their off games.
I probably missed a couple of pitchers who are very good on a given day, but after the guys I mentioned, the pitching fell off for almost all teams. There just weren't a lot of number two pitchers who could get to a 2 to 1 strike to ball ratio, much less a 3 or 4 to one ratio. Obviously, it isn't good for a team to be without a true ace or two. But it also wasn't good for MWL batters as the hitters didn't see consistently good pitching. The good news is that next year a lot of good pitchers and potentially really good pitchers return: Moore, Lessel, Schindler, Watson, Nielsen, Clift and Waggoner . Others with quite a bit of experience in league who have the potential to shine - Toby Woods, Chris Clayton, Malik Evans and Cooper Stiles. Let me know who I missed. I didn't get to see everybody. Imagine what a great year it would be if a few more of these guys become 'Dominators'.
The youth excuse. I don't like to use the youth excuse because a lot of state finals teams have only four or five seniors. But I think we can use this excuse to some degree. With the exception of Marist, the senior night ceremony was very brief. Not only that, but we had several teams that were heavy with freshman and sophomores. These young players were decent, but don't compare with seniors. Why are seniors important? Senior starters are usually bigger, stronger, more experienced and more baseball savvy than the underclassman. Plus, they've likely seen most of the pitchers they will face. Were most frosh, sophs and juniors anywhere near as good as TJ, Kristian Smith, Bryson Jones, Pomeroy, Silver, Swindling, Eyster, Innouye, Britt, Boehm, Harpole, DeHaven, Herr, Cunningham, Leung, Bates, Helfrich, Dudley, Craig, Larson, Dunlap, Svennson, or Concannon? A few, but not many underclassmen could play like these guys. And these seniors bring a maturity and focus that the underclassmen don't.
So, as spectators, we thought our league was tough. But in effect, we were watching a bunch of young teams developing this year. Next year will be much different. Churchill brings back 6 juniors who played extensively, including Lessel and DeZarn. North brings back 5 heavily experienced juniors and hopefully a healthy Toby Woods on the mound. Sheldon brings back three juniors who were regulars and four sophs who started or got significant experience. Thurston returns five juniors who started or had lots of playing time, plus junior to be Watson and Sophi to be Clift. South returns a lot, but may still be too young next year! Axemen Giland and Morrison will return for their senior year, Schindler and Wectawski will be juniors and four frosh who started or played a lot will be back. Springfield and Marshfield might be facing the same situation as South - more experienced next year, but still too young. Marist bucked the trend, having had 12 seniors on their team.
I'm a little melancholy that the season is winding down too fast. It has been fun watching all of the young teams grow, and it was great fun to watch the 5A MWL teams compete nose to nose with the MWL 6A teams. The MWL season has at least through Wednesday in post season play. I hope we can stretch it to another championship game on June 4.
Photos
New photos are up for several teams since the last post, and I think they were all on sunny days. Sheldon-Redmond, NE-Silverton, Churchill-Corvallis games. Click on the year '2011' on the following page to get to your teams photos. Photos
Sunday, May 15, 2011
6A Seeding Sweep
MWL 6A Seeding Sweep!
Not only did Thurston, Sheldon and South Eugene sweep their Special District seeding games, but they did it in a big way.
Sheldon's game had more meaning. The winner, Sheldon, got an automatic berth to the round of 32. As the loser, Redmond has to win a play-in game to get to the round of 32. Sheldon proved what everyone was thinking - Redmond isn't really a #3 RPI team. It's true, Redmonds high RPI comes on the backs of a lot of games against 5A opponents. Sheldon's win dropped Redmond to #5 in the RPI. Redmond will host Century. Century has an RPI of 36. That compares to Sheldon's #16 ranking.
Thurston 2011 Undisputed MWL champs.
The MWL championship trophy stays in Springfield for the fourth year. The Millers earned it last year, while the Colts won back to back titles in '08 and '09. It took a nine game MWL win streak by the Colts to close the season to claim the trophy. Who would have thought this could happen after the Colts were no hit on opening day? Thurston followed getting no hit by North with a 2 run output against Sheldon, and quickly went 0-2 in league.
Then came two back to back 9 inning games near the end of the first round. Thurston won the first against Springfield 2-1 and lost the second to Churchill 3-2. Since then, it's pretty much been bombs away for Thurston. The Colts opened the second round with two 7-6 wins, one of them another nine inning game. Then Thurston ramped up the offense even more in 10-7 and 10-9 wins. The wins weren't pretty, and they were usually late, but they were wins. Lately, Thurston's defense has stepped up, allowing just five runs in the last four games. Seven different Colts homered in league. A frosh, a soph, four juniors and a senior. Aye-yi-yi. Wait'll next year. The Colts had at least six players with 10 rbi's. Pitching is key down the playoff stretch. Thurston's pitching has been very good over the last four games. If pitching regresses, the bats better stay hot.
Thurston is a fun, never-say-die team to watch. Just about any player can reach the fence, so they are never out of a game and they know it. If your team gets bumped out of the playoffs early, jump on over to a Colt playoff game. It'll be worth it.
Marist - North Eugene game
I chose to go to the Springfield at Churchill game because the game would determine seeding order and Kameron Bates and Jake Lessel were scheduled to dual. I passed up the North Eugene - Marist game because North Eugene and Marist couldn't change their order of seeding even if Marist won. Plus Marist's Zach Eyster wasn't scheduled to pitch against Andrew Moore. So I go watch an 8-0 ballgame, while I missed "The best high school game I have ever seen." game. I attended the Sheldon-Redmond game the night after the Churchill-Springfield game. All I heard in the pre-game chatter was what a great game the North-Marist game was and that the paper did not do the game justice. And I thought the paper did a good job with Delaney's catches. But the fans were saying that there were several tremendous infield plays as well as several double plays. Oh, well, I got some good photos.
Fryback story followup.
For those of you who read the Jim Fryback-kielbasa story in my last blog.... There is no truth to the rumor that after I blogged about Jim that he and fellow Irishman Ted Norman got a ladder and tried to remove the asterisk from the baseball banner in Sheldon's gym. (The asterisk by 1968 signifies a co-championship with Marshfield)
League stats
I hope to get league stats from most teams this week. I already have Sheldon's and South's final stats. I think the unofficial final stats ranking all players are pretty close. The big exception being missing RBI's from Thurston's 29-1 win over Marshfield. League unofficial stats all players. Remember, these are for just the 16 league games.
Photos and donations
I added several more galleries of photos. Many were when the sun was out, which makes the photo's 'pop'. I also have a couple of galleries where I typed 'Print at home'. You won't find any copyright marks on those. They are just way too dark to sell because or dark, cloudy, muddy conditions. Remember half of the profits go to your school's booster club. I am pleased to announce I wrote a check for over 50 bucks to Marist last month. Typical prices are 4x6 for $2, 5x7 for $3.50 and 8x10 for $6.99. All photos are guaranteed by the photo service, Smugmug. You can jump off to your school's gallery from this page.
Photos
Donations.
A couple of minutes ago I just received my first donation! And for more than my suggestion of $10. Thanks a million! Well, not quite a million. It brightens up my wife's day when her stay at home husband say's, "Darling, I sold another photo." or "Darling, I received a donation, today."
Facebook page.
I'm not even sure why I am doing this, but I started a Facebook page for the website that you can link to from my home page. Being an introvert, I don't really understand what the big whoppee is about Facebook. But I've been told kids will go to the Facebook page before they check the real MWL site, so I'll try it. I posted a few pictures on it. Other than that, I'm not sure what I will be posting. If you know what I should be posting about, let me know. And can anyone tell me who the Miller is who is falling from the sky into an ocean of grass? Facebook link
Follow the playoffs on Twitter.
I'll be tweeting the scores during the playoffs. I'll most likely be at the Willamette playin game Tuesday. A Colt fan texts me Thurston scores that I then tweet out to MWL fans when the Colts play. Same with North. If you would like to text me scores at 541-337-1311, I can tweet those, too. I assume that if you get tweets, you can add your game scores to the tweet, but I have no idea how to do that. Anyway, here's the Tweet page if you want to sign up. MWL Tweet. I don't tweet a lot, usually just on game days and if anything big happens, like the Red Sox signing one of our players out of high school. Actually, I wouldn't tweet if it were the Sox. Yankees, Yes. Red Sox, No.
Not only did Thurston, Sheldon and South Eugene sweep their Special District seeding games, but they did it in a big way.
- Thurston and South Eugene beat their Portland opponents on the road.
- Thurston's big bats clobbered Lincoln 11 to 3. The Colts are averaging over 12 runs per game in their last 11 games!
- South took a 5-1 lead in the top of the fourth and held on for a 5-3 road win.
- In Eugene, Sheldon pounded Redmond 11-1 in five innings. Redmond didn't look like a #3 RPI team.
Sheldon's game had more meaning. The winner, Sheldon, got an automatic berth to the round of 32. As the loser, Redmond has to win a play-in game to get to the round of 32. Sheldon proved what everyone was thinking - Redmond isn't really a #3 RPI team. It's true, Redmonds high RPI comes on the backs of a lot of games against 5A opponents. Sheldon's win dropped Redmond to #5 in the RPI. Redmond will host Century. Century has an RPI of 36. That compares to Sheldon's #16 ranking.
Thurston 2011 Undisputed MWL champs.
The MWL championship trophy stays in Springfield for the fourth year. The Millers earned it last year, while the Colts won back to back titles in '08 and '09. It took a nine game MWL win streak by the Colts to close the season to claim the trophy. Who would have thought this could happen after the Colts were no hit on opening day? Thurston followed getting no hit by North with a 2 run output against Sheldon, and quickly went 0-2 in league.
Then came two back to back 9 inning games near the end of the first round. Thurston won the first against Springfield 2-1 and lost the second to Churchill 3-2. Since then, it's pretty much been bombs away for Thurston. The Colts opened the second round with two 7-6 wins, one of them another nine inning game. Then Thurston ramped up the offense even more in 10-7 and 10-9 wins. The wins weren't pretty, and they were usually late, but they were wins. Lately, Thurston's defense has stepped up, allowing just five runs in the last four games. Seven different Colts homered in league. A frosh, a soph, four juniors and a senior. Aye-yi-yi. Wait'll next year. The Colts had at least six players with 10 rbi's. Pitching is key down the playoff stretch. Thurston's pitching has been very good over the last four games. If pitching regresses, the bats better stay hot.
Thurston is a fun, never-say-die team to watch. Just about any player can reach the fence, so they are never out of a game and they know it. If your team gets bumped out of the playoffs early, jump on over to a Colt playoff game. It'll be worth it.
Marist - North Eugene game
I chose to go to the Springfield at Churchill game because the game would determine seeding order and Kameron Bates and Jake Lessel were scheduled to dual. I passed up the North Eugene - Marist game because North Eugene and Marist couldn't change their order of seeding even if Marist won. Plus Marist's Zach Eyster wasn't scheduled to pitch against Andrew Moore. So I go watch an 8-0 ballgame, while I missed "The best high school game I have ever seen." game. I attended the Sheldon-Redmond game the night after the Churchill-Springfield game. All I heard in the pre-game chatter was what a great game the North-Marist game was and that the paper did not do the game justice. And I thought the paper did a good job with Delaney's catches. But the fans were saying that there were several tremendous infield plays as well as several double plays. Oh, well, I got some good photos.
Fryback story followup.
For those of you who read the Jim Fryback-kielbasa story in my last blog.... There is no truth to the rumor that after I blogged about Jim that he and fellow Irishman Ted Norman got a ladder and tried to remove the asterisk from the baseball banner in Sheldon's gym. (The asterisk by 1968 signifies a co-championship with Marshfield)
League stats
I hope to get league stats from most teams this week. I already have Sheldon's and South's final stats. I think the unofficial final stats ranking all players are pretty close. The big exception being missing RBI's from Thurston's 29-1 win over Marshfield. League unofficial stats all players. Remember, these are for just the 16 league games.
Photos and donations
I added several more galleries of photos. Many were when the sun was out, which makes the photo's 'pop'. I also have a couple of galleries where I typed 'Print at home'. You won't find any copyright marks on those. They are just way too dark to sell because or dark, cloudy, muddy conditions. Remember half of the profits go to your school's booster club. I am pleased to announce I wrote a check for over 50 bucks to Marist last month. Typical prices are 4x6 for $2, 5x7 for $3.50 and 8x10 for $6.99. All photos are guaranteed by the photo service, Smugmug. You can jump off to your school's gallery from this page.
Photos
Donations.
A couple of minutes ago I just received my first donation! And for more than my suggestion of $10. Thanks a million! Well, not quite a million. It brightens up my wife's day when her stay at home husband say's, "Darling, I sold another photo." or "Darling, I received a donation, today."
Facebook page.
I'm not even sure why I am doing this, but I started a Facebook page for the website that you can link to from my home page. Being an introvert, I don't really understand what the big whoppee is about Facebook. But I've been told kids will go to the Facebook page before they check the real MWL site, so I'll try it. I posted a few pictures on it. Other than that, I'm not sure what I will be posting. If you know what I should be posting about, let me know. And can anyone tell me who the Miller is who is falling from the sky into an ocean of grass? Facebook link
Follow the playoffs on Twitter.
I'll be tweeting the scores during the playoffs. I'll most likely be at the Willamette playin game Tuesday. A Colt fan texts me Thurston scores that I then tweet out to MWL fans when the Colts play. Same with North. If you would like to text me scores at 541-337-1311, I can tweet those, too. I assume that if you get tweets, you can add your game scores to the tweet, but I have no idea how to do that. Anyway, here's the Tweet page if you want to sign up. MWL Tweet. I don't tweet a lot, usually just on game days and if anything big happens, like the Red Sox signing one of our players out of high school. Actually, I wouldn't tweet if it were the Sox. Yankees, Yes. Red Sox, No.
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Tie Breaker, RPI and Jim Fryback story
Tie breaker and seeds
The MWL seeds are mostly set, with Wednesday's Springfield - Churchill game determining the 5A three and four seeds. I'm hoping it's a match-up of Kameron Bates and Jake Lessel. I don't think either pitched Monday.
Several people emailed me and asked why I already had North Eugene as the number one 5A seed and Marist number two. They play each other Wednesday. If Marist wins, North and Marist will have identical 12-4 records and will have split their season series. Each league sets up their own tie breaking rules. This is the current tie-breaker set up.
Marist is currently ranked fourth in state in the RPI at 575, while North Eugene is 5th at 564. If North beats Marist at Marist, their RPI's should be very, very close. The RPI formula depends on the record of every in-state team that either Marist or North have played. Without adding in all of those teams, their difference is less than one RPI point in North's favor if North wins.
What it all means is that if both teams keep winning they should not see each other until at least the semi's.
Thurston is ranked #6 in the 6A RPI and automatically advances to the 6A round of 32 and should have a good match-up based on the #6 RPI rank.
Does it matter if your team is a co-champion but second seed?
This will lead into a longwinded story involving Sheldon's assistant coach Jim Fryback, so you may want to get back to work and wait until the next blog.
I believe this year the AD's decided that "There will be only one MWL champion". In the case of a tie, the tie breaker process will be used and if there is a perfect tie, the RPI will break the tie. That made sense if the two teams were from the same classification, like Sheldon and Thurston from 6A, or North and Marist from 5A. But this year a tie could be between a 5A and 6A team, and I say a 'co-championship' would be appropriate.
Maybe I'm sensitive to co-championships because my senior year at Marshfield, I played on an 8-1 co-champion football team, a 15-3 co-champion basketball team and a co-champion baseball team. Back in those days only one team went to state in football and baseball, and Marshfield was the odd man out. So I only went to state in basketball, where my awesome 15 inch vertical kept me on the bench most of the time.
But the district co-championship in baseball means a lot now, especially in baseball, as no one thinks Marshfield was ever good in baseball. But if you go into the Sheldon gym, look at their banners, and if Jim Fryback hasn't gotten a ladder and removed the asterisk by 1968 in baseball, you'll have proof that Sheldon and Marshfield tied for the district champoinship.
Adults can do wonderful things to kids, and the Eugene-Springfield schools cooked up a good one to keep Marshfield and North Bend out of the state baseball playoffs. The MWL was set up in two divisions for several years. The Eugene-Springfield schools played in the 'northern league' while Marshfield and North Bend played each other a million times in the 'southern league'. Then there was a playoff. The winner of the southern league played the number two northern team. If the southern team won, then the southern team played the northern team, but had to beat them twice to get to state. It was a diabolical set up. I suppose in response to Marshfield's domination of football and basketball in the 50's.
Here's where Fryback comes in. I didn't know him back them. But I was a 190 pound fullback and he was a much smaller defensive player who I enjoyed flicking off my thigh pads. Fryback was quite the basketball player and as I said, I was vertically challenged, mostly by the weight of my large derriere. We split our basketball series with Sheldon and got to play them in Mac Court to see who would be the one and two seeds in the Rose Garden. I offered my services to Marshfield's legendary coach Bruce Hoffine to go into the game early and, shall we say, 'frustrate' Fryback and Sheldon's big center, but Hoffine told me to go practice my free throws. Coach should have taken up my offer as Sheldon won. Marshfield lost the tourney opener against number one David Douglas by three points, while Fryback and Sheldon handled Baker in their opener. The Irish eventually lost to David Douglas by 9 in a contest for the fourth place trophy.
So then comes baseball season. The Eugene schools really didn't know much about Marshfield because we played our summer ball in the Klamath Falls, Medford and Roseburg legion hotbeds. Old timers will remember the Keck, Brosterhaus, Miller combo's from Klamath and Jim Beamer from Roseburg. Those guys were baseball's LeBron James.
We handled the pesky Bulldogs and we were pumped for our series against North Eugene and Sheldon. We were strong on pitching and felt we could take all three. One of our pitchers, Herb Pryor, would go on to set the NCAA record for complete game victories at UNLV and go on to triple A ball. It rained and rained and we couldn't get our games in. Finally the OSAA said we had to get our games in, so Marshfield, North Eugene and Sheldon headed off to Bend....... Fryback told me the next part of the story when a bunch of Sheldon parents were socializing back in the 90's, but he didn't realize who I was.
Fryback was still seething during the baseball season about me running over him in football. Things were different back in the good old days and not much was out of bounds. So he sends a batch of tainted kielbasa to Marshfield high school, knowing that there were three Polish coaches who would probably take home the kielbasa, my Dad being one of them. I ate it up! It was great! But the next morning when we got on the bus, I had a horrible pain in my side. I thought I was nervous, so I didn't tell my dad (the coach) anything. The pain just kept getting worse. I finally had to tell dad that I was sweating and my gut was killing me. They took me off the bus in Drain and found the only doctor in town, who quickly diagnosed me with appendicitis. Turned out the 'doctor' was an Irish alum. Anyway, I was sent back to Coos Bay, and had my appendix removed by another Irish alum.
The bus travelled the rest of the way to Bend. Marshfield took care of North Eugene 2-0. Then the Pirates beat Sheldon 4-2, earning the co-champion title, and headed to the bus to go to the motel for a good nights rest before playing Sheldon for the tie breaker. But no, the OSAA pulled Marshfield off the bus and said we had to play a triple header. Sheldon won the tie-breaker 5-1. The next year in a similar set-up, Pirate Herb Pryor threw 12 innings of no hit ball in the divisions playoffs, but ran out of innings.
Anyway, the title co-champion does relieve the sting a little bit. And I've mostly forgiven Fryback for the Kielbasa trick. Though when I see him at Courtsports and he thinks I have walked over to his recumbent cycle to talk some baseball, I am really turning on the radioactive isotope under his seat.
Good Luck in the playoffs everyone!
The MWL seeds are mostly set, with Wednesday's Springfield - Churchill game determining the 5A three and four seeds. I'm hoping it's a match-up of Kameron Bates and Jake Lessel. I don't think either pitched Monday.
Several people emailed me and asked why I already had North Eugene as the number one 5A seed and Marist number two. They play each other Wednesday. If Marist wins, North and Marist will have identical 12-4 records and will have split their season series. Each league sets up their own tie breaking rules. This is the current tie-breaker set up.
- Check to see if a team won the head to head match-ups.
- If the teams split their head to head, then start at the top of the standings and check to see if either team beat the top ranked team. So, ff Marist & North tie, the league looks to Thurston as the highest placing team besides Marist and North.
- North beat Thurston once, 5-0. Marist lost both games by scores of 8-5 and 10-9.
- Had Marist and North had the same record against Thurston, the league would check the next highest placing team which is Sheldon. North and Marist both split with the Irish.
- Just keep going down the standings until you find the first team that one of tied teams beat more than the other tied team and you have found your winner.
- If there is a 'perfect' tie, where the tied teams split against each other and beat everyone else the same number of times, then this year I believe the RPI was going to be used as the next tiebreaker.
Marist is currently ranked fourth in state in the RPI at 575, while North Eugene is 5th at 564. If North beats Marist at Marist, their RPI's should be very, very close. The RPI formula depends on the record of every in-state team that either Marist or North have played. Without adding in all of those teams, their difference is less than one RPI point in North's favor if North wins.
What it all means is that if both teams keep winning they should not see each other until at least the semi's.
Thurston is ranked #6 in the 6A RPI and automatically advances to the 6A round of 32 and should have a good match-up based on the #6 RPI rank.
Does it matter if your team is a co-champion but second seed?
This will lead into a longwinded story involving Sheldon's assistant coach Jim Fryback, so you may want to get back to work and wait until the next blog.
I believe this year the AD's decided that "There will be only one MWL champion". In the case of a tie, the tie breaker process will be used and if there is a perfect tie, the RPI will break the tie. That made sense if the two teams were from the same classification, like Sheldon and Thurston from 6A, or North and Marist from 5A. But this year a tie could be between a 5A and 6A team, and I say a 'co-championship' would be appropriate.
Maybe I'm sensitive to co-championships because my senior year at Marshfield, I played on an 8-1 co-champion football team, a 15-3 co-champion basketball team and a co-champion baseball team. Back in those days only one team went to state in football and baseball, and Marshfield was the odd man out. So I only went to state in basketball, where my awesome 15 inch vertical kept me on the bench most of the time.
But the district co-championship in baseball means a lot now, especially in baseball, as no one thinks Marshfield was ever good in baseball. But if you go into the Sheldon gym, look at their banners, and if Jim Fryback hasn't gotten a ladder and removed the asterisk by 1968 in baseball, you'll have proof that Sheldon and Marshfield tied for the district champoinship.
Adults can do wonderful things to kids, and the Eugene-Springfield schools cooked up a good one to keep Marshfield and North Bend out of the state baseball playoffs. The MWL was set up in two divisions for several years. The Eugene-Springfield schools played in the 'northern league' while Marshfield and North Bend played each other a million times in the 'southern league'. Then there was a playoff. The winner of the southern league played the number two northern team. If the southern team won, then the southern team played the northern team, but had to beat them twice to get to state. It was a diabolical set up. I suppose in response to Marshfield's domination of football and basketball in the 50's.
Here's where Fryback comes in. I didn't know him back them. But I was a 190 pound fullback and he was a much smaller defensive player who I enjoyed flicking off my thigh pads. Fryback was quite the basketball player and as I said, I was vertically challenged, mostly by the weight of my large derriere. We split our basketball series with Sheldon and got to play them in Mac Court to see who would be the one and two seeds in the Rose Garden. I offered my services to Marshfield's legendary coach Bruce Hoffine to go into the game early and, shall we say, 'frustrate' Fryback and Sheldon's big center, but Hoffine told me to go practice my free throws. Coach should have taken up my offer as Sheldon won. Marshfield lost the tourney opener against number one David Douglas by three points, while Fryback and Sheldon handled Baker in their opener. The Irish eventually lost to David Douglas by 9 in a contest for the fourth place trophy.
So then comes baseball season. The Eugene schools really didn't know much about Marshfield because we played our summer ball in the Klamath Falls, Medford and Roseburg legion hotbeds. Old timers will remember the Keck, Brosterhaus, Miller combo's from Klamath and Jim Beamer from Roseburg. Those guys were baseball's LeBron James.
We handled the pesky Bulldogs and we were pumped for our series against North Eugene and Sheldon. We were strong on pitching and felt we could take all three. One of our pitchers, Herb Pryor, would go on to set the NCAA record for complete game victories at UNLV and go on to triple A ball. It rained and rained and we couldn't get our games in. Finally the OSAA said we had to get our games in, so Marshfield, North Eugene and Sheldon headed off to Bend....... Fryback told me the next part of the story when a bunch of Sheldon parents were socializing back in the 90's, but he didn't realize who I was.
Fryback was still seething during the baseball season about me running over him in football. Things were different back in the good old days and not much was out of bounds. So he sends a batch of tainted kielbasa to Marshfield high school, knowing that there were three Polish coaches who would probably take home the kielbasa, my Dad being one of them. I ate it up! It was great! But the next morning when we got on the bus, I had a horrible pain in my side. I thought I was nervous, so I didn't tell my dad (the coach) anything. The pain just kept getting worse. I finally had to tell dad that I was sweating and my gut was killing me. They took me off the bus in Drain and found the only doctor in town, who quickly diagnosed me with appendicitis. Turned out the 'doctor' was an Irish alum. Anyway, I was sent back to Coos Bay, and had my appendix removed by another Irish alum.
The bus travelled the rest of the way to Bend. Marshfield took care of North Eugene 2-0. Then the Pirates beat Sheldon 4-2, earning the co-champion title, and headed to the bus to go to the motel for a good nights rest before playing Sheldon for the tie breaker. But no, the OSAA pulled Marshfield off the bus and said we had to play a triple header. Sheldon won the tie-breaker 5-1. The next year in a similar set-up, Pirate Herb Pryor threw 12 innings of no hit ball in the divisions playoffs, but ran out of innings.
Anyway, the title co-champion does relieve the sting a little bit. And I've mostly forgiven Fryback for the Kielbasa trick. Though when I see him at Courtsports and he thinks I have walked over to his recumbent cycle to talk some baseball, I am really turning on the radioactive isotope under his seat.
Good Luck in the playoffs everyone!
Monday, May 9, 2011
South Eugene spoils pennant race
After driving through the rains to get home from Thurston Friday night, I opened my email to check on scores from the MWL. The first email title was "South Eugene 9 Marist 1. No Typo!" I wasn't overly shocked by a South upset of Marist, I figured Joe Schindler must have pitched and pitched a beaut of a game. But I was shocked by the score. The Marist bats are good for a few more runs, and the Axemen hadn't had any success holding the better teams down, allowing 10.6 runs per game by the top four MWL teams, including giving up 19 to Marist in the first round.
Indeed, Schindler did pitch a fine game, giving up just two hits, one a bunt single. Schindler was a little shaky in the first, walking leadoff Logan Silver, and two outs later, falling behind clean-up Jake Britt, 3-1, before Britt singled in Silver. But from then on, it was almost autopilot, starting with striking out the side in the second. The third inning was stormy due to two errors, which helped load the bases, but Schindler took care of that with an infield pop up and a strike out of the clean up batter. Three up, three down in the fourth and fifth. A walk with outs in each of the sixth and 7th and Schindler took the Axemen home with a victory.
Meanwhile, South broke the game wide open in the fourth, sending 12 batters to the plate and scoring six. Carlos Larson led off the inning from the 5 slot with a solo shot to left center. The next four batters got on via two singles, a walk and a hit batter. A few batters later, Gus Craig tripled in two runs and scored on a passed ball. With Schindler dialed in on the mound, Marist was headed towards a loss and second place in the MWL.
At the same time, I was at the eastern front of the MWL, where Thurston was hosting Churchill. I prefer pitching duals with small ball and great batting matches between the best pitchers and the best hitters in the league. So I thought about going to South to see if Schindler would be pitching and facing Silver, Swindlling, Britt and company. But I looked out the window and chose the shelter of the mancave at Thurston. I knew the odds of a great pitching dual were slim, but I also knew that a) the Colts are entertaining in a wild and wooly way, and b) the wind would be blowing out 20 knots per hour and the Colt sluggers and Churchill's Bryson Jones might match the five homer game I saw at Thurston last week.
The game was well recapped last Friday, so I won't rerun the game. Instead I'll emphasize how the Colts are living on the edge. Thurston is on an 7 game win streak: Going back six games, here are their scores:
Now all Thurston has to do is beat Springfield (6-8) and Marshfield (0-14) and the worst they can do is tie for first with North Eugene. North has to face and beat Churchill and Marist at Marist to force a tie with Thurston.
State Playoff Seeding Picture.
So, right now it looks like the 6A order for the Special District seeding games will be Thurston, Sheldon and South Eugene. Hybrid seeding games are Friday. 6A play-in games are Tuesday. The MWL 6A #1 finisher will get a bye in the play-in round. The 6A #2 finisher has to win it's seeding game to get a play-in bye. South Eugene, our 6A number three team, will have to play both a seeding game Friday and a play in game next Tuesday.
In the 5A, North and Marist are battling it out for first. They have a head to head on the Wednesday, the last day of league play. Marist has to beat Sheldon to stay in the race for the 5A number one seed. Springfield and Churchill are tied for the number three and four seeds and have a head to head Wednesday.
The top four teams are still in it for the title. Can't get much better than that.
PS. Getting back to the "Not a Typo!" email. There actually was a typo. The score was 8-1 rather than 9-1. But I knew what the South fan meant.... We won! And we soundly beat a very good team!
Indeed, Schindler did pitch a fine game, giving up just two hits, one a bunt single. Schindler was a little shaky in the first, walking leadoff Logan Silver, and two outs later, falling behind clean-up Jake Britt, 3-1, before Britt singled in Silver. But from then on, it was almost autopilot, starting with striking out the side in the second. The third inning was stormy due to two errors, which helped load the bases, but Schindler took care of that with an infield pop up and a strike out of the clean up batter. Three up, three down in the fourth and fifth. A walk with outs in each of the sixth and 7th and Schindler took the Axemen home with a victory.
Meanwhile, South broke the game wide open in the fourth, sending 12 batters to the plate and scoring six. Carlos Larson led off the inning from the 5 slot with a solo shot to left center. The next four batters got on via two singles, a walk and a hit batter. A few batters later, Gus Craig tripled in two runs and scored on a passed ball. With Schindler dialed in on the mound, Marist was headed towards a loss and second place in the MWL.
At the same time, I was at the eastern front of the MWL, where Thurston was hosting Churchill. I prefer pitching duals with small ball and great batting matches between the best pitchers and the best hitters in the league. So I thought about going to South to see if Schindler would be pitching and facing Silver, Swindlling, Britt and company. But I looked out the window and chose the shelter of the mancave at Thurston. I knew the odds of a great pitching dual were slim, but I also knew that a) the Colts are entertaining in a wild and wooly way, and b) the wind would be blowing out 20 knots per hour and the Colt sluggers and Churchill's Bryson Jones might match the five homer game I saw at Thurston last week.
The game was well recapped last Friday, so I won't rerun the game. Instead I'll emphasize how the Colts are living on the edge. Thurston is on an 7 game win streak: Going back six games, here are their scores:
- 7-6 over North. NE runners on 2nd and 3rd when game ended.
- 7-6 over Sheldon. 9 innings
- 10-7 over South. Came back from a 7-3 deficit.
- 10-9 over Marist. Came back from 4 down, scoring 5 in the sixth.
- 4-1 over Willamette
- 8-5 over Churchill. Came back from 0-1 and 4-3 deficits
Now all Thurston has to do is beat Springfield (6-8) and Marshfield (0-14) and the worst they can do is tie for first with North Eugene. North has to face and beat Churchill and Marist at Marist to force a tie with Thurston.
State Playoff Seeding Picture.
So, right now it looks like the 6A order for the Special District seeding games will be Thurston, Sheldon and South Eugene. Hybrid seeding games are Friday. 6A play-in games are Tuesday. The MWL 6A #1 finisher will get a bye in the play-in round. The 6A #2 finisher has to win it's seeding game to get a play-in bye. South Eugene, our 6A number three team, will have to play both a seeding game Friday and a play in game next Tuesday.
In the 5A, North and Marist are battling it out for first. They have a head to head on the Wednesday, the last day of league play. Marist has to beat Sheldon to stay in the race for the 5A number one seed. Springfield and Churchill are tied for the number three and four seeds and have a head to head Wednesday.
The top four teams are still in it for the title. Can't get much better than that.
PS. Getting back to the "Not a Typo!" email. There actually was a typo. The score was 8-1 rather than 9-1. But I knew what the South fan meant.... We won! And we soundly beat a very good team!
Sunday, May 1, 2011
Thurston has the inside track to the crown
The leaders are in a tight pack as they round the last curve at 190 mph. Marist is 9-2, Sheldon 9-3, North 9-3 and Thurston 9-3. Look to east Springfield to find where the MWL trophy is likely to land. The Colts couldn't have set the table any better.
Thurston hosts Marist in what I hope lines up the Colts Tyler Johnson and Kyle Watson against Marist's Zach Eyster and Kevin Haskin. All four should be available for this Battle Royale. If the Colts can pull out a win on their home field they will be tied with Marist and possibly Sheldon and North Eugene in the loss column. (Sheldon could gain a half game league lead if they beat South Eugene) The schedule then favors the Colts as they finish with Willamette 4-8, Churchill 5-7, Springfield 5-7 and Marshfield. Willamette can throw Waggoner or Svennson at Thurston Wednesday. Churchill could throw Lessel, but he likely won't be available Friday. Springfield has Bates. But I have to believe these teams are going to be maximizing their pitching for wins against other middle of the pack teams.
Pitchers
Speaking of pitching, it's the time of year for pitchers to get dialed in for the playoffs. It looks like the weather is getting better and those arms should be getting livelier. Unless a pitcher is pushing 90 mph, he needs to toss at least three strikeouts for every walk, with four or more likely to get a pitcher deep into the playoffs. Our league's a little thin on pitchers with control this year so far.
Andrew Moore's is tossing over 7 strike outs per walk. That's a Wow! Kameron Bates is over a 4 to one ratio. South's Joe Schindler is a bit of a pitching anomaly. Schindler is striking out batters at almost a 4 k to one walk ratio, but he's giving up a lot of hits. Sheldon's two lefties, Nielsen and Cunningham are 7-2 in the win-loss column, but are walking a thin line in the walk column. Churchill's Jake Lessel has a 3-1 win-loss record, yet not quite 2 k's to every walk.
Thurston' opponent Monday has a steady-eddie pitching duo in Eyster and Haskin. They are a combined 6-1. They're not dominant strike out pitchers, although Eyster is averaging 6 per 7 innings. The two are masters at not walking a lot of batters and sprinkling mostly harmless singles through out a game. Marist counts on solid pitching and backs it up with a stellar D and a good offense. In Thurston's 8-5 first round win, frosh Aaron Clift started for the Colts and Eyster for Marist. (The game was 5-5 after six, and the Colts took it in the top of the 7th, in a game Marist's D stumbled.) I'm curious who will get the nod tomorrow.
I've been lucky to see several pitchers when they are on for entire games. I've also seen most of them struggle in other outings. Moore has been the only consistently dominant pitcher and has been on every game. The others I have enjoyed when they are on - Lessel from Churchill, Schindler from South, Eyster from Marist, Cunningham and Nieslen from Sheldon and Bates from Springfield. I've caught TJ of the Colts looking great in long relief. Four of these eight will be back - Moore, Lessel, Schindler and Nieslen. And there are lots of others returning next year who I haven't seen much; Watson, Alie, Stiles, Clift, Evans, Woods and Clayton. We should see scores go down next year.
Hitters
Coming into the year, I thought this might be a huge year for hitters. We've had quite a few dingers so far, but I actually expected more. We had lots of batters returning who had good power years last year, Goddard, Bates, DeHaven, Watson, Long, Harople, Dudley, TJ and Ryan Helfrich to name some. My logic was that there weren't a lot of dominant pitchers returning and these guys should do very well at the plate feeding off of the youngins on the mound. I thought it would take just a couple of guys on each team to step up at the plate, get on base to set up rbi situations for the veteran power guys and then we would see a lot of high scoring games. The batters I've mentioned are doing quite well for the most part. But I think the high number of pretty good lefties is getting to the younger batters. High school players just don't see enough high quality left handed pitching in their early years. New power players have been Bryson Jones from Churchill, Will Swindling of Marist (new to us anyway), Stefan Drake of Thurston and Jalen Drath of Willamette. The league does have three clutch soph RBI collector's in Watson, Joe Schindler from South and Cooper Stiles from Sheldon.
It's time to sit back and enjoy the dual playoff run. We've got the big four fighting for the title. Then we have the next batch of four fighting to stay out of play in games or just trying to raise their RPI. And don't forget, with the everyone in playoff format, it just takes a five or game win streak to take it all. Just like North did last year out of the number three seed spot.
League scoring
Team For Against Differential
Marist 8.4 4.9 3.5
Sheldon 7.7 3.0 4.7
Thurston 7.5 4.4 3.1
North Eugene 6.4 1.6 4.7
South Eugene 6.2 8.5 -2.3
Willamette 4.6 5.8 -1.2
Springfield 4.0 4.4 -0.4
Churchill 3.6 5.1 -1.5
Marshfield 1.8 14.3 -12.5
Photos
Got some great weather at times last week and some took really great photos.
Caught up the photos galleries for one or two games for each of the following teams:
Link to Sheldon Photos
Link to Willamette Photos
Link to Churchill Photos
Link to Thurston Photos
Links to all teams photo pages
Good Luck to everyone this week. Everyone gets at least a playin game, so just keep on getting better. Let's get at least one team to the state championship game for the fifth year in a row! How about one in each classification?!
Thurston hosts Marist in what I hope lines up the Colts Tyler Johnson and Kyle Watson against Marist's Zach Eyster and Kevin Haskin. All four should be available for this Battle Royale. If the Colts can pull out a win on their home field they will be tied with Marist and possibly Sheldon and North Eugene in the loss column. (Sheldon could gain a half game league lead if they beat South Eugene) The schedule then favors the Colts as they finish with Willamette 4-8, Churchill 5-7, Springfield 5-7 and Marshfield. Willamette can throw Waggoner or Svennson at Thurston Wednesday. Churchill could throw Lessel, but he likely won't be available Friday. Springfield has Bates. But I have to believe these teams are going to be maximizing their pitching for wins against other middle of the pack teams.
Pitchers
Speaking of pitching, it's the time of year for pitchers to get dialed in for the playoffs. It looks like the weather is getting better and those arms should be getting livelier. Unless a pitcher is pushing 90 mph, he needs to toss at least three strikeouts for every walk, with four or more likely to get a pitcher deep into the playoffs. Our league's a little thin on pitchers with control this year so far.
Andrew Moore's is tossing over 7 strike outs per walk. That's a Wow! Kameron Bates is over a 4 to one ratio. South's Joe Schindler is a bit of a pitching anomaly. Schindler is striking out batters at almost a 4 k to one walk ratio, but he's giving up a lot of hits. Sheldon's two lefties, Nielsen and Cunningham are 7-2 in the win-loss column, but are walking a thin line in the walk column. Churchill's Jake Lessel has a 3-1 win-loss record, yet not quite 2 k's to every walk.
Thurston' opponent Monday has a steady-eddie pitching duo in Eyster and Haskin. They are a combined 6-1. They're not dominant strike out pitchers, although Eyster is averaging 6 per 7 innings. The two are masters at not walking a lot of batters and sprinkling mostly harmless singles through out a game. Marist counts on solid pitching and backs it up with a stellar D and a good offense. In Thurston's 8-5 first round win, frosh Aaron Clift started for the Colts and Eyster for Marist. (The game was 5-5 after six, and the Colts took it in the top of the 7th, in a game Marist's D stumbled.) I'm curious who will get the nod tomorrow.
I've been lucky to see several pitchers when they are on for entire games. I've also seen most of them struggle in other outings. Moore has been the only consistently dominant pitcher and has been on every game. The others I have enjoyed when they are on - Lessel from Churchill, Schindler from South, Eyster from Marist, Cunningham and Nieslen from Sheldon and Bates from Springfield. I've caught TJ of the Colts looking great in long relief. Four of these eight will be back - Moore, Lessel, Schindler and Nieslen. And there are lots of others returning next year who I haven't seen much; Watson, Alie, Stiles, Clift, Evans, Woods and Clayton. We should see scores go down next year.
Hitters
Coming into the year, I thought this might be a huge year for hitters. We've had quite a few dingers so far, but I actually expected more. We had lots of batters returning who had good power years last year, Goddard, Bates, DeHaven, Watson, Long, Harople, Dudley, TJ and Ryan Helfrich to name some. My logic was that there weren't a lot of dominant pitchers returning and these guys should do very well at the plate feeding off of the youngins on the mound. I thought it would take just a couple of guys on each team to step up at the plate, get on base to set up rbi situations for the veteran power guys and then we would see a lot of high scoring games. The batters I've mentioned are doing quite well for the most part. But I think the high number of pretty good lefties is getting to the younger batters. High school players just don't see enough high quality left handed pitching in their early years. New power players have been Bryson Jones from Churchill, Will Swindling of Marist (new to us anyway), Stefan Drake of Thurston and Jalen Drath of Willamette. The league does have three clutch soph RBI collector's in Watson, Joe Schindler from South and Cooper Stiles from Sheldon.
It's time to sit back and enjoy the dual playoff run. We've got the big four fighting for the title. Then we have the next batch of four fighting to stay out of play in games or just trying to raise their RPI. And don't forget, with the everyone in playoff format, it just takes a five or game win streak to take it all. Just like North did last year out of the number three seed spot.
League scoring
Team For Against Differential
Marist 8.4 4.9 3.5
Sheldon 7.7 3.0 4.7
Thurston 7.5 4.4 3.1
North Eugene 6.4 1.6 4.7
South Eugene 6.2 8.5 -2.3
Willamette 4.6 5.8 -1.2
Springfield 4.0 4.4 -0.4
Churchill 3.6 5.1 -1.5
Marshfield 1.8 14.3 -12.5
Photos
Got some great weather at times last week and some took really great photos.
Caught up the photos galleries for one or two games for each of the following teams:
Link to Sheldon Photos
Link to Willamette Photos
Link to Churchill Photos
Link to Thurston Photos
Links to all teams photo pages
Good Luck to everyone this week. Everyone gets at least a playin game, so just keep on getting better. Let's get at least one team to the state championship game for the fifth year in a row! How about one in each classification?!
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Shameless Plug
Some of you may have noticed that I have added a 'Donation' button via PayPal to the home page. Your support would be greatly appreciated. The expansion from six to nine teams, and a huge increase in softball interest, has tripled the number of hits to the website. I'm sure the increased visits to the site are due to the great recaps that are coming in from several teams and perhaps to the tight race at the top and middle of the standings. The great fan support has changed the website from being a 15 hour a week hobby to a 40-plus an hour week test to see if I can keep up. Cheer me up by buying photos. Remember, that half of the profits from photos go to the booster club. I prefer selling photos to donations, but if I haven't quite got the right photo, please consider donating. Or buy photos and donate. You don't need a PayPal account. PayPal accepts credit cards.
Thanks.
Thanks.
Monday, April 25, 2011
First Round Review
The cold, rainy days of April are almost behind us and the 70 degree days of May are near. Surprisingly, the MWL got all of their league games in prior to the official start of the second round last Friday. Of course, Springfield has been a road team the first round as they wait for their facility to dry out.
At the turn, the teams finshed about where I projected for the end of the season, with the big exception being Sheldon. I grouped Marist, North Eugene and Thurston as locks for the top three spots. I had Sheldon, Willamette, Springfield and South Eugene in the next batch. Churchill just outside of the middle group and Marshfield in a rebuilding year.
Sheldon's defense was phenomenal the first six games, giving up less than 2 runs per game. The two big lefties, Cason Cunningham and Brett Nielsen, were six and one in the first round. The two are a little high on the walk-o-meter, but Cunningham is over 9 k's a game, and Nielsen is sitting down 13 a game. Sophomore Ryan Land has been impressive in the outfield and at the plate.
Injuries may end up playing a big part in the finish this year. North Eugene's lefty Toby Woods pumped up the Highlanders with a 2-0 start and a 1.11 ERA, only to get injured. The Highlander's fortunes have been slipping since. Andrew Moore is 3-1, with a .50 ERA and a league leading 46 k's. But you're going to see more teams get really aggressive like Sheldon did in the first round - attacking the ball early in the count and being willing to take a k here or there in exchange for some very hard hit balls, forcing North to make plays.
Thurston was a little wobbly coming out of the gate. The Colts were skunked in their first league game against North, and scored just two runs against Sheldon in their third game of the first round. Since then the Colt bats have gotten pretty hot, and their defense has been steady for the most part. Sophomore Kyle Watson is 4-0 after Friday's round. Senior Tyler Johnson is getting stronger as the season progresses, and frosh Aaron Clift has been impressive on the mound. Watson, Johnson, Jarren Goddard, and Joey Urness have been hitting the ball well. The Colts seem to have momentum going into the second round.
Marist, my pre-season pick as MWL champions are a half a game out of first. I thought Spartan pitching would be a smidgen better than it has performed and I thought the bats would be hotter than they have been. Marist has won by big margins and had some squeakers. Marist has used four different starters to get them to within half a game of league leading Sheldon: Zach Eyster, Kevin Haskins, Alex Torres and Jerry Rouleau. Eyster has looked very sharp when I've seen him. The Marist D has had it's bad moments, but can put together great games. They'll need to be consistent the second half. Just one homer from the Spartans in the first round. I expected more.
I put a lot of pressure on returning MVP Kameron Bates to carry the Millers to a sixth place finish. Bates is coming off of a fall knee surgery. He's not quite up to speed, but he performed well the first round. However, the Miller O didn't. Bates lost a 2-3 game to South and a 2-4 game to Sheldon. Bates is 1-3 so far.
Willamette is about where I projected. I think their pitching has improved, but obviously not enough for them to make the big jump. Offensively, Tony Svennson has come off of injured reserve and is making a huge impact on the Wolverines with his bat and presence on the mound. Getting mileage out of Svennson on the mound would be a bonus. The Wolverines are relying on Trent Waggoner and his 1.8 ERA for now. Not having Svennson's bat was certainly a factor in two early losses last round. Cole Hathaway is having a year at the plate. The soph has three triples and a dinger.
South Eugene earns the honor of most injury plagued this year. Centerfielder Gus Craig has been out. That is a big hurt in the field and at the plate. Max Morrison, another solid stick for South hurt an elbow tendon and has taken a seat. There's more, but you get the picture when South is playing three freshmen.
I cautiously picked Churchill to finish 8th. They have just three returning players. But you can always expect the Lancers to play great D, and that will keep you in a lot of games. Other than getting bombed by South, Churchill has held opponents to five or less in six of their games. That's good enough to finish in the middle of the pack. And who knew Bryson Jones would pop four dingers? I've seen a couple of nice outings by junior Jake Lessel, including the win over Sheldon.
Marshfield is regularly playing one junior, five sophs and three frosh. Given the lopsided losses my alma matre sustained, I was fearful of seeing them play in Eugene. But when I saw them, and discounted for the youth, I didn't feel as bad. kids are trying hard and they all can play. They just need to hit the weights, play summer ball and work on pitching. Sophomore Doug Moulzahn is doing most of the Pirate pitching. He'll get better, and if he gets some offensive and defensive support, could end up a good one.
It's been fun getting to know the pitchers from the teams who joined/rejoined the MWL. Cunningham and Nielsen from Sheldon are fun to watch. Eyster has had some great stretches. And South's Joe Schindler has can put it all together. I hope new to the league Toby Woods gets back off of the injury list. The oldies, Bates, Moore, Waggoner are very good to great. Other pitchers I have enjoyed watching are Lessel from South and frosh Aaron Clift from the Colts. I haven't seen 4-0 Kyle Watson yet this year and haven't seen the Miller's Dudley in a start as well as a host of others. It will be interesting to see if the pitchers or hitters get stronger in the second round.
Firefox users.
Make sure you upgrade to 4.0! I had a couple of folks say they were having problems. I hadn't checked Firefox in awhile and I opened the MWL website and it was bonkers. I upgraded Firefox and Voila!
Secret Page for Blog Users
I use this format for a 'MWL At-A-Glance' softball page. Take a peek and see if you find it useful. MWL baseball at a glance.
At the turn, the teams finshed about where I projected for the end of the season, with the big exception being Sheldon. I grouped Marist, North Eugene and Thurston as locks for the top three spots. I had Sheldon, Willamette, Springfield and South Eugene in the next batch. Churchill just outside of the middle group and Marshfield in a rebuilding year.
Sheldon's defense was phenomenal the first six games, giving up less than 2 runs per game. The two big lefties, Cason Cunningham and Brett Nielsen, were six and one in the first round. The two are a little high on the walk-o-meter, but Cunningham is over 9 k's a game, and Nielsen is sitting down 13 a game. Sophomore Ryan Land has been impressive in the outfield and at the plate.
Injuries may end up playing a big part in the finish this year. North Eugene's lefty Toby Woods pumped up the Highlanders with a 2-0 start and a 1.11 ERA, only to get injured. The Highlander's fortunes have been slipping since. Andrew Moore is 3-1, with a .50 ERA and a league leading 46 k's. But you're going to see more teams get really aggressive like Sheldon did in the first round - attacking the ball early in the count and being willing to take a k here or there in exchange for some very hard hit balls, forcing North to make plays.
Thurston was a little wobbly coming out of the gate. The Colts were skunked in their first league game against North, and scored just two runs against Sheldon in their third game of the first round. Since then the Colt bats have gotten pretty hot, and their defense has been steady for the most part. Sophomore Kyle Watson is 4-0 after Friday's round. Senior Tyler Johnson is getting stronger as the season progresses, and frosh Aaron Clift has been impressive on the mound. Watson, Johnson, Jarren Goddard, and Joey Urness have been hitting the ball well. The Colts seem to have momentum going into the second round.
Marist, my pre-season pick as MWL champions are a half a game out of first. I thought Spartan pitching would be a smidgen better than it has performed and I thought the bats would be hotter than they have been. Marist has won by big margins and had some squeakers. Marist has used four different starters to get them to within half a game of league leading Sheldon: Zach Eyster, Kevin Haskins, Alex Torres and Jerry Rouleau. Eyster has looked very sharp when I've seen him. The Marist D has had it's bad moments, but can put together great games. They'll need to be consistent the second half. Just one homer from the Spartans in the first round. I expected more.
I put a lot of pressure on returning MVP Kameron Bates to carry the Millers to a sixth place finish. Bates is coming off of a fall knee surgery. He's not quite up to speed, but he performed well the first round. However, the Miller O didn't. Bates lost a 2-3 game to South and a 2-4 game to Sheldon. Bates is 1-3 so far.
Willamette is about where I projected. I think their pitching has improved, but obviously not enough for them to make the big jump. Offensively, Tony Svennson has come off of injured reserve and is making a huge impact on the Wolverines with his bat and presence on the mound. Getting mileage out of Svennson on the mound would be a bonus. The Wolverines are relying on Trent Waggoner and his 1.8 ERA for now. Not having Svennson's bat was certainly a factor in two early losses last round. Cole Hathaway is having a year at the plate. The soph has three triples and a dinger.
South Eugene earns the honor of most injury plagued this year. Centerfielder Gus Craig has been out. That is a big hurt in the field and at the plate. Max Morrison, another solid stick for South hurt an elbow tendon and has taken a seat. There's more, but you get the picture when South is playing three freshmen.
I cautiously picked Churchill to finish 8th. They have just three returning players. But you can always expect the Lancers to play great D, and that will keep you in a lot of games. Other than getting bombed by South, Churchill has held opponents to five or less in six of their games. That's good enough to finish in the middle of the pack. And who knew Bryson Jones would pop four dingers? I've seen a couple of nice outings by junior Jake Lessel, including the win over Sheldon.
Marshfield is regularly playing one junior, five sophs and three frosh. Given the lopsided losses my alma matre sustained, I was fearful of seeing them play in Eugene. But when I saw them, and discounted for the youth, I didn't feel as bad. kids are trying hard and they all can play. They just need to hit the weights, play summer ball and work on pitching. Sophomore Doug Moulzahn is doing most of the Pirate pitching. He'll get better, and if he gets some offensive and defensive support, could end up a good one.
It's been fun getting to know the pitchers from the teams who joined/rejoined the MWL. Cunningham and Nielsen from Sheldon are fun to watch. Eyster has had some great stretches. And South's Joe Schindler has can put it all together. I hope new to the league Toby Woods gets back off of the injury list. The oldies, Bates, Moore, Waggoner are very good to great. Other pitchers I have enjoyed watching are Lessel from South and frosh Aaron Clift from the Colts. I haven't seen 4-0 Kyle Watson yet this year and haven't seen the Miller's Dudley in a start as well as a host of others. It will be interesting to see if the pitchers or hitters get stronger in the second round.
Firefox users.
Make sure you upgrade to 4.0! I had a couple of folks say they were having problems. I hadn't checked Firefox in awhile and I opened the MWL website and it was bonkers. I upgraded Firefox and Voila!
Secret Page for Blog Users
I use this format for a 'MWL At-A-Glance' softball page. Take a peek and see if you find it useful. MWL baseball at a glance.
Friday, April 15, 2011
Arghhhh! I missed an almost Pirate victory
Most of you probably weren't planning on going to the Churchill-Marshfield game on Thursday. But here I was, bundled in a turtleneck, sweatshirt, gloves and longjohns ready to go to Churchill. I made a check of the school schedules on highschoolspsorts.net. No postponement. Then I checked the OSAA scoreboard and the game was postponed to Saturday. So I stayed home. As I said, "ARGHH."
Sorry Churchill fans, but I pull for the Pirates. I graduated from Marshfield in 1968. We tied Sheldon for the league title and had a good baseball run for several years in the early 70's. That was it until I returned in 2003. A soon to be 1st team all state pitcher and his 90 mph fastball, Matt Duryea, moved to Coos Bay and I instantly became a great pitching coach. Marshfield went to state for the first time ever in Duryea's senior year and once more the next year. The Pirate baseball fortunes then dropped off to the pre playoff years level.
My ties to the Pirate baseball program and the efforts of coach Quintin Hall to build the program keep me ever hopeful. So when Churchill's David Doerkson emailed me a score at 9 PM, I let out a giant "No-o-o-o!!". My wife came into my office and asked me if something had happened to my boys. I sheepishly told her the truth. The yell was a two fold yell. I missed my Pirates AND they pulled off a seventh inning five run rally to take a two run lead and got the first batter out in the bottom of the 7th. Churchill rallied and stole the victory from the Pirates.
Improving baseball in Coos Bay is a tough challenge. It's not because of the weather. North Bend has always had a solid to great program. A long time ago, Coos Bay had a great little league program and the varsity played in the heart of town at Mingus Park. The city booted the high school off the parklands for adult summer league softball and the Pirates moved their facilities 8 miles up Coos River. Out of sight, out of mind. The Pirates made another field move within a mile of the school, but the field was still literally out of sight. The Pirates finally moved to the high school, but if you've been to the facility you know how it compares to North Bend and the Eugene-Springfield schools. It's tough for the kids to look at the football/track and basketball facilities and think that the school cares much about baseball. If I ever win a big lottery, I'll help Q with one of his visions of moving home plate to the northwest corner. Then I'll throw in turf and put in lights.
Two other big issues for the Pirates are kids not staying in school or losing their eligibility and players not playing summer ball. If you saw the 2010 version of the Pirates, you noticed that there were several non seniors who looked like legit baseball players - good strokes at the plate, good footwork turning the double play, a solid catcher and more. But the team lost over half of those potential returnees. The result this year is that the Pirates are throwing a lot of babes into the fire. The good news is that these babes come with good attitudes and their are several skilled ones who just need to grow and get experience. Good Luck, coach Hall.
I haven't seen Churchill or Marshfield this year yet. The Churchill game is already listed as postponed. Marshfield and North have to make a decision soon about Marshfield driving up to Swede. With luck, maybe they'll get the game in. I'm already bundled up.
Photos
I haven't promoted my photos this year. I finally have team pages set up with direct links to the photo galleries. Half of the profit goes to the booster clubs. Purchasing photos helps pay for my gas money, photo gallery hosting, red vines and state playoff tickets.
Thanks for your support and encouragement.
Sorry Churchill fans, but I pull for the Pirates. I graduated from Marshfield in 1968. We tied Sheldon for the league title and had a good baseball run for several years in the early 70's. That was it until I returned in 2003. A soon to be 1st team all state pitcher and his 90 mph fastball, Matt Duryea, moved to Coos Bay and I instantly became a great pitching coach. Marshfield went to state for the first time ever in Duryea's senior year and once more the next year. The Pirate baseball fortunes then dropped off to the pre playoff years level.
My ties to the Pirate baseball program and the efforts of coach Quintin Hall to build the program keep me ever hopeful. So when Churchill's David Doerkson emailed me a score at 9 PM, I let out a giant "No-o-o-o!!". My wife came into my office and asked me if something had happened to my boys. I sheepishly told her the truth. The yell was a two fold yell. I missed my Pirates AND they pulled off a seventh inning five run rally to take a two run lead and got the first batter out in the bottom of the 7th. Churchill rallied and stole the victory from the Pirates.
Improving baseball in Coos Bay is a tough challenge. It's not because of the weather. North Bend has always had a solid to great program. A long time ago, Coos Bay had a great little league program and the varsity played in the heart of town at Mingus Park. The city booted the high school off the parklands for adult summer league softball and the Pirates moved their facilities 8 miles up Coos River. Out of sight, out of mind. The Pirates made another field move within a mile of the school, but the field was still literally out of sight. The Pirates finally moved to the high school, but if you've been to the facility you know how it compares to North Bend and the Eugene-Springfield schools. It's tough for the kids to look at the football/track and basketball facilities and think that the school cares much about baseball. If I ever win a big lottery, I'll help Q with one of his visions of moving home plate to the northwest corner. Then I'll throw in turf and put in lights.
Two other big issues for the Pirates are kids not staying in school or losing their eligibility and players not playing summer ball. If you saw the 2010 version of the Pirates, you noticed that there were several non seniors who looked like legit baseball players - good strokes at the plate, good footwork turning the double play, a solid catcher and more. But the team lost over half of those potential returnees. The result this year is that the Pirates are throwing a lot of babes into the fire. The good news is that these babes come with good attitudes and their are several skilled ones who just need to grow and get experience. Good Luck, coach Hall.
I haven't seen Churchill or Marshfield this year yet. The Churchill game is already listed as postponed. Marshfield and North have to make a decision soon about Marshfield driving up to Swede. With luck, maybe they'll get the game in. I'm already bundled up.
Photos
I haven't promoted my photos this year. I finally have team pages set up with direct links to the photo galleries. Half of the profit goes to the booster clubs. Purchasing photos helps pay for my gas money, photo gallery hosting, red vines and state playoff tickets.
- 4x6's are $2.00
- 8x10s are currently $5.99. Not all pictures can be blown up to 8x10s because I have already cropped them so much.
- There are options for collages, calendars, t-shirts, etc.
- Buy a lot of photos to spread the shipping cost:)
- Smugmug guarantees the photos.
- To find galleries for your school, go to the index page, hover over 'Photos', then click on your school
- I haven't photographed Churchill or Marshfield yet. Also, I'm behind on uploading pre league games.
- Reminder that game recappers get free access to pictures of their son(s) for free printing at home or use as a screensaver. Still could use recappers from Marshfield, South Eugene, and Springfield.
Thanks for your support and encouragement.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
NE vs Sheldon, Cunningham vs Moore and more
In my final preseason prediction I mentioned that I thought Marist, North Eugene and Thurston were a notch above everyone else. I picked Sheldon 4th and among a second tier of teams that include a lot of young teams who need time to mature. Sheldon ripened up in a hurry and has beaten both 6A brothers in games at Sheldon.
We are a quarter of a way through league and the teams are shaking out as expected with the exception of Sheldon at 5-0. Sheldon has yet to play two of my top three picks in the first round, so they still have a lot to prove. Wednesday is their next big test. They will step on the field at Swede to take on the 4-0 Highlanders and Andrew Moore with undisputed possession of first place on the line. And even though Moore hasn't allowed a hit or run in his first two league outings, I think the Irish have a shot at getting hits and getting a win.
Moore brings his 0.00 ERA, 28 k's and two no hitters into the game to face Cason Cunningham. Cunningham is no slouch with a 1.02 ERA, 19 k's and just 5 hits in the same number of innings as Moore. The main difference between the two besides being right and left handed, is that Moore has almost eliminated his walks. Like Moore, Cunningham has a great defense behind him. The Irish outfield might be a little better than North's because of Irish centerfielder Ryan Land. Land can cover a huge territory, plays smart and can make the diving catch.
The bats on both teams have mirrored much of the league - punchless this year, although Sheldon has flexed their muscles on occasion. I don't think you'll see either team break this game open at the plate. Both teams have two players with one home run apiece. For North, that's Garrett Harpole and Shawn Boehm. For Sheldon, Daniel Herr and Cooper Stiles. Ryan Land of the Irish has three triples. Sheldon has six players who have hit doubles while North has two. It's not likely that Moore or Cunningham are going to let these batters light it up.
Near the end of Beltline, Marshfield and Churchill will be playing each other. Each team will be trying for their first league win. I expect to see Marshfield's #1 pitcher Doug Molzahn and expect that Churchill will hold back their #1 for Thurston on Friday.
If I was correct about Thurston being one of the three best teams in the league, then they should win out the rest of the first round. The Colts face Willamette, Churchill, Springfield and Marshfield to finish the first half. Thurston could stumble, but their frosh ace Aaron Clift has done well and will improve. And Tyler Johnson had a good outing in relief against dangerous Marist on Monday.
The Millers need to pick it up if they are to make my #5 pick. It won't be easy with Marist, Thurston and Churchill left this round. Wednesday should see Kameron Bates on the mound for Springfield. But Marist probably won't use Eyster after he went six on Monday.
Willamette has played all five 5A MWL opponents, going 2-3. Now the Wolverines do-si-do with the big boys - Thurston, Sheldon and South Eugene. Great news that Tony Svennson is back for the Wolverines. He carries a big stick and will turn a few games around, if not with the upcoming games with the 6A teams, then against the 5A teams next round.
South gets the bye Wednesday. Then they face Marist and probably Eyster, followed by Marshfield and Willamette.
According to the weatherman five minutes ago, it's not raining at my house, but something wet is coming out of the sky. Let's hope we can squeeze in some games tomorrow, because the Thursday and Friday forecasts are gloomy.
Thanks to the coaches and parents who have forwarded recaps and stats. The website wouldn't be much fun without your help.
We are a quarter of a way through league and the teams are shaking out as expected with the exception of Sheldon at 5-0. Sheldon has yet to play two of my top three picks in the first round, so they still have a lot to prove. Wednesday is their next big test. They will step on the field at Swede to take on the 4-0 Highlanders and Andrew Moore with undisputed possession of first place on the line. And even though Moore hasn't allowed a hit or run in his first two league outings, I think the Irish have a shot at getting hits and getting a win.
Moore brings his 0.00 ERA, 28 k's and two no hitters into the game to face Cason Cunningham. Cunningham is no slouch with a 1.02 ERA, 19 k's and just 5 hits in the same number of innings as Moore. The main difference between the two besides being right and left handed, is that Moore has almost eliminated his walks. Like Moore, Cunningham has a great defense behind him. The Irish outfield might be a little better than North's because of Irish centerfielder Ryan Land. Land can cover a huge territory, plays smart and can make the diving catch.
The bats on both teams have mirrored much of the league - punchless this year, although Sheldon has flexed their muscles on occasion. I don't think you'll see either team break this game open at the plate. Both teams have two players with one home run apiece. For North, that's Garrett Harpole and Shawn Boehm. For Sheldon, Daniel Herr and Cooper Stiles. Ryan Land of the Irish has three triples. Sheldon has six players who have hit doubles while North has two. It's not likely that Moore or Cunningham are going to let these batters light it up.
Near the end of Beltline, Marshfield and Churchill will be playing each other. Each team will be trying for their first league win. I expect to see Marshfield's #1 pitcher Doug Molzahn and expect that Churchill will hold back their #1 for Thurston on Friday.
If I was correct about Thurston being one of the three best teams in the league, then they should win out the rest of the first round. The Colts face Willamette, Churchill, Springfield and Marshfield to finish the first half. Thurston could stumble, but their frosh ace Aaron Clift has done well and will improve. And Tyler Johnson had a good outing in relief against dangerous Marist on Monday.
The Millers need to pick it up if they are to make my #5 pick. It won't be easy with Marist, Thurston and Churchill left this round. Wednesday should see Kameron Bates on the mound for Springfield. But Marist probably won't use Eyster after he went six on Monday.
Willamette has played all five 5A MWL opponents, going 2-3. Now the Wolverines do-si-do with the big boys - Thurston, Sheldon and South Eugene. Great news that Tony Svennson is back for the Wolverines. He carries a big stick and will turn a few games around, if not with the upcoming games with the 6A teams, then against the 5A teams next round.
South gets the bye Wednesday. Then they face Marist and probably Eyster, followed by Marshfield and Willamette.
According to the weatherman five minutes ago, it's not raining at my house, but something wet is coming out of the sky. Let's hope we can squeeze in some games tomorrow, because the Thursday and Friday forecasts are gloomy.
Thanks to the coaches and parents who have forwarded recaps and stats. The website wouldn't be much fun without your help.
Monday, April 11, 2011
Big week for 6A MWL teams and Marist
I'm hearing talk of North running the table and Andrew Moore tossing more no hitters. Wow. How quickly we forget. It's tough to throw a no hitter. I've been fortunate enough to see both of Moore's gems. A great infield play saved his first no hitter, and he didn't have to face Gus Craig against South. A blooper to the outfield, a grounder two more feet to the right of the glove - that's all it takes to ruin a no-no.
It's early in the season to think a team or pitcher is going to run the table. Team wise, North has only played three games in league - 13 to go. They haven't exactly been killing the ball, although they've shown more power this year than at the same time last year. There are enough good pitchers in this league to keep North within reach throughout a game, and when a team is close, anything can happen.
It's a huge week for Marist (3-0) and a couple of the 6A teams. Marist plays 6A Thurston and South Eugene, with Springfield in the middle. Marist can line up their pitchers however they want, but they could end up seeing their opponents aces in all three games. Spartan power bats have to come out this week.
South Eugene (2-2) gets Sheldon and Marist with a bye in between. Axemen Joe Schindler could be used for both games. Schindler gives South a great shot in both games. We think of Schindler as a pitcher, but he already has 3 doubles and 4 rbis for South. South needs Gus Craig back in their line up.
Sheldon (4-0) gets South, North and Willamette. Sheldon threw Neilsen for three innings last Friday, so they may not come back with him against South. That would be lucky for South. Will Sheldon see Andrew Moore? North's Moore will probably go Monday and Friday, so Sheldon would see lefties Woods or Clatyon or both. (Note that Sheldon has a lot of left handed batters.) At the plate, Irishmen Daniel Herr shares the league lead in rbis with 5 and Ryan Land shares the lead in trips with 2.
Thurston (1-2) has two of the three undefeated teams behind them. They start the week with undefeated Marist. The Colts have a good shot at putting a blemish on the Spartans schedule. Thurston then finishes the week with Willamette and Churchill. A Colt sweep this week would put them at 4-2 and back in the pennant race. Thurston needs to get their bats going, and should, having played a tough schedule so far. Joey Urness has a couple of triples and Stephan Drake has a homer. But that's about it for Colt power.
North (3-0) has Willamette Monday. Moore is in cycle to throw this one. If North wins and Sheldon beats south Eugene, neither game a lock, North and Sheldon would be undefeated going into their game Wednesday.
Willamette (2-2) has the toughest schedule this week. North Eugene - with Moore likely on the mound, then 6A's Thurston - with Kyle Watson likely on the mound, and Sheldon. Trent Waggoner could get the Monday/Friday starts. Waggoner has 16 k's versus 4 walks in league this year. That's a ratio that should keep Willamette in both games. The Wolverine bats have been pretty solid so far. Drath and Concannon have dingers and the team has 14 doubles in four games.
The Millers have played South, North, Willamette and Sheldon. This week it's Marshfield and Marist. Bates is on cyle to pitch against Marist. Springfield has been playing good D, but their bats haven't come alive.
Churchill (0-4) and Marshfield (0-3) face each other Wednesday. Churchill has a bye Monday, while Marshfield plays Springfield in Coos Bay. There's a possibility that the Lancers and Pirates are both 0-4 when they play each other.
Pitchers ahead of batters
I'm not a big believer in the theory that pitchers are always ahead of hitters early in the season, however....
they are this year. I thought there might be two or three really outstanding pitchers this year and many solid ones. At this point, it looks like Moore will be over the top good. Springfield's Kameron Bates may come on and regain intimidator status as he regains his strength from fall surgery. He is hitting his spots with 11 k's to 2 walks, but isn't up to full speed on his fastball yet. Hopefully he'll be stronger at playoff time. There are two or three others who may end up being dominant, time will tell. Sheldon's Cason Cunningham was tough Friday against Springfield. If Cunningham gets his K to Walk ratio up to 3 or 4 to one, he'll be dominant.
Lots of non seniors are looking good. I haven't seen all teams, and if I've seen a team, I usually have seen only one of the team's starters. But here are some non seniors that are looking good. Frosh Aaron Clift of Thurston - and he was sent into Swede against Moore - that's Roman Colosseum stuff. Sophs Kyle Watson of Thurtson, Britt Neilsen of Sheldon and Joe Schindler of South. Juniors Trent Waggoner and Toby Woods of North. I'm sure there are more blossoming non seniors, but I haven't seen them play yet.
It's early in the season to think a team or pitcher is going to run the table. Team wise, North has only played three games in league - 13 to go. They haven't exactly been killing the ball, although they've shown more power this year than at the same time last year. There are enough good pitchers in this league to keep North within reach throughout a game, and when a team is close, anything can happen.
It's a huge week for Marist (3-0) and a couple of the 6A teams. Marist plays 6A Thurston and South Eugene, with Springfield in the middle. Marist can line up their pitchers however they want, but they could end up seeing their opponents aces in all three games. Spartan power bats have to come out this week.
South Eugene (2-2) gets Sheldon and Marist with a bye in between. Axemen Joe Schindler could be used for both games. Schindler gives South a great shot in both games. We think of Schindler as a pitcher, but he already has 3 doubles and 4 rbis for South. South needs Gus Craig back in their line up.
Sheldon (4-0) gets South, North and Willamette. Sheldon threw Neilsen for three innings last Friday, so they may not come back with him against South. That would be lucky for South. Will Sheldon see Andrew Moore? North's Moore will probably go Monday and Friday, so Sheldon would see lefties Woods or Clatyon or both. (Note that Sheldon has a lot of left handed batters.) At the plate, Irishmen Daniel Herr shares the league lead in rbis with 5 and Ryan Land shares the lead in trips with 2.
Thurston (1-2) has two of the three undefeated teams behind them. They start the week with undefeated Marist. The Colts have a good shot at putting a blemish on the Spartans schedule. Thurston then finishes the week with Willamette and Churchill. A Colt sweep this week would put them at 4-2 and back in the pennant race. Thurston needs to get their bats going, and should, having played a tough schedule so far. Joey Urness has a couple of triples and Stephan Drake has a homer. But that's about it for Colt power.
North (3-0) has Willamette Monday. Moore is in cycle to throw this one. If North wins and Sheldon beats south Eugene, neither game a lock, North and Sheldon would be undefeated going into their game Wednesday.
Willamette (2-2) has the toughest schedule this week. North Eugene - with Moore likely on the mound, then 6A's Thurston - with Kyle Watson likely on the mound, and Sheldon. Trent Waggoner could get the Monday/Friday starts. Waggoner has 16 k's versus 4 walks in league this year. That's a ratio that should keep Willamette in both games. The Wolverine bats have been pretty solid so far. Drath and Concannon have dingers and the team has 14 doubles in four games.
The Millers have played South, North, Willamette and Sheldon. This week it's Marshfield and Marist. Bates is on cyle to pitch against Marist. Springfield has been playing good D, but their bats haven't come alive.
Churchill (0-4) and Marshfield (0-3) face each other Wednesday. Churchill has a bye Monday, while Marshfield plays Springfield in Coos Bay. There's a possibility that the Lancers and Pirates are both 0-4 when they play each other.
Pitchers ahead of batters
I'm not a big believer in the theory that pitchers are always ahead of hitters early in the season, however....
they are this year. I thought there might be two or three really outstanding pitchers this year and many solid ones. At this point, it looks like Moore will be over the top good. Springfield's Kameron Bates may come on and regain intimidator status as he regains his strength from fall surgery. He is hitting his spots with 11 k's to 2 walks, but isn't up to full speed on his fastball yet. Hopefully he'll be stronger at playoff time. There are two or three others who may end up being dominant, time will tell. Sheldon's Cason Cunningham was tough Friday against Springfield. If Cunningham gets his K to Walk ratio up to 3 or 4 to one, he'll be dominant.
Lots of non seniors are looking good. I haven't seen all teams, and if I've seen a team, I usually have seen only one of the team's starters. But here are some non seniors that are looking good. Frosh Aaron Clift of Thurston - and he was sent into Swede against Moore - that's Roman Colosseum stuff. Sophs Kyle Watson of Thurtson, Britt Neilsen of Sheldon and Joe Schindler of South. Juniors Trent Waggoner and Toby Woods of North. I'm sure there are more blossoming non seniors, but I haven't seen them play yet.
Thursday, April 7, 2011
South Eugene, RPI test (did you fail?) ...
It's early, but South Eugene is out of the blocks in a hurry. The Axemen are 2-0 with a win over Kameron Bates of Springfield and a lopsided 16-4 victory over Churchill. Now comes the meat of their schedule - North Eugene, Thurston, Sheldon, a bye and Marist. South will likely see Moore when they face North Eugene, then they have back to back games against 6A opponents. After the 6A opponents they tackle the veteran team in our league, Marist. I consider Marist the most veteran team in the league because they have 12 seniors, while every other team is lucky if they have five seniors.
Could it be that South's 12-2 win over Cottage Grove got their bats going prior to the Churchill game? Soph Joe Schindler and junior Max Morrison lead the team (and share the league lead) with three rbi's. Frosh Jimmy Grossman and junior Ben Giland have 2 rbis each. How's that for a youth movement? What I really like is the South is getting experience with late inning wins. They pulled one out against Summit and beat Springfield by scoring in the bottom of the 7th. With all the young players in the league not having much varsity batting experience, South might be getting a jump on other teams because their bats are warming up early.
Willamette RPI test
After all of the RPI education I have dispensed, I would have thought people who took the RPI test would have done better. The question was would Willamette's 370 RPI go up (options for how much up) or down?
First you have to know the RPI formula. IF you want to be a pro, click on Frequently Asked Questions on the OSAA site. Here's the overview:
25% on Willamette's W-L record. Willamette's loss cost them 12 RPI points. Had Willamette won their RPI would have gone up another 22 points from the minute before the Marist game. That's a 32 point spread
50% on Willamette's opponents W-L record . The opponents records were about .311 before the Marist game. Marist was 8-1 (.899) going into the Willamette game so the Spartans were bound to raise Willamette's score a lot in this criteria no matter who won the game. And this criteria is 50% of the formula.
25% on Willamette's opponents opponents W-L record. Honest. Willamette's opponents opponents were winning at a 387 clip before they played Marist. Marist opponents record going into the Willamette game was about .525. Again, in this criteria Marist would be raising Willamette's score no matter what the outcome of the Marist-Willamette game. Willamette gained 11 RPI points in this category just by playing Marist.
What does it all mean? It means that early in the season your RPI fluctuates wildly, but after about 20 games there isn't much change. That's because a single loss doesn't change your W-L percentage that much late in the season, doesn't change your opponents W-L percentage much, or your opponent's opponents. Somehow, the RPI is very accurate in the end. The main issue with the RPI at this point is that the RPI does not count out of state opponents opponents records. The RPI does include the opponents record, but that is only 25% of the overall formula.
Reporters.
I'm getting great recaps from Dean Inuoye of Marist and Dave Doreksen from Churchill as well as the Willamette and Sheldon coaches. It would be great to pick up at least two more teams. If we have six of the teams reporting plus myself, it is likely that each game will be recapped. There will be one or two games where neither team has a reporter, but if we have enough reporters that won't happen often. If you would like to be a recapper/reporter please email me at mwlnow@yahoo.com. And remember, you get to shamelessly plug your own child and get extra free photo attention and free photos from me of your child. The recaps don't have to be near as long as you are seeing on the main page. And if you just want to send in just the box scores, that's fine too. Box scores look like this:
Churchill 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 - 1 2 3
Sheldon 0 1 1 0 0 1 X - 3 5 2
Lessel, Murray(6) and Kearney; Cunningham and D Lewis
WP Cunningham LP Lessel
RBI Jones, Stiles, D Lewis
HR Jones
2B Cunningham, Stiles
Gary
Could it be that South's 12-2 win over Cottage Grove got their bats going prior to the Churchill game? Soph Joe Schindler and junior Max Morrison lead the team (and share the league lead) with three rbi's. Frosh Jimmy Grossman and junior Ben Giland have 2 rbis each. How's that for a youth movement? What I really like is the South is getting experience with late inning wins. They pulled one out against Summit and beat Springfield by scoring in the bottom of the 7th. With all the young players in the league not having much varsity batting experience, South might be getting a jump on other teams because their bats are warming up early.
Willamette RPI test
After all of the RPI education I have dispensed, I would have thought people who took the RPI test would have done better. The question was would Willamette's 370 RPI go up (options for how much up) or down?
- 38% of the respondents said "Go Down". You go back to Algebra I
- 21% said up by 0 to 50%. Not bad, perhaps you didn't have the guts to move to the right answer, because an increase of 78 points for one game would be too much. I'll give you a C.
- 21 % said between 50 and 100 points. Correcto-Mundo. You get to brag to other MWL fans.
- 12% said between 100-150 points. You get a B for positive attitude. Must have been Willamette fans factoring a victory over Marist.
- 8% said 200 points or more. You get a D. It's just a hair too far into the season to see huge swings in a day.
First you have to know the RPI formula. IF you want to be a pro, click on Frequently Asked Questions on the OSAA site. Here's the overview:
25% on Willamette's W-L record. Willamette's loss cost them 12 RPI points. Had Willamette won their RPI would have gone up another 22 points from the minute before the Marist game. That's a 32 point spread
50% on Willamette's opponents W-L record . The opponents records were about .311 before the Marist game. Marist was 8-1 (.899) going into the Willamette game so the Spartans were bound to raise Willamette's score a lot in this criteria no matter who won the game. And this criteria is 50% of the formula.
25% on Willamette's opponents opponents W-L record. Honest. Willamette's opponents opponents were winning at a 387 clip before they played Marist. Marist opponents record going into the Willamette game was about .525. Again, in this criteria Marist would be raising Willamette's score no matter what the outcome of the Marist-Willamette game. Willamette gained 11 RPI points in this category just by playing Marist.
What does it all mean? It means that early in the season your RPI fluctuates wildly, but after about 20 games there isn't much change. That's because a single loss doesn't change your W-L percentage that much late in the season, doesn't change your opponents W-L percentage much, or your opponent's opponents. Somehow, the RPI is very accurate in the end. The main issue with the RPI at this point is that the RPI does not count out of state opponents opponents records. The RPI does include the opponents record, but that is only 25% of the overall formula.
Reporters.
I'm getting great recaps from Dean Inuoye of Marist and Dave Doreksen from Churchill as well as the Willamette and Sheldon coaches. It would be great to pick up at least two more teams. If we have six of the teams reporting plus myself, it is likely that each game will be recapped. There will be one or two games where neither team has a reporter, but if we have enough reporters that won't happen often. If you would like to be a recapper/reporter please email me at mwlnow@yahoo.com. And remember, you get to shamelessly plug your own child and get extra free photo attention and free photos from me of your child. The recaps don't have to be near as long as you are seeing on the main page. And if you just want to send in just the box scores, that's fine too. Box scores look like this:
Churchill 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 - 1 2 3
Sheldon 0 1 1 0 0 1 X - 3 5 2
Lessel, Murray(6) and Kearney; Cunningham and D Lewis
WP Cunningham LP Lessel
RBI Jones, Stiles, D Lewis
HR Jones
2B Cunningham, Stiles
Gary
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Opening Day Recap
I picked the right league opener to watch Friday. Andrew Moore threw an extremely well controlled no-no against Thurston. Just one ball left the infield and the two runners who walked were wiped off the basepaths by double plays. Nearly as impressive was Thurston's frosh Aaron Clift. Clift went five full innings before turning the ball over to TJ. Clift had a strikeout in each inning - a nice way to avoid big innings.
Coach Nicholsen had to be happy with laying down a sac bunt so early in league play this year. A batter did not lay a bunt down earlier in the game and I'm sure coach was thinking, "Oh, no. Not again this year." And, of course, Nicholsen had to be elated with Shawn Boehm's 3 run homer and the deep double by Kyle DeHaven - both with two outs!
Thurston coach Phil Dube had to be happy with his Clift. Clift didn't seem fazed by the pressure of opening the season at Swede. Dube couldn't have been happy with the Colt bats, but he knows a buzzsaw (Moore) when he sees one.
Pitchers ruled the day. Only two of the eight teams playing scored more than three runs. Willamette's Trent Waggoner had a nice day in his 7 inning, 2 hit win over Marshfield. One of my pitching keys is when a pitcher is reaching or surpassing a ratio of 4 strikeouts for every walk. Waggoner almost got to the magic 4:1 ratio with 10 k's and 3 walks. Marshfield's soph Doug Molzahn, was pretty efficient himself. Striking out 3 and walking just 1 in four innings. That's not overpowering, but pitchers have to avoid walks, and Molzahn did.
Willamette coach Jon Guldager will be hoping that soph Scott Kuvass's two doubles are a sign of good things to come. Even better, Wolverines Jalen Drath and Ryan Concannon each jacked one out. The Pirates only got two hits, which may be the situation the first round. The youngest team in the league and the Pirates have no seniors. I'm curious if any of the youngin's have started growing facial hair. Give them a round of varsity pitching and things will improve.
Following the pitching theme, the Sheldon - Churchill game had some strong pitching, but also wild pitching. Irishman Cason Cunningham went 7 innings, striking out 9, but walking or hitting 6 batters. Junior Lancer Jake Lessel also struck out 9, but in just 5 and 1/3 innings. But he too walked or hit 6 batters. If they don't get the walks down, teams will start really crowding the plate to take a few more hits on the arm. Time will tell. At the plate, Churchill senior Bryson Jones hit the lone homer in the game.
No recap, box scores or stats from the South Eugene win over Springfield. It was a 3-2 win by South. I heard it was Bates on the mound for the Millers, but no word on who pitched the gem for South.
Monday's round of games oddly don't feature any 1-0 teams facing each other. I'm going to try and make the Willamette 1-0 at Marist 0-0 game. Hopefully, it won't get rained out. The game will be a good opportunity to see what these two teams have on the mound. I've seen most of Marist's pitchers. It will be interesting to see if they can hold the Wolverines to less than the 5 runs Willamette scored against Marshfield. Willamette got seven full innings out of Waggoner against Marshfield, so they can throw anybody. If no one looks like they can go a lot of innings, it might be time for Willamette to only show their pitchers to the meat of the order one time through. Too bad the meat of Marists batting order is from 1 to about 7.
All of the other games are going to be interesting because I assume everyone threw their number one pitcher last Friday, unlike Marist who had a bye. South 1-0 at Churchill 0-1. There will be a total of 7 seniors dressed for this game. So we have two young teams. Pitching will probably drop off from opening day. I haven't seen Churchill, but I'm guessing their infield/outfield play is a little better than South's. The game should be decided at the plate, with both teams being giving the opportunity to hit the ball. If one of the teams' can pound it, they may put some pressure on the young defenses on the field.
North Eugene 1-0 at Springfield 0-1. Springfield's relatively inexperienced players at the varsity level are bound to have problems with the North lefties. High school age kids just don't see enough left handed pitching to catch on to how easy it is to hit them. This is a good opportunity for both teams to establish a solid number two pitcher on their staff.
Sheldon at Marshfield. Maybe Sheldon doesn't know the North Bend bridge is closed and you have to go around the bay. Would the Irish have to forfeit for not getting to the game? Last Friday, Sheldon squeaked by Churchill and Marshfield stayed close to Willamette. This is another game where we don't know what the falloff is in pitching to the number two pitcher. As stated earlier, the extremely young Pirates are likely to make Sheldon's number two look good as the Pirates view varsity pitching this first round of league games.
Thurston has a bye.
Looks like just as last Friday's scores reflected a lot of good number ones throughout the league, Monday's games could turn into some offensive outbursts. Hopefully, some number two's will emerge.
League stats are posted here - league stats. I received recaps or box scores from all but the South Eugene-Springfield game. If you can help out with those stats, please email me at mwlnow@yahoo.com
I haven't done a good job of teaching how the RPI works. Please take the RPI poll on the main page. The poll closes during the Willamette-Marist game.
I just noticed that three of four Monday games are at the three worst draining fields in the league. Can you guess which three?
Coach Nicholsen had to be happy with laying down a sac bunt so early in league play this year. A batter did not lay a bunt down earlier in the game and I'm sure coach was thinking, "Oh, no. Not again this year." And, of course, Nicholsen had to be elated with Shawn Boehm's 3 run homer and the deep double by Kyle DeHaven - both with two outs!
Thurston coach Phil Dube had to be happy with his Clift. Clift didn't seem fazed by the pressure of opening the season at Swede. Dube couldn't have been happy with the Colt bats, but he knows a buzzsaw (Moore) when he sees one.
Pitchers ruled the day. Only two of the eight teams playing scored more than three runs. Willamette's Trent Waggoner had a nice day in his 7 inning, 2 hit win over Marshfield. One of my pitching keys is when a pitcher is reaching or surpassing a ratio of 4 strikeouts for every walk. Waggoner almost got to the magic 4:1 ratio with 10 k's and 3 walks. Marshfield's soph Doug Molzahn, was pretty efficient himself. Striking out 3 and walking just 1 in four innings. That's not overpowering, but pitchers have to avoid walks, and Molzahn did.
Willamette coach Jon Guldager will be hoping that soph Scott Kuvass's two doubles are a sign of good things to come. Even better, Wolverines Jalen Drath and Ryan Concannon each jacked one out. The Pirates only got two hits, which may be the situation the first round. The youngest team in the league and the Pirates have no seniors. I'm curious if any of the youngin's have started growing facial hair. Give them a round of varsity pitching and things will improve.
Following the pitching theme, the Sheldon - Churchill game had some strong pitching, but also wild pitching. Irishman Cason Cunningham went 7 innings, striking out 9, but walking or hitting 6 batters. Junior Lancer Jake Lessel also struck out 9, but in just 5 and 1/3 innings. But he too walked or hit 6 batters. If they don't get the walks down, teams will start really crowding the plate to take a few more hits on the arm. Time will tell. At the plate, Churchill senior Bryson Jones hit the lone homer in the game.
No recap, box scores or stats from the South Eugene win over Springfield. It was a 3-2 win by South. I heard it was Bates on the mound for the Millers, but no word on who pitched the gem for South.
Monday's round of games oddly don't feature any 1-0 teams facing each other. I'm going to try and make the Willamette 1-0 at Marist 0-0 game. Hopefully, it won't get rained out. The game will be a good opportunity to see what these two teams have on the mound. I've seen most of Marist's pitchers. It will be interesting to see if they can hold the Wolverines to less than the 5 runs Willamette scored against Marshfield. Willamette got seven full innings out of Waggoner against Marshfield, so they can throw anybody. If no one looks like they can go a lot of innings, it might be time for Willamette to only show their pitchers to the meat of the order one time through. Too bad the meat of Marists batting order is from 1 to about 7.
All of the other games are going to be interesting because I assume everyone threw their number one pitcher last Friday, unlike Marist who had a bye. South 1-0 at Churchill 0-1. There will be a total of 7 seniors dressed for this game. So we have two young teams. Pitching will probably drop off from opening day. I haven't seen Churchill, but I'm guessing their infield/outfield play is a little better than South's. The game should be decided at the plate, with both teams being giving the opportunity to hit the ball. If one of the teams' can pound it, they may put some pressure on the young defenses on the field.
North Eugene 1-0 at Springfield 0-1. Springfield's relatively inexperienced players at the varsity level are bound to have problems with the North lefties. High school age kids just don't see enough left handed pitching to catch on to how easy it is to hit them. This is a good opportunity for both teams to establish a solid number two pitcher on their staff.
Sheldon at Marshfield. Maybe Sheldon doesn't know the North Bend bridge is closed and you have to go around the bay. Would the Irish have to forfeit for not getting to the game? Last Friday, Sheldon squeaked by Churchill and Marshfield stayed close to Willamette. This is another game where we don't know what the falloff is in pitching to the number two pitcher. As stated earlier, the extremely young Pirates are likely to make Sheldon's number two look good as the Pirates view varsity pitching this first round of league games.
Thurston has a bye.
Looks like just as last Friday's scores reflected a lot of good number ones throughout the league, Monday's games could turn into some offensive outbursts. Hopefully, some number two's will emerge.
League stats are posted here - league stats. I received recaps or box scores from all but the South Eugene-Springfield game. If you can help out with those stats, please email me at mwlnow@yahoo.com
I haven't done a good job of teaching how the RPI works. Please take the RPI poll on the main page. The poll closes during the Willamette-Marist game.
I just noticed that three of four Monday games are at the three worst draining fields in the league. Can you guess which three?
Friday, April 1, 2011
League Openers - SUNSHINE! Axemen facility improvments.
Fantastic match-ups for the league openers. And fantastic sunshine!
Three match-ups involve teams that look pretty close on paper.
I should have an accurate roster for most teams after today's North-Thurston game. Still need Marshfield's and Springfield. All rosters are on one page for ease of use. Here is the link: Rosters
You can get by inning updates from the game I attend by following mwlnow on Twitter Link to Twitter . Search for 'mwlnow' and click on follow on the right side.
Text me scores while you are at games. My text number is 541-337-1311. I need new texters from most teams. I Twitter out the results as I get them. If you are smart phone savvy, you can sit in the stands and smugly say, 'North and Thurston are tied 1-1 in the ninth and Marshfield is ahead of Willamette in the first."
Check out the new poll. It will close Monday the 4th.
Three match-ups involve teams that look pretty close on paper.
- Thurston at North Eugene. Two of the top three teams in the league. Hopefully, the pitching match-up will be Andrew Moore vs TJ. Both teams have top notch defenses behind their pitchers. The game will probably be determined on the battle between Moore and the Thurston bats.
- Springfield at South Eugene. The defending MWL champs lost a lot to graduation, as did South. But the Millers have returning MVP Kameron Bates, who should be on the mound. South has one of the best players in the league in Gus Craig in centerfield. This is a very even match between two good teams that have an opportunity to establish an identity with a win. Miller fans should take note of some great improvements at South. Check out the new drainage system for the outfield! Actually you won't see it because it is under the grass, but the usually swampy South outfield will be bone dry today. Also new is a huge concrete base for the spectator area. Batting cages will soon be in right field, shortening the right field pole from 410 feet to 340. With luck a new scoreboard will be up by the end of the season. Could South be a program on the rise?
- Churchill at Sheldon. Two teams in identical situations. Both teams graduated a ton of talent. Both teams have great programs that know how to develop players. Sheldon appears to be a little ahead of Churchill at this point, but Churchill D is always good, and if the Lancer pitcher has a good day, the tide could turn in Churchill's favor.
- Marshfield at Willamette. Willamette is my 'program of the future'. Maybe the future is now - as in today. I believe the Willamette program is moving into the world of Churchill, Marist, North Eugene, Sheldon and Thurston and establishing a long term successful program. Marshfield, loaded with sophs and frosh, but no seniors is hoping this young team establishes a new Pirate baseball attitude. The Pirates can show their new attitude by bursting the Wolverine's bubble.
- Marist has a bye.
I should have an accurate roster for most teams after today's North-Thurston game. Still need Marshfield's and Springfield. All rosters are on one page for ease of use. Here is the link: Rosters
You can get by inning updates from the game I attend by following mwlnow on Twitter Link to Twitter . Search for 'mwlnow' and click on follow on the right side.
Text me scores while you are at games. My text number is 541-337-1311. I need new texters from most teams. I Twitter out the results as I get them. If you are smart phone savvy, you can sit in the stands and smugly say, 'North and Thurston are tied 1-1 in the ninth and Marshfield is ahead of Willamette in the first."
Check out the new poll. It will close Monday the 4th.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Official League Prediction
It's time for my final prediction. Due to bad Oregon weather and six teams fleeing the state during spring break, I've only seen three teams - Marist and Sheldon once each, and North Eugene twice. I'm not changing my groupings of teams, but I'm changing the final order a little bit.
Top three group alpha order: Marist, North Eugene, Thurston - throw a blanket over them. It's a three way race to the title for these teams. But here is how they will finish (hopefully, blogs are editable in two months).
1. Marist: Marist bats are hot early. Offense: I saw the Spartans in a losing cause against North Medford. The Spartans were hitting the ball hard and on the button, but right to people. I left between games to dry off my camera and didn't come back to watch Marist hammer three homers (Silver, Swindling and Inuoye) against the Tornado. At least 8 players have tripled!
Pitching: I'm putting a lot of pressure on seniors Zach Eyster and Kevin Haskin, but they have started strong and combined with the Marist bats, should pick up a lot of W's.
Defense: Defense is what keeps the best teams at the top, and Marist has it all. Their backstop is catcher Will Swindling, headed toward the University of San Francisco on a baseball scholarship. The Spartans have some speed in the outfield and are quick in the infield. The gap in the quality of defenses in the league has closed and generally, most teams aren't losing games because of bad fielding. Still some teams are better than others and Marist will be one of the better D's.
All in all, Marist's defense will keep the Spartans in almost every game. I believe it will be their bats, especially early in the season, that will carry them to the title.
Marist sits out the opening day of MWL league games with a bye.
2. North Eugene. The Highlanders should be an automatic number one pick as they return six players who played in the state championship game, including the winning pitcher Andrew Moore. I'm betting that Moore will come close to running the table in league. He's just that good at hitting the corners and changing speeds, of which he has a lot of. In any other year, North's number two pitcher would be good enough to win most of the games that Moore doesn't pitch. But this isn't just any year because almost every team has an ace who can beat anyone. It looks like the number two will be either of the tall lefties, Toby Woods or Big Cat Clayton. (Moore, Woods and Clayton will return in 2012). Defensively, Kyle DeHaven returns behind the dish. The Highlander infield is as good as it always is, which is usually the best in the league. There might be a lack of speed at a spot or two in the outfield, but you won't find these guys making mental mistakes, so they'll be fine in the outfield.
North Eugene opens by hosting Thurston, my #3 pick. Gonna be a great league opener. I'll be there.
3. Thurston. I didn't see the Colts in preseason, and they didn't have impressive scores out of Arizona, where the MWL went 9-14 against competition that had a couple of weeks head start on Oregon teams. I'll base my ranking on who is returning for Thurston and the overall program.
Tyler Johnson was listed number 30 on Baseball Northwest's Watch List for Oregon players. His batterymate will be junior Jarren Goddard, ranked number 27 for the class of 2012. Goddard hammered four dingers in Arizona and TJ added one more. Sophomore Kyle Watson is ranked number 19 as a pitcher and 1st baseman for the class of 2013. MWL fans would probably agree with these rankings and agree that the Colt pitching staff is in good hands.
All leaguer Zach Kopczenski, will help anchor down the infield with TJ when TJ isn't on the mound. Tyler Dumilieu returns as an all-leaguer in the outfield.
I think the Colts bats will be good, but not dominant. Goddard brings the power to the Colts lineup (.413 in league last year). Kopczenski (.326) and TJ (.379) are going to have to be hot in key games if the Colts are going to win the MWL title. Dumilieu (.367) has wheels and will be a pest on the bases. If the Colts don't find power at the plate, they have the speed to play small ball and everyone's favorite, the hit and run.
4-7 Alpha order: Sheldon, South Eugene, Springfield, Willamette - Who will improve the fastest?
4. Sheldon. Sheldon is loaded with potential. Where the Irish finish will depend on how fast they come together as a team. Senior Cason Cunningham will lead the Irish on the mound. He's had a fine spring so far, including a no hitter in Arizona. The Irish have at least four players on the BBNW watch list - Cunningham, Ryan Land, Cooper Stiles, Brett Nielsen.
Sheldon plays Churchill in the league opener. Two young teams in a very important early season game.
5. Springfield. It appears all league MVP Kameron Bates has fully recovered from his injury. Kameron is not only a good pitcher because he throws strikes, but he and Andrew Moore are among the most focused and intense players in the league. The Millers have only played three games so far, so there hasn't been a chance to develop a number two. Malik Evans, ranked number 16 for the class of 2013 by Baseball Northwest, and senior Blaine Dudley have to develop for the Millers to end up in 4th, or even 5th.
Offensivley, Dudley, Bates and senior Ryan Helfrich will likely provide power at the plate. However, the Millers send a lot of new varsity players into the teeth of a lot of good MWL pitchers. Don't expect much out of the Miller bats early in league play.
Springfield travels to South Eugene, my #6 pick, to open league.
6. South Eugene. South Eugene features two returning all league players who are also listed very high on Baseball Northwest's Watch list. Senior Gus Craig is listed as number 7 in the Oregon class of 2011, while Joe Schindler is ranked number 2 in the class of 2013. Senior Carlos Larson and junior outfielder Max Morrison are also on the watch list. The Axemen are pretty young, but are 3-2 on the season just three days before league starts.
I'm hoping to see them today, Wednesday, to get more info on the Axemen.
7. Willamette. Willamette has all of the pieces to make a run as high as third. It's just a question of whether or not this is the year that pitching finally comes through. The Wolverine MaxPrep roster has 11 pitchers listed, which I assume isn't right, but.....
There are six seniors on the roster. You're sure to remember Ryan Concannon Tony Svensson and Matt Erickson. Willamette was very young last year, which could have hurt their chances of earning all league honors. But they picked off several all league spots with frosh and sophs. Cole Urioste, Scott Kuvaas and Trent Waggoner were all league and have at least one more year after 2011.
Willamette's bats were up and down in Arizona. But last year in league, Kuvaas hit .372, Urioste hit .349 and senior all leaguer Tony Svennson .356. I'm thinking Waggoner will do well on the mound. Willamette's D has improved tremendously the last four years. If the Wolverine's second and third pitchers come through they will place high in the standings. But I'll let them prove it.
Willamette hosts Marshfield to open league.
8. Churchill. Churchill had just three non-seniors last year. This year they have just three seniors. Do good programs like Churchill really have rebuilding years? Or are they reloading with a good JV team? Churchill's football team has reloaded several times after losing good seniors, and I've always ranked them quite high. It's dangerous ranking Churchill this low, but I doubt they can climb much higher than fifth this year.
Pitchers Jordan Thompson (soph), junior Jake Lessel (number 20 on BBNW, class of 2012) and Brandon Doerkson have all shown glimpses of brilliance at times in pre-league play. You and I know the Lancer D will be good. Good infield play is just built into the Churchill program. The Lancer bats are mostly new to varsity play in a year with at least one very solid pitcher on each team. How fast can these young Lancers get up to speed at the plate? Senior Bryson Jones, junior Chase Kearney and Thompson are also on the BBNW watch list.
9. Marshfield. The Pirates are going into the season with no seniors. Out of nine potentail returnees, only three came back. But coach Hall, has a solid group of sophomores and juniors and has some hungry and talented frosh. The best chance of Marsfield ruining another team's RPI ranking will be when sophomore Doug Moltzan is on the mound pitching to Raymond Jones. Juniors Devon Knowlton and Mason Anderson, sophs Alex Dew, Tyler Johnson, along with Jones and Moltzan will be trying to pull along the hungry, agreesive frosh - Johnny Phillips, Anthony Ross and Drew Jones.
Let me know if you agree or disagree or want to sneak your name (or son's name) in here for a semi-legitamate reason. Gary at mwlnow@yahoo.com
Top three group alpha order: Marist, North Eugene, Thurston - throw a blanket over them. It's a three way race to the title for these teams. But here is how they will finish (hopefully, blogs are editable in two months).
1. Marist: Marist bats are hot early. Offense: I saw the Spartans in a losing cause against North Medford. The Spartans were hitting the ball hard and on the button, but right to people. I left between games to dry off my camera and didn't come back to watch Marist hammer three homers (Silver, Swindling and Inuoye) against the Tornado. At least 8 players have tripled!
Pitching: I'm putting a lot of pressure on seniors Zach Eyster and Kevin Haskin, but they have started strong and combined with the Marist bats, should pick up a lot of W's.
Defense: Defense is what keeps the best teams at the top, and Marist has it all. Their backstop is catcher Will Swindling, headed toward the University of San Francisco on a baseball scholarship. The Spartans have some speed in the outfield and are quick in the infield. The gap in the quality of defenses in the league has closed and generally, most teams aren't losing games because of bad fielding. Still some teams are better than others and Marist will be one of the better D's.
All in all, Marist's defense will keep the Spartans in almost every game. I believe it will be their bats, especially early in the season, that will carry them to the title.
Marist sits out the opening day of MWL league games with a bye.
2. North Eugene. The Highlanders should be an automatic number one pick as they return six players who played in the state championship game, including the winning pitcher Andrew Moore. I'm betting that Moore will come close to running the table in league. He's just that good at hitting the corners and changing speeds, of which he has a lot of. In any other year, North's number two pitcher would be good enough to win most of the games that Moore doesn't pitch. But this isn't just any year because almost every team has an ace who can beat anyone. It looks like the number two will be either of the tall lefties, Toby Woods or Big Cat Clayton. (Moore, Woods and Clayton will return in 2012). Defensively, Kyle DeHaven returns behind the dish. The Highlander infield is as good as it always is, which is usually the best in the league. There might be a lack of speed at a spot or two in the outfield, but you won't find these guys making mental mistakes, so they'll be fine in the outfield.
North Eugene opens by hosting Thurston, my #3 pick. Gonna be a great league opener. I'll be there.
3. Thurston. I didn't see the Colts in preseason, and they didn't have impressive scores out of Arizona, where the MWL went 9-14 against competition that had a couple of weeks head start on Oregon teams. I'll base my ranking on who is returning for Thurston and the overall program.
Tyler Johnson was listed number 30 on Baseball Northwest's Watch List for Oregon players. His batterymate will be junior Jarren Goddard, ranked number 27 for the class of 2012. Goddard hammered four dingers in Arizona and TJ added one more. Sophomore Kyle Watson is ranked number 19 as a pitcher and 1st baseman for the class of 2013. MWL fans would probably agree with these rankings and agree that the Colt pitching staff is in good hands.
All leaguer Zach Kopczenski, will help anchor down the infield with TJ when TJ isn't on the mound. Tyler Dumilieu returns as an all-leaguer in the outfield.
I think the Colts bats will be good, but not dominant. Goddard brings the power to the Colts lineup (.413 in league last year). Kopczenski (.326) and TJ (.379) are going to have to be hot in key games if the Colts are going to win the MWL title. Dumilieu (.367) has wheels and will be a pest on the bases. If the Colts don't find power at the plate, they have the speed to play small ball and everyone's favorite, the hit and run.
4-7 Alpha order: Sheldon, South Eugene, Springfield, Willamette - Who will improve the fastest?
4. Sheldon. Sheldon is loaded with potential. Where the Irish finish will depend on how fast they come together as a team. Senior Cason Cunningham will lead the Irish on the mound. He's had a fine spring so far, including a no hitter in Arizona. The Irish have at least four players on the BBNW watch list - Cunningham, Ryan Land, Cooper Stiles, Brett Nielsen.
Sheldon plays Churchill in the league opener. Two young teams in a very important early season game.
5. Springfield. It appears all league MVP Kameron Bates has fully recovered from his injury. Kameron is not only a good pitcher because he throws strikes, but he and Andrew Moore are among the most focused and intense players in the league. The Millers have only played three games so far, so there hasn't been a chance to develop a number two. Malik Evans, ranked number 16 for the class of 2013 by Baseball Northwest, and senior Blaine Dudley have to develop for the Millers to end up in 4th, or even 5th.
Offensivley, Dudley, Bates and senior Ryan Helfrich will likely provide power at the plate. However, the Millers send a lot of new varsity players into the teeth of a lot of good MWL pitchers. Don't expect much out of the Miller bats early in league play.
Springfield travels to South Eugene, my #6 pick, to open league.
6. South Eugene. South Eugene features two returning all league players who are also listed very high on Baseball Northwest's Watch list. Senior Gus Craig is listed as number 7 in the Oregon class of 2011, while Joe Schindler is ranked number 2 in the class of 2013. Senior Carlos Larson and junior outfielder Max Morrison are also on the watch list. The Axemen are pretty young, but are 3-2 on the season just three days before league starts.
I'm hoping to see them today, Wednesday, to get more info on the Axemen.
7. Willamette. Willamette has all of the pieces to make a run as high as third. It's just a question of whether or not this is the year that pitching finally comes through. The Wolverine MaxPrep roster has 11 pitchers listed, which I assume isn't right, but.....
There are six seniors on the roster. You're sure to remember Ryan Concannon Tony Svensson and Matt Erickson. Willamette was very young last year, which could have hurt their chances of earning all league honors. But they picked off several all league spots with frosh and sophs. Cole Urioste, Scott Kuvaas and Trent Waggoner were all league and have at least one more year after 2011.
Willamette's bats were up and down in Arizona. But last year in league, Kuvaas hit .372, Urioste hit .349 and senior all leaguer Tony Svennson .356. I'm thinking Waggoner will do well on the mound. Willamette's D has improved tremendously the last four years. If the Wolverine's second and third pitchers come through they will place high in the standings. But I'll let them prove it.
Willamette hosts Marshfield to open league.
8. Churchill. Churchill had just three non-seniors last year. This year they have just three seniors. Do good programs like Churchill really have rebuilding years? Or are they reloading with a good JV team? Churchill's football team has reloaded several times after losing good seniors, and I've always ranked them quite high. It's dangerous ranking Churchill this low, but I doubt they can climb much higher than fifth this year.
Pitchers Jordan Thompson (soph), junior Jake Lessel (number 20 on BBNW, class of 2012) and Brandon Doerkson have all shown glimpses of brilliance at times in pre-league play. You and I know the Lancer D will be good. Good infield play is just built into the Churchill program. The Lancer bats are mostly new to varsity play in a year with at least one very solid pitcher on each team. How fast can these young Lancers get up to speed at the plate? Senior Bryson Jones, junior Chase Kearney and Thompson are also on the BBNW watch list.
9. Marshfield. The Pirates are going into the season with no seniors. Out of nine potentail returnees, only three came back. But coach Hall, has a solid group of sophomores and juniors and has some hungry and talented frosh. The best chance of Marsfield ruining another team's RPI ranking will be when sophomore Doug Moltzan is on the mound pitching to Raymond Jones. Juniors Devon Knowlton and Mason Anderson, sophs Alex Dew, Tyler Johnson, along with Jones and Moltzan will be trying to pull along the hungry, agreesive frosh - Johnny Phillips, Anthony Ross and Drew Jones.
Let me know if you agree or disagree or want to sneak your name (or son's name) in here for a semi-legitamate reason. Gary at mwlnow@yahoo.com
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Out of State Wipe Out?
I don't like to blog without seeing any baseball, but my trips to Springfield this week only ended up in wasted gas. With no more games scheduled locally this week, I may as well make a stab at how our teams are shaping up.
Arizona - Nevada Wipe Out?
It looks like the six teams that went south for spring break will each get in from three to four games. So far, we are 3-10, with Willamette (2) and Marist (1) picking up the wins. But keep in mind that most of our out of state opponents have been playing since mid February. Opponents bats and pitching are undoubtedly a little more dialed in than ours.
My three pre-season league favorites, Marist, North and Thurston all travelled South. Marist picked up a 6-1 win, and I might add they were coming off of a great performance in the second game of a double header against North Medford last Saturday. Marist is holding their opponents under 3 runs per game. Keep pitcher Zach Eyster on your watch list. That's a great sign for the Spartans. Combine the defense with 7 runs per game on offense, including several dingers and I feel good about my prediction of Marist being in the top three. Silver, Swindling and Ryan Inouye all jacked one in the second North Medford game. For those not familiar with Marist baseball, just think football. These guys hit as hard in baseball as they do in football. Matt Beattie and Austin Baird are two more gridiron jocks who have had good games at the plate.
Thurston's defense looks good, giving up three and a half runs per game this year. Colt bats haven't exploded, but they've been playing tough opponents. There are going to be a lot of strong pitching staffs this year, and Thurston's Tyler Johnson and Kyle Watson are bound to generate buzz on the mound. You can expect these guys to be in the top three, too.
North Eugene lost a 2-1 game to a Selby coached Sierra Vista team. Doesn't that sound like Highlander baseball!? The Highlanders have given up over five runs per game; unusual for North. But in the games Moore pitched, North is giving up just 1.66 runs per game. With a league full of really tough pitching this year, North's other pitchers will have to step up. Lefties Chris Clayton and Toby Woods have looked good at times. I think North bats are ahead of where they were last year at this time. True, I'm comparing to an abysmal start last year, but this year's Highlander's are looking much more confident at the plate.
Springfield and Willamette should be very good this year, if.....
If Kameron Bates is full strength. The Millers have only played one game, but 2010 league MVP had a stellar pitching performance and appears to be back to full strength after knee surgery. Blaine Dudley is going to try and be the other stopper. Soph Malik Evans returns on the mound after a successful W-L year in 2010. Dudley and Evans are going to have to come through if the Millers are to repeat. I'm curious to see how Ryan Helfrich does at the plate this year after ringing up 10 RBIi's in league last year.
If Willamette's pitchers don't walk batters. Willamette is my surprise team of 2011. I've said this program is on the rise bigtime, and so far they haven't disappointed. The Wolverines are 2-1 in Arizona. Willamette's Achilles heel has been their pitching, but it looks like that is coming under control. Trent Waggoner, Ryan Concannon and Koleton Williams gave up just three walks over the last two games. Keep in mind that Willamette returns two all league sophs, Scott Kuvaas and Cole Uriste.
South, Churchill and Sheldon are my unknowns. I haven't followed the 6A schools the last four years and Churchilll only has three players returning from last year's roster. Of the three, Churchill (2-2) and South Eugene (2-2) look to be doing a little better at this early stage. Churchill scores a lot in it's first three games and defense had a shut out against Elmira before they left for the sunshine. South Eugene's Gus Craig is sure to create some talk and maybe the entire team will, too. South Eugene gave up just four runs in the last two games. Axemen bats need to get hot as they are averaging just 3.3 runs at the plate. Sheldon has played five games and given up at least 10 runs in three of them, one of which was an Irish win. Let's just say this is a very young team with a lot of potential. The Irish will progress rapidly as they gel as a team.
Marshfield has lost the only two games it has played. Like several recent years, I expect the Pirates to steal a couple of games and foul up some team's seeding. By the way, Marshfield's softball team has a 4-0 record so far!
RPI fun
Springfield is 1-0 with an RPI of 472. Sheldon is 2-3 with an RPI of 521. Willamette is 2-1 with an RPI of 'NA'.
I don't know why, but the RPI's are swinging a lot, sometimes several hundred points in a day for a team. Sometimes over one hundred points for teams that haven't played. I followed the RPI closely in football and basketball and this type of gyration did not occur in those sports. I know some of the RPI weirdness is due to out-of-state games not counting much in RPI calculations, but that doesn't account for everything. It's a good thing we have 16 league games. The RPI will start to smooth out as we get into league play.
Roster loaded with frosh and sophs
I have four complete rosters and a pretty good list of players from some other teams. I thought the Peach Fuzz award would go to Sheldon with six sophs, but it goes to South Eugene with five frosh!
It will be interesting to watch Churchill, which has only three players returning. The Lancers have three seniors and nine juniors and only two sophs. That might make Churchill, along with Thurston, one of the 'older' teams in the league. I'm betting that their defense will be good and they'll do just fine.
The Colts are fielding five seniors and six juniors, making Thurston the senior citizens of the league. I love their pitching staff. The Colts may pitch their way to the title in a year with a lot of good pitchers.
North Eugene has about four seniors, but they have four juniors who played on their state champion team last year and several more who were on that roster. The Maine import has a wicked 12-6 curve coming from the left side. North has to have a number two develop into an ace if they are going to take the MWL.
Willamette has five seniors, six juniors, and five sophs. The Wolverines are returning a lot of players of all ages. They looked fundamentally sound last year, but the pitching just didn't come through. The pitching is much better and the rest of the lads are older and stronger.
I haven't been able to scratch together a player list or roster from Marist, Marshfield or Springfield, so other than knowing that Marist is loaded, has a fair number of seniors; and Marshfield is planning on playing several frosh and may have just one senior, I'm in the dark about these teams.
When I lived in DeSoto, Texas, the local high school's goal was to get a two-year or four year off for each senior on the team. They had met their goal seven years in a row. They also had ton's of seniors on their team every year, and the JV team was loaded with juniors awaiting their turn on varsity. What a contrast to seeing so many frosh and sophs on our MWL teams over the last decade. (A lot of people think football when they think of high school sports in Texas, but I can assure that baseball is just as intense.) If you haven't seen the All-Teams-At-A-Glance roster, here is what I have so far. If you can help out on the missing teams pleast do. All Teams One Page Roster.
Thanks to all of the coaches and parents who have texted/emailed recaps this week. I know it's not easy texting recaps on phones or finding computers and wireless access.
Bring some sunshine back, league games start next week.
Arizona - Nevada Wipe Out?
It looks like the six teams that went south for spring break will each get in from three to four games. So far, we are 3-10, with Willamette (2) and Marist (1) picking up the wins. But keep in mind that most of our out of state opponents have been playing since mid February. Opponents bats and pitching are undoubtedly a little more dialed in than ours.
My three pre-season league favorites, Marist, North and Thurston all travelled South. Marist picked up a 6-1 win, and I might add they were coming off of a great performance in the second game of a double header against North Medford last Saturday. Marist is holding their opponents under 3 runs per game. Keep pitcher Zach Eyster on your watch list. That's a great sign for the Spartans. Combine the defense with 7 runs per game on offense, including several dingers and I feel good about my prediction of Marist being in the top three. Silver, Swindling and Ryan Inouye all jacked one in the second North Medford game. For those not familiar with Marist baseball, just think football. These guys hit as hard in baseball as they do in football. Matt Beattie and Austin Baird are two more gridiron jocks who have had good games at the plate.
Thurston's defense looks good, giving up three and a half runs per game this year. Colt bats haven't exploded, but they've been playing tough opponents. There are going to be a lot of strong pitching staffs this year, and Thurston's Tyler Johnson and Kyle Watson are bound to generate buzz on the mound. You can expect these guys to be in the top three, too.
North Eugene lost a 2-1 game to a Selby coached Sierra Vista team. Doesn't that sound like Highlander baseball!? The Highlanders have given up over five runs per game; unusual for North. But in the games Moore pitched, North is giving up just 1.66 runs per game. With a league full of really tough pitching this year, North's other pitchers will have to step up. Lefties Chris Clayton and Toby Woods have looked good at times. I think North bats are ahead of where they were last year at this time. True, I'm comparing to an abysmal start last year, but this year's Highlander's are looking much more confident at the plate.
Springfield and Willamette should be very good this year, if.....
If Kameron Bates is full strength. The Millers have only played one game, but 2010 league MVP had a stellar pitching performance and appears to be back to full strength after knee surgery. Blaine Dudley is going to try and be the other stopper. Soph Malik Evans returns on the mound after a successful W-L year in 2010. Dudley and Evans are going to have to come through if the Millers are to repeat. I'm curious to see how Ryan Helfrich does at the plate this year after ringing up 10 RBIi's in league last year.
If Willamette's pitchers don't walk batters. Willamette is my surprise team of 2011. I've said this program is on the rise bigtime, and so far they haven't disappointed. The Wolverines are 2-1 in Arizona. Willamette's Achilles heel has been their pitching, but it looks like that is coming under control. Trent Waggoner, Ryan Concannon and Koleton Williams gave up just three walks over the last two games. Keep in mind that Willamette returns two all league sophs, Scott Kuvaas and Cole Uriste.
South, Churchill and Sheldon are my unknowns. I haven't followed the 6A schools the last four years and Churchilll only has three players returning from last year's roster. Of the three, Churchill (2-2) and South Eugene (2-2) look to be doing a little better at this early stage. Churchill scores a lot in it's first three games and defense had a shut out against Elmira before they left for the sunshine. South Eugene's Gus Craig is sure to create some talk and maybe the entire team will, too. South Eugene gave up just four runs in the last two games. Axemen bats need to get hot as they are averaging just 3.3 runs at the plate. Sheldon has played five games and given up at least 10 runs in three of them, one of which was an Irish win. Let's just say this is a very young team with a lot of potential. The Irish will progress rapidly as they gel as a team.
Marshfield has lost the only two games it has played. Like several recent years, I expect the Pirates to steal a couple of games and foul up some team's seeding. By the way, Marshfield's softball team has a 4-0 record so far!
RPI fun
Springfield is 1-0 with an RPI of 472. Sheldon is 2-3 with an RPI of 521. Willamette is 2-1 with an RPI of 'NA'.
I don't know why, but the RPI's are swinging a lot, sometimes several hundred points in a day for a team. Sometimes over one hundred points for teams that haven't played. I followed the RPI closely in football and basketball and this type of gyration did not occur in those sports. I know some of the RPI weirdness is due to out-of-state games not counting much in RPI calculations, but that doesn't account for everything. It's a good thing we have 16 league games. The RPI will start to smooth out as we get into league play.
Roster loaded with frosh and sophs
I have four complete rosters and a pretty good list of players from some other teams. I thought the Peach Fuzz award would go to Sheldon with six sophs, but it goes to South Eugene with five frosh!
It will be interesting to watch Churchill, which has only three players returning. The Lancers have three seniors and nine juniors and only two sophs. That might make Churchill, along with Thurston, one of the 'older' teams in the league. I'm betting that their defense will be good and they'll do just fine.
The Colts are fielding five seniors and six juniors, making Thurston the senior citizens of the league. I love their pitching staff. The Colts may pitch their way to the title in a year with a lot of good pitchers.
North Eugene has about four seniors, but they have four juniors who played on their state champion team last year and several more who were on that roster. The Maine import has a wicked 12-6 curve coming from the left side. North has to have a number two develop into an ace if they are going to take the MWL.
Willamette has five seniors, six juniors, and five sophs. The Wolverines are returning a lot of players of all ages. They looked fundamentally sound last year, but the pitching just didn't come through. The pitching is much better and the rest of the lads are older and stronger.
I haven't been able to scratch together a player list or roster from Marist, Marshfield or Springfield, so other than knowing that Marist is loaded, has a fair number of seniors; and Marshfield is planning on playing several frosh and may have just one senior, I'm in the dark about these teams.
When I lived in DeSoto, Texas, the local high school's goal was to get a two-year or four year off for each senior on the team. They had met their goal seven years in a row. They also had ton's of seniors on their team every year, and the JV team was loaded with juniors awaiting their turn on varsity. What a contrast to seeing so many frosh and sophs on our MWL teams over the last decade. (A lot of people think football when they think of high school sports in Texas, but I can assure that baseball is just as intense.) If you haven't seen the All-Teams-At-A-Glance roster, here is what I have so far. If you can help out on the missing teams pleast do. All Teams One Page Roster.
Thanks to all of the coaches and parents who have texted/emailed recaps this week. I know it's not easy texting recaps on phones or finding computers and wireless access.
Bring some sunshine back, league games start next week.
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