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Inside LSU Baseball: Pitching, Defense, and Next Steps · JustIN Time

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  Welcome to another edition of the Justin Dawn podcast.
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  I'm your host Justin, and today we're just going to be real
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  quick, real quick with it because we're we were on a
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  four-game losing streak going into last night's game and it
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  just wasn't looking good. We didn't look good out there.
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  They didn't look comfortable out at Ole Miss.
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  You know, pitching was decent on Friday night, but on Saturday we
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  had a complete defensive and pitching collapse.
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  On Sunday we had a defensive collapse in that eventually cost
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  us the game, but we're going to get into that right now.
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  We're just going to go over inning by inning the games
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  starting with the Friday night Ole Miss game.
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  Offensively, we started off hot. We scored two in the first, two
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  in the first inning of each game.
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  Then, you know, in the bottom of the first we let them come back,
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  you know, get to themselves. Catching needs to be better
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  again. I feel like I've said that 1000
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  times. We need to catch the ball
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  better. But you know, then you got they
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  Homer to go up three to two. Then it was quiet.
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  We tied the game 3 to 3. Then we made some defensive
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  changes and that eventually cost us later on where you get a
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  single, then air on the second base second baseman.
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  That eventually cost us and we ended up losing that game, this
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  game I think by a final of six to three.
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  You know, Cowan took the loss. You know, pitching wise we did.
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  We weren't horrible. Evans did give up 3, but he
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  struck out nine in that first game, which is a high life.
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  We can eliminate that one bad inning from him and get him to
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  settle in faster. We'll be we'll be fine.
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  He'll be a, you know, he's an SEC Friday night guy, you know,
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  Saturday. This is where he gets real ugly.
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  You know, we score twice, we get on the board twice in the first
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  two innings. Told them the Schmidt holds in
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  the scoreless ball through three and then in the 4th is where it
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  all went downhill. You know, we get them scoring
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  single, a walk, I'll pitch a walk, another wild pitch,
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  sacrifice flies, scores 1A ground out, moves the runners
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  up, you know, single and then a two run home run to give them a
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  four to two lead. And you know, we just they just
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  never looked back. They went on the score in the
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  5th, the 6th and then they scored seven in the bottom of
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  the sixth to 10. Run rule is 12 to two.
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  You know, OK, then we get here, which I will say after they
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  completely, you know, laid down and died on Saturday to get 10
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  run rule. They were down 7 to nothing
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  going into the 7th. Once again it was bad defensive
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  play, a couple of questionable calls by umpires, 2 in this
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  game, but you know overall. Then we had the I'm just skip it
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  to the 7th inning. We had Curio Homer to right
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  field, Aaron BD Homer to left field, Brown Homer to right
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  field, Simpson single two and scored Milem and Sarna Curio
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  single down the right field line and scored Yaman and then Yamin
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  scored Simpson Yaman and then to get a wild pitch for Yaman to
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  tie the game. Then just man error cost us this
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  game. You know errors this weekend was
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  a thing of errors in leaving runners on base.
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  Let's see you total them up. We left three on base on.
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  Let's me be honest, on Sunday we couldn't touch this order, we
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  couldn't touch him, but we left three on base on Saturday, 6 on
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  base on, 7 on base on Friday and five on base on Saturday.
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  We didn't move the ball, put the ball in play.
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  When we had runners on, we didn't do anything.
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  You know, let's talk about the bright spot, which was last
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  night. At first it was a back and forth
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  game. You know, we scored one, they
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  scored first, then we got on the board, then they took a 2 to one
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  lead and then we jumped back and got 3.
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  But we left seven on base last night.
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  You can't do that. Pitching was the bright spot in
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  this game in my opinion. We struck out 16.
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  We only walked two. But what needs to needs to be
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  addressed is the errors. We need to get into that rhythm
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  where we are, our field, our pitching, can trust our fielders
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  and don't feel like they have to make a pitch.
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  You know, I feel like we've got Braun at first.
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  Where are, you know, infield doesn't have to make the perfect
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  throw every time. They can just throw it and trust
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  the guy to make the catch. He's not perfect either, but
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  he's a little better than what we had there and offensively
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  he's really good right now. Looks like Brown starting to
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  come back with the bat, Mylan starting to pick it up.
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  Curious picking it up, you know Stanfield, Stanfield and Dardar,
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  we can keep those guys healthy. That's where we're at our peak
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  because our infield is Bond, Dardar, Mylan and Pearson and
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  the outfield. If Stanfield stays healthy, the
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  outfield is great with Stanfield, Curial and Brown.
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  Where we need heavy, heavy, heavy, heavy improvement is
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  behind the play to catcher. That's the position where you
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  should, it's in the name. Catch the ball, catch the ball.
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  We've got a catcher sitting on the bench.
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  You can catch and field. Just catch cleanly and field the
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  position cleanly and he's on fire with the bat to Yaman.
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  But what it boils down to is these guys need to build a trust
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  and start playing as a team and come together.
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  You know, today's tax day, it's the 15th.
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  This is when Jay likes to have his final lineup set.
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  We'll see about that this weekend.
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  We've got Texas A&M who just came off a huge 2 game sweep of
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  their rival in Texas. They're riding a high.
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  And I think I'm, if I'm not mistaken, or ranked 10 #10 right
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  now in D1, top 25 with a conference record of nine and
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  five in an overall record of 28 and seven.
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  Here's the weekend. You bounce back.
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  This is a perfect time to bounce back because it doesn't get any
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  easier after this. And it's not saying that this is
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  easy, but you know, let's see, schedule wise, we've got A&M
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  this weekend. Then we go to Starkville to play
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  Mississippi State, which is a hard series to play.
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  It's a hard place to play at. Then you get kind of a break.
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  You come home and play South Carolina, but not really because
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  South Carolina is picking up and playing ball at the right time.
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  Then you have probably you toughest one on the schedule
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  right now. You go to Athens to play
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  Georgia, who's on a high streak or was until he lost to Florida,
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  which Speaking of, that's your last series of the season or the
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  regular season is Florida. So you've got time.
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  You were sitting at six wins. You've got the time to clean up,
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  play clean baseball and come back and show what you can do.
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  I mean, you just have to take it and day by day and go with it.
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  You know, you just got to come with it, come ready to play,
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  start up, you know, you know, you had a team and Ole Miss who?
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  Ole Miss This series meant a lot more to them than it meant to
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  us. That was evident.
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  Their fans actually showed up for once and it was huge.
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  They're all butt heard about Wayne Kiffin and not everything.
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  It fired those guys up. They were hitting 15th in the 16
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  team SEC league at 2:56 and they hit 348 against us this weekend.
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  It's not a good look. You know, I'm not even we're not
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  even doing powerhouse pose this week because there was no bright
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  spots. You got almost shut out in the
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  last three games. You almost got shut out.
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  I will say this, but soon Cookman is a way better team
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  than people gave them credit for.
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  They're not ranked, but after they went on the road and beat
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  us, came to Baton Rouge and beat us last week, they turned
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  around, went back on the road to Florida and beat 4 to 13 to 7.
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  But you know, I'll look at the SEC standings as they stand
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  right now. And you know, like I said,
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  there's no teams that stand out, you know, that really stand out
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  to me at this moment. You got a lot of, you got one
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  team in double digit wins in Georgia at 11:00 and 4:00.
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  And then the rest of the next one is 9 and five, nine and
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  five, nine and six, eight and 78 and 7-8 and seven, 7 and 8, 6:00
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  and 9:00. LS us almost in last place.
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  They need to pick it up again. This is crucial.
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  But I saw somewhere this on TikTok.
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  I think it was this week. I don't remember who it was.
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  We could have we could end this season with an SEC regular
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  season champion that doesn't have twenty wins.
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  That's just how good the SEC is in baseball.
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  Let's pull up the I'll pull up the D1 rankings right now.
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  Going into last week, we had 10 SEC teams in the top 25.
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  LSU obviously dropped out. Yeah, so we have 12345678910
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  again this week. That's ten teams out of 16 in
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  the SEC that are ranked in the top 25.
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  Yeah, 12, 34567891010 out of 16. This league just beats each
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  other up. You know, there's really good
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  teams throughout the league, you know, throughout the entire
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  league. We have really good teams and
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  it's going to be interesting to see who's playing hot at the
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  right time come to end of May when we go to the SEC
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  Tournament. You know, it's just going to be
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  really interesting to find out, really interesting to see.
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  We'll see how it goes, but this league this year is so there's
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  not one team that's drastically better than the next in as bad
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  as LSU is doing with the Texas A and Mississippi State, South
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  Carolina, Georgia, Florida, with the five series we have left, if
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  LSU plays to the capability of LSU pitching, fielding, hitting,
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  running bases, they play to their potential.
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  Where we were the number one, we were pre season #1 they play to
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  their top. They won't host a regional
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  because I think it's that shit has sailed.
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  But they'll be sitting at a pretty comfortable two seed
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  going into conference play in conference play.
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  Won't be a main conference tournament, won't be a you need
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  to win it all to get in situation.
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  What you need to do is you need to focus.
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  Take it one game at a time, have fun out there, play and then
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  whatever happens, happens. But you have to be better.
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  You have to be a little bit better each game, a little bit
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  better every day of practice and that's what it boils down to.
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  I'll give my top three guys offense, defense and pitching
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  wise this weekend. Defense is Steven Milem.
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  You know, he was just outstanding as always.
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  Then I've got I'll LeBron at 1 foot offense.
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  I think he really stepped it up. His game is really good right
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  now. He's hitting blood both
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  left-handed and right-handed, pitching, then pitching just
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  because he did so good after that first inning.
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  And I'll give it to case in Evans.
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  I think that's a huge thing. If we can get him to settle down
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  in the first inning and I give up a huge inning, he'll be fine.
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  Some key things I think needs to happen this weekend is and just
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  for the rest of the season. We need to get daughter back and
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  get him healthy. Him being in the middle infield
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  I think solidified it and was decent enough.
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  Whether each guy had enough trust in each other.
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  Stanfield needs to stay healthy. He needs to.
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  I mean that poor guy that he's just had a rough go of it this
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  season. He's started off the season
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  missing however many games. It was 15 games or so with his
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  hand. Then he comes back and last
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  weekend he runs into the wall and bruises some ribs.
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  We need to get him healthy. He needs to stay at a point
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  where he can play at the top and just getting Dardar healthy and
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  just getting Cooper Moore back and healthy.
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  We need some help on the starting end of the line for
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  pitching wise. I think Schmidt and Evans are
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  doing great, but you have to play defense behind them and
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  help them out and you have to get some run support and help
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  them out offensively. Curiel is start another guy
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  that's starting to pick it up with the bat, you know, and you
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  know, once we get those things going, hitting is contagious and
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  it'll come. These guys just need to go out
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  there and play their game and it'll come.
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  They'll get the brakes, but they need to go out there, work hard,
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  play and just play with the intensity that they want to win,
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  that they want to be out there and everything will fall into
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  place and we'll hopefully be in a regional.
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  But you know, hopefully it gets better before it gets worse and
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  it doesn't get any worse. But that'll do it for me today.
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  Like I said, this is going to be a short one, no powerhouse pose
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  or anything. I would say tone setting Tiger
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  of the week. Just they need to come out and
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  play. Then you come out with
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  enthusiasm and then you come out and just really want it.
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  They don't want it right now. They can say they want it, but
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  you don't show me. You don't show the drive and
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  stuff that you want it. They need to get a better team
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  attitude and come out and play like always, like share,
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  subscribe, comment. I would love to know your
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  thoughts and hopefully all issues this weekend can come out
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  and have a good series. Get a series win against Texas
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  AM. That'll go a lot ways.
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  Our RPI is 75 maybe less. We could use these wins to boost
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  them up and we can't lose another mid week game but
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  that'll do it for me. Remember comment like comment
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  like share, subscribe, do all the things.
• 14:45
  Have a great day and go Tigers.