How big was Jake Michalak’s Sunday start against Valparaiso (6 innings, 1 run, 10 strikeouts)? They knew it was there, and to answer…huge! (Press Pros Feature Photos)
Big Ten play commences Friday in Bloomington, Indiana and the Buckeyes face the unavoidable reckoning of who they are, and how they’re going to be remembered in 2025.
There is no good news, bad news scenario with Big Ten play opening this weekend against Indiana. It’s just fact with conference baseball.
How did you do in the league, people will ask by season’s end?
Did you make the tournament? And did you win in the tournament?
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Injuries, transfers, inexperience, and coaching changes notwithstanding, none of it matters come June. And no one remembers that you lost 12-10 to Alabama. Now, it’s what did you do in the league?
They’re 5-9 at this writing after beating East Michigan Tuesday, and could easily be 9-5 if they had pitched better. And they’re not alone.
Indiana, at 7-9, is one of my big surprises through the season’s first month. I thought they’d be better, and in fact, wrote in February that the Hoosiers had been groomed to be in the top five of the conference by season’s end. And they may yet be.
And that was no guess. Following last year’s Big Ten Tournament I asked competing coaches in Omaha who they believed would come back this year impact the conference standings despite losses to graduation and the draft. Three of the four that I asked pointed to Indiana…and Penn State.
Indiana is pitching at an average of 6.5 runs per game, they’ve had some issues, and Gavin Seebold, an experienced returning starter has struggled (1-2, 9.72 ERA). Depth was supposed to be their ace in the hole, and like the Buckeyes, that card has yet to surface on the mound.
Tyler Pettorini burst in the past week has driven his batting average by 60 points…to .355 with 5 homers and 20 RBIs.
They are a powerful offensive threat, headed by Devin Taylor (.382, 6 HRs, .765% slug), who many believe to be one of the first ten position players taken in this summer’s draft. But like the Buckeyes, there are days when the offense doesn’t deliver and you have to pitch to win. Indiana, by my reckoning, has not come to that confidence yet. 15 games is simply too small a sample size to project, good or bad.
But pitching is what it is. The Buckeyes’ starting pitchers have not lit things up, either, with the exception of Chase Herrell, who’s shown consistency and improvement in each of his four starts, and last Sunday’s start by Jake Michalak against Valparaiso (1 run, 5 hits, 10 strikeouts). And not to belabor the point, but simply compare the Big Ten stats and teams that have pitched well – Oregon, Purdue, Michigan, and Penn State. Albeit, some of the numbers are against suspect competition compared to what Ohio State has faced, but that all changes this weekend.
Offensively, the Buckeyes are capable of doing some damage in Bloomington. The lineup of Maddix Simpson (third), Lee Ellis (short), Pettorini (second) and Will Carpenter paid dividends in the series win over Valpo, and again in Wednesday. In addition, the move to have both Matt Graveline and Mason Eckelman alternating between catching and designated hitter is beginning to show consistency. Eckelman had another two hits against Eastern Michigan and stands currently at .291. And the focal point of the lineup, Tyler Pettorini, went 4 for 6 Tuesday to raise his average to .355 with 5 homers and a .695% slug percentage.
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And defensively, the move to put Lee Ellis at shortstop paid impressive dividends with his play last weekend against Valpo. He covers a lot of ground and has the strongest arm on the infield. Reggie Bussey may or may not have the strongest arm in the outfield, but he covers ground with the best I’ve seen so far.
So all that aside, this weekend begins another start and a new season. Win a series at Indiana and suddenly you’re playing in another mental frame of mind with Iowa and Oregon looming. Do damage over the next three weeks and you upset the Big Ten standings at roughly the halfway point of the season. Glass half full.
Too optimistic?
Not if you pitch, and they know they have to pitch, and two more strong performances by Herrell and Michalak this weekend may change some minds.
What’s wrong with the pitching…with everyone’s pitching? The blue-bloods who follow the Buckeyes and read this site ask on a weekly basis.
Walks, first and foremost. You have to throw strikes, and I’ll go so far to say that ‘Trackman’, and the proud effort by umpires in amateur levels of baseball to shrink the strike zone according to ‘Trackman’, have made it very…VERY…hard to pitch. Simply put, they give way too much credit to college freshman and sophomore pitchers and their ability to thread the needle. It’s ridiculous to not call a strike with a pitch that’s a ball width wide…and it has been since 1869.
The second thing is mistakes in the strike zone – location. It doesn’t matter if you throw 95 miles per hour if you throw it belt high and right down the middle of the plate. You must pitch, not throw, and that includes being able to land your off-speed and breaking pitches with regularity. 95 is hitting speed in college baseball now by the time you face the batting order for a second time.
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But no one that I’ve seen has a patent on perfection. Mistakes are going to be made in baseball – at all levels of baseball – and when opposing teams do (and they will) this Buckeye batting order has shown an amazing ability to hit, get on base, and score. As a team they’re up 24 points in team batting average in just the last four games, alone (.288). And through 14 games they’re now averaging 8.5 runs per game – 11 per game in games they’ve won! You can win doing that.
But there’s just one thing. The team ERA is 8.5 as well, but there are heartening signs…arms that are beginning to become grounded and more confident.
I say this and it’s no excuse. There’s a reason why big league teams play 34 games in spring training, and some of them still can’t play once the regular season begins.
So 5-9 isn’t where you’d like to be, but 7-9 isn’t where Indiana wants to be, either.
A new season begins…Friday.
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