-Long day for this guy.... Traveling, when an airplane is involved, is just a ridiculous amount of hurry up and wait. I thought I gave myself plenty of time to get from Columbia back to St. Louis yesterday. The flight was 7:45p. It shouldn't have taken two hours to get back to Lambert airport from Columbia. So I told myself I'd leave at 4:30p at the absolute latest. Todd Henderson didn't make anyone throw it into a postage stamp yesterday and the game actually moved pretty fast. I hung around for awhile afterward and pulled out of the stadium at 4:20p. But I hit this huge backup about 75 miles from St. Louis on I-70. Never figured out what caused it, but it was stop and go, sometimes just stopped for 30 seconds or so, for about 6 miles. So that put me pretty far behind schedule. I didn't know the time limit to check a bag on Southwest, but I suspected it was 45 minutes. I had a lot of things go my way at the rental car counter (shuttle left immediately) and at the check-in area (no line). My bag tag printed at 6:58p. So I go through security, which thankfully, was about 10% of the wait that I encountered at Hartsfield two day before, and made my flight just fine.
67 minute flight to Atlanta. But since we got in early, there wasn't a gate ready for us, so we sat on the taxiway for 25 minutes before "docking" at the end of C concourse. I noticed several empty gates on the long walk to the airport train. Then I stood around the baggage carousel for 10 minutes or so before my bag showed up. Had to wait about 6 minutes on the MARTA train, which departed at 10:59p. It's around a 25 minute train ride to my part of town and I live right across the street from the station. Walked in around 11:30p. So all told, it took longer to make my way from the Atlanta Airport to my front door (after touching down) than it took to fly from St. Louis to Atlanta and it also took longer to drive from Columbia to St. Louis than it did to fly from St. Louis down here.
Sometimes I guess it's natural to wonder if it's really worth all that headache. Sitting there on Interstate 70, staring at the back of an 18 wheeler in stop and go traffic, wondering what will happen if I miss the flight, knowing I'm due back at the office today, thinking about how expensive that hotel room was on graduation weekend, most would probably question why they signed up for it. I still refuse to look at it that way. Going on the road is a blast, even with all those headaches. This weekend especially, being so far away, you really just get to focus on baseball. And that's what I like.... There will come a time when I won't or can't do so many away trips, but I want that to stay in the future for awhile. I remember back in 2011, we were tailgating at The Varsity over here in Midtown before the tech football game. I ran into an ex-Miss RedRain. Neither she nor her friend had tickets to the game. Their plan, apparently, was to tailgate and then walk back to their hotel and watch it on TV there. She told me she had an in on some tickets, but didn't want to pay for them. I told her "that's the difference between you and me. I'd never look for a reason not to go to something like this." She wasn't very amused and, fortunately, that was the last time I saw her for quite awhile. I say all that to say that the travel and the grind can really wear you down, but it's not in my personality to want to quit doing it, and I absolutely relish these trips over the years, even when they end with travel headaches like yesterday.
-For the game itself, how good was Heath Holder? He's really putting together something special here. Walking into the stadium, I just knew that guy wasn't going to let us lose. And he didn't. He's mixing his pitches and he is really locating well. Early in the season, he just didn't miss enough bats when he was in the strike zone, then he started struggling to find the zone. He's making it look easy now. He's thrown his curve for a strike for a month, really going back to Texas A&M, and he's just very hard to hit when he does that. This run that he's on really reminds me of what Michael Palazzone did for us back in 2011. Pally stayed in the rotation that whole year and by the end of the season, was our Friday night (or series opening) guy. We can't really do that with Heater since we play on Thursday, but if we get into a regional, he deserves to get the baseball in game one. We'll play the late game Saturday if he does.
-I figured that we'd get to Plassmeyer eventually. He wasn't fooling any of our hitters in the early going, we just couldn't get anything string anything together, but everyone was getting solid contact. It was great to see Skyler Weber bounce back after a tough Saturday and I thought that his first AB yesterday really set a good early tone for him.
-I couldn't believe they gave Curry anything to hit yesterday. Man, that HR that he hit would have been past the entry way into the parking lot in Athens.... Only question was fair or foul, but what a blast. I'm hard pressed to remember a freshman who had that kind of weekend in an SEC series. You'd think that he would be wearing how with catching all those innings, but the opposite appears to be the case.
-The add on runs that we had late wound up being huge. I think it was in the 7th inning, we hit a ball to 3rd base that kicked off the 3B's glove (would have been a great play if he made it) and slid into the OF, allowing two runs to score. Turned out we really needed that padding.
-This was a very, very even series. I know we won a 4 run game, lost a 5 run game, and won a 3 run game, so when you look at it, it doesn't look like they were overly close.... They really were though. Missouri's inability to make some plays at 2nd base in game one early came back to bite them, they had a late grand slam that broke it open in game 2, and I don't think anyone ever relaxed in game 3.... I don't think we win this series last year. I think we give away yesterday in the late innings. This team has a good mentality and I will say, I don't think we've lost a game in the conference that we should have won. I guess the possible exception is the middle game at Miss State. And unlike last year, we are playing our best baseball of the year right now.
-Was really disappointed that we made things difficult yesterday by not making a pitching change at the start of the 8th. That's on the coach. Heath had pretty clearly reached the end of his rope by the 7th. We needed six outs and we had Bo Tucker and Blake Cairnes, neither of whom had thrown a pitch on the weekend. No reason to run Heath back out there for the 8th, and then all of a sudden, we still had six outs to get, but now with two men on base. Great mentality by the players all weekend. I just don't know why the coach continues to leave those guys out there so long.
-So, standings wise.... We are currently in 10th place in the conference. The best we can do is 13-17. But I think that the highest we can finish is 10th. If Missouri sweeps Kentucky this weekend, UK would also be 13-17, but would have the tie breaker over us. It's interesting though because Tennessee is 7-20. If they sweep us, they would pass us in the standings and could get themselves to the SECT (same situation they were in last season). We are 2 games up on Auburn (who goes to Vanderbilt) and 3 up on Arkansas (who goes to Miss State). Arkansas getting swept at home last weekend by Alabama would certainly suggest that the Hogs have run out of gas on the season. It's a pretty good bet that we are going to get to Hoover.
I still think that we are going to have to sweep this weekend to get into a regional. We are 26-26 now, so we really need to go 3-1 this week to avoid having to win 3 games in Hoover to be above .500 on selection day. Beyond that, I just don't think they're going to put a 12-18 team in the tourney as an at large. So we'll see.... Tennessee does have something to play for, but not as much as we do.
-All in all, it was a successful weekend in the Show Me State. We've handled tech nicely at Turner Field. It's only appropriate to beat them in what I'm sure will be our final game there.
67 minute flight to Atlanta. But since we got in early, there wasn't a gate ready for us, so we sat on the taxiway for 25 minutes before "docking" at the end of C concourse. I noticed several empty gates on the long walk to the airport train. Then I stood around the baggage carousel for 10 minutes or so before my bag showed up. Had to wait about 6 minutes on the MARTA train, which departed at 10:59p. It's around a 25 minute train ride to my part of town and I live right across the street from the station. Walked in around 11:30p. So all told, it took longer to make my way from the Atlanta Airport to my front door (after touching down) than it took to fly from St. Louis to Atlanta and it also took longer to drive from Columbia to St. Louis than it did to fly from St. Louis down here.
Sometimes I guess it's natural to wonder if it's really worth all that headache. Sitting there on Interstate 70, staring at the back of an 18 wheeler in stop and go traffic, wondering what will happen if I miss the flight, knowing I'm due back at the office today, thinking about how expensive that hotel room was on graduation weekend, most would probably question why they signed up for it. I still refuse to look at it that way. Going on the road is a blast, even with all those headaches. This weekend especially, being so far away, you really just get to focus on baseball. And that's what I like.... There will come a time when I won't or can't do so many away trips, but I want that to stay in the future for awhile. I remember back in 2011, we were tailgating at The Varsity over here in Midtown before the tech football game. I ran into an ex-Miss RedRain. Neither she nor her friend had tickets to the game. Their plan, apparently, was to tailgate and then walk back to their hotel and watch it on TV there. She told me she had an in on some tickets, but didn't want to pay for them. I told her "that's the difference between you and me. I'd never look for a reason not to go to something like this." She wasn't very amused and, fortunately, that was the last time I saw her for quite awhile. I say all that to say that the travel and the grind can really wear you down, but it's not in my personality to want to quit doing it, and I absolutely relish these trips over the years, even when they end with travel headaches like yesterday.
-For the game itself, how good was Heath Holder? He's really putting together something special here. Walking into the stadium, I just knew that guy wasn't going to let us lose. And he didn't. He's mixing his pitches and he is really locating well. Early in the season, he just didn't miss enough bats when he was in the strike zone, then he started struggling to find the zone. He's making it look easy now. He's thrown his curve for a strike for a month, really going back to Texas A&M, and he's just very hard to hit when he does that. This run that he's on really reminds me of what Michael Palazzone did for us back in 2011. Pally stayed in the rotation that whole year and by the end of the season, was our Friday night (or series opening) guy. We can't really do that with Heater since we play on Thursday, but if we get into a regional, he deserves to get the baseball in game one. We'll play the late game Saturday if he does.
-I figured that we'd get to Plassmeyer eventually. He wasn't fooling any of our hitters in the early going, we just couldn't get anything string anything together, but everyone was getting solid contact. It was great to see Skyler Weber bounce back after a tough Saturday and I thought that his first AB yesterday really set a good early tone for him.
-I couldn't believe they gave Curry anything to hit yesterday. Man, that HR that he hit would have been past the entry way into the parking lot in Athens.... Only question was fair or foul, but what a blast. I'm hard pressed to remember a freshman who had that kind of weekend in an SEC series. You'd think that he would be wearing how with catching all those innings, but the opposite appears to be the case.
-The add on runs that we had late wound up being huge. I think it was in the 7th inning, we hit a ball to 3rd base that kicked off the 3B's glove (would have been a great play if he made it) and slid into the OF, allowing two runs to score. Turned out we really needed that padding.
-This was a very, very even series. I know we won a 4 run game, lost a 5 run game, and won a 3 run game, so when you look at it, it doesn't look like they were overly close.... They really were though. Missouri's inability to make some plays at 2nd base in game one early came back to bite them, they had a late grand slam that broke it open in game 2, and I don't think anyone ever relaxed in game 3.... I don't think we win this series last year. I think we give away yesterday in the late innings. This team has a good mentality and I will say, I don't think we've lost a game in the conference that we should have won. I guess the possible exception is the middle game at Miss State. And unlike last year, we are playing our best baseball of the year right now.
-Was really disappointed that we made things difficult yesterday by not making a pitching change at the start of the 8th. That's on the coach. Heath had pretty clearly reached the end of his rope by the 7th. We needed six outs and we had Bo Tucker and Blake Cairnes, neither of whom had thrown a pitch on the weekend. No reason to run Heath back out there for the 8th, and then all of a sudden, we still had six outs to get, but now with two men on base. Great mentality by the players all weekend. I just don't know why the coach continues to leave those guys out there so long.
-So, standings wise.... We are currently in 10th place in the conference. The best we can do is 13-17. But I think that the highest we can finish is 10th. If Missouri sweeps Kentucky this weekend, UK would also be 13-17, but would have the tie breaker over us. It's interesting though because Tennessee is 7-20. If they sweep us, they would pass us in the standings and could get themselves to the SECT (same situation they were in last season). We are 2 games up on Auburn (who goes to Vanderbilt) and 3 up on Arkansas (who goes to Miss State). Arkansas getting swept at home last weekend by Alabama would certainly suggest that the Hogs have run out of gas on the season. It's a pretty good bet that we are going to get to Hoover.
I still think that we are going to have to sweep this weekend to get into a regional. We are 26-26 now, so we really need to go 3-1 this week to avoid having to win 3 games in Hoover to be above .500 on selection day. Beyond that, I just don't think they're going to put a 12-18 team in the tourney as an at large. So we'll see.... Tennessee does have something to play for, but not as much as we do.
-All in all, it was a successful weekend in the Show Me State. We've handled tech nicely at Turner Field. It's only appropriate to beat them in what I'm sure will be our final game there.
