He did a lot of things right…Buckeyes freshman starter Gavin Kuzniewski makes a play at first to gain an out in the second inning of Saturday’s loss to Minnesota. (Press Pros Feature Photos)
Buckeyes drop their seventh game in a row despite another strong performance by freshman starting pitcher Gavin Kuzniewski.
Columbus, OH – The hits, it seems, just keep on coming; and we’re not talking about the kind you hear on Pandora.
The baseball Buckeyes dropped their seventh game in a row and their fourth Big Ten series of the season Saturday with an uninspiring 9-2 loss to the Minnesota Golden Gophers on a day when just across the Olentangy River the sun, and the world (despite the overcast), shone brightly on the next big thing come September.
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“What a difference a half mile makes, eh?” someone asked during the seventh inning of Saturday’s latest example of the Buckeyes’ baseball rebuild.
Rebuild on one side of the river. And retooling on another. One man’s Tavien St. Clair, the Buckeyes’ prized freshman quarterback candidate in football, turned out to be freshman Gavin Kuzniewski Saturday at Bill Davis Stadium where the Fishers, Indiana native gave Justin Haire and staff equal reason for optimism with five innings of 3-run, 3-hit baseball against the Gophers.
Technically, as good as starting performance on the mound since Jake Michalak struck out ten against Valparaiso a month ago, Kuzniewski took another step toward proving that his value as a dependable weekender is as close as the opportunities that Justin Haire keeps talking about.
“He’s making the most of them,” Haire said Saturday after his 3-run, 3-hit, 5 strikeout performance against rapidly-improving Minnesota, a program emerging from its own three-year period of doldrums.
“Every time he goes out there he keeps getting better. He just competes, he throw strikes, and he gave us a chance.”
OSU’s Reggie Bussey follows the flight of his second inning triple in Saturday’s loss to Minnesota at Bill Davis Stadium.
Prepping for the prom a year ago back at Fishers High School, in the span of a year suddenly he’s prepping for the weekend rotation in the absence of injured starters Chase Herrell and Blaine Wynk.
“And he’s earning it,” said catcher Mason Eckelman, following Kuzniewski’s best outing of the year on Saturday. “He’s worked hard, he competes…he’s earned this.”
The one loud exception to his Saturday showcase was a mistake made to Gopher second baseman Easton Richter, a fastball left up over the plate in the second inning that Richter rocketed out of Bill Davis and off the scoreboard in right field. Other than that…a single run an inning later off a walk and RBI double by right fielder Josh Fitzgerald.
The issue, as has happened before this spring, became a lack of offense in the same game you get decent starting pitching. The Buckeyes managed just three base hits during those five innings, and Reggie Bussey’s second inning triple was wasted when he was left standing at third by Gopher starter Kyle Remington.
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Out of the game in the sixth, Kuzniewski was replaced by Sahil Patel, who gave up three runs in the seventh…Spencer Hill, who surrendered a run on two hits in relief of Patel…and Charlie Giese, who worked the eighth and ninth (2 runs on 2 hits).
The Buckeyes finally got on the scoreboard in the seventh on a single by Maddix Simpson and a following RBI hit by Ellis; and put up a token tally in the bottom of the ninth with a Simpson double, followed by an Ellis RBI double to conclude the scoring.
Buckeyes hit some balls hard…but Gopher centerfielder Drew Berkland robbed Ryan Miller of this bid for a double in the second inning.
Minnesota won it with 9 runs on 7 hits.
The Buckeyes lost it with 2 runs on 9 hits.
Kuzniewski was charged with the loss (3-3), while Kyle Remington earned his first win of the year (1-5).
“We had some chances,” added Haire. “We just didn’t capitalize on them. And in the fourth, fifth, and sixth innings we hit about five balls really hard. They just caught them.”
The Buckeyes fell to 8-23 for the season and 2 and 2-12 in conference play.
Other Notes
Gavin Kuzniewski dropped his earned run average with Saturday’s outing, to 4.54 over the course of now 30.2 innings. That’s second only to that of Nik Copenhaver’s 3.54 over 20.1 innings.
The hitting stars, such as they were, were Lee Ellis and Maddix Simpson, each of which collected two hits on Saturday, and the only multi-hit Buckeyes. Simpson’s average continues to climb, now at .283…while Ellis sits a point higher at .284.
Ohio State coach Justin Haire asks for an explanation of an obstruction call in the eighth inning from umpire Matt Neader that cost the Buckeyes an out at the plate. Neader had other things on his mind.
Big Ten umpiring again came under scrutiny Saturday for the fact of a continual stream of video reviews (four) on routine plays that not so long ago were accepted as a matter of course. But now coaches roll the dice on nearly any call that’s short of the Ray Charles standard. To their credit, Saturday’s crew was upheld on three of the four contested calls.
What should have been reviewed, and wasn’t, was a curious call in the eighth inning on a play at the plate when OSU third baseman Maddix Simpson was called for obstructing the path of Minnesota’s Charlie Sutherland attempting to score from second on a base hit to left field. Simpson had made a diving attempt to catch the ground ball and was lying on the ground as Sutherland approached.
But umpire Matt Neader somehow construed that Sutherland had to step around Simpson to touch third and then proceed to the plate, despite there being no contact between the two…and that Sutherland never broke stride. Sutherland was cut down easily at the plate, only to have Neader shock the house with a call that might have rivaled Grady Smith’s phantom interference call during the Iowa-Illinois game in last year’s Big Ten Tournament.
“The fielder has the right to make a play on the ball, and that was what Maddix did,” said Justin Haire.
Another example of an all-too-common notion. With Big Ten officiating there’s what you get on one side of the river…and what you get on the other.
Catcher Mason Eckelman lines up Minnesota runner Charlie Sutherland on this play at the plate in the eighth inning.
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