It was getting dark when I left the hotel today about 75 minutes in advance of first pitch.... And it continued to get darker as we got closer to the scheduled start time. Both teams took BP and warmed up as normal. They even did the National Anthem around 5:45p local time, which seemed awfully early. It was just after 5:50p that I was walking up to the stadium when the game was officially delayed.
Watching the radar on my phone, I really thought that we'd play tonight. Apparently the head grounds guy told a number of people that if we could start before midnight, we'd play. Around 7:30p was the first real break in the clouds that I saw. The rain seemed to taper off shortly thereafter too. But then, they cancelled tonight very shortly after that. Our team emerged from the stadium under a large swatch of cloudless of sky, after it stopped raining for a solid five minutes or so. I never saw the field (I went into the stadium, but only to use the bathroom - try pulling that in Athens) and it could have been that the outfield was just too saturated to play. I don't know. But calling it when they did seemed odd and it appeared that the rain was done at the time that they called it off.
I remember last year we cancelled the Friday night opener with Missouri in the middle of the afternoon, somewhat surprisingly. And then Missouri swept us in the DH the next day. Maybe that was on their minds today, I don't know. I sure saw a lot of Missouri fans driving away during the rain delay. No bigger contingent than we appear to have out here (a dozen or so), Missouri's crowd would have been virtually non-existant had they started at, say, 8pm. So maybe that was on their minds too. I kept thinking watching their fans leaving that it would almost be like a neutral site game if they played it.
So I came back here and watched most of the Braves/ Royals game on TV.... A game that was played 125 miles west of here started on time and never looked to have any rain falling (looked very windy, however). I'm disappointed that tonight got cancelled as I was set to see a game on six consecutive days; Braves Tuesday, us against Western Carolina Wednesday, Braves last night, and then these three. But that's ok.... I really like a double header.... I like getting up and having nothing to do but spend the majority of the day at the ballpark. I don't know that I'd want to do it every single Saturday, but it's fun to mix that in there sometimes.
I figure tomorrow is probably the biggest day of Scott Stricklin's coaching career. The Super Regional that they played against Oregon in 2012 was obviously huge for him; Kent State's winning that is almost certainly what convinced McGarity and company that Stricklin was the right guy for our job. But tomorrow, I think, is bigger for him personally. With what's happened the last 2+ seasons, I think he really, really needs to get into the NCAAT if he's going to be back for a 4th season. That hope can virtually end tomorrow (if we get swept, the best we can do is 12-18) or we can take a huge step in the direction of sewing it up. A split tomorrow means, I think, that we'll have to win out. It's a very, very big day for this team, but also for Stricklin as it could be the difference between his continuing to coach big time college baseball, or not.
I think that the team is a good mental spot right now. The body language seems really good and they appear to possess more confidence right now than we've seen all year. Maybe I'm reading too much into two wins, but a big part of me wants to believe that a corner was turned on Sunday with that win over Ole Miss.
It's funny too how much talk there was today about that Friday night game here two years ago.... I don't think anyone who sat through that one will ever forget it. It's the one game that we've played since the start of 2014 that gets talked about the most. That was obviously more centered around the wind and brutal, bone rattling cold... We won't have elements like that tomorrow or Sunday, but maybe we do something out here this weekend that hammers its way into our collective memory of Georgia baseball.
Watching the radar on my phone, I really thought that we'd play tonight. Apparently the head grounds guy told a number of people that if we could start before midnight, we'd play. Around 7:30p was the first real break in the clouds that I saw. The rain seemed to taper off shortly thereafter too. But then, they cancelled tonight very shortly after that. Our team emerged from the stadium under a large swatch of cloudless of sky, after it stopped raining for a solid five minutes or so. I never saw the field (I went into the stadium, but only to use the bathroom - try pulling that in Athens) and it could have been that the outfield was just too saturated to play. I don't know. But calling it when they did seemed odd and it appeared that the rain was done at the time that they called it off.
I remember last year we cancelled the Friday night opener with Missouri in the middle of the afternoon, somewhat surprisingly. And then Missouri swept us in the DH the next day. Maybe that was on their minds today, I don't know. I sure saw a lot of Missouri fans driving away during the rain delay. No bigger contingent than we appear to have out here (a dozen or so), Missouri's crowd would have been virtually non-existant had they started at, say, 8pm. So maybe that was on their minds too. I kept thinking watching their fans leaving that it would almost be like a neutral site game if they played it.
So I came back here and watched most of the Braves/ Royals game on TV.... A game that was played 125 miles west of here started on time and never looked to have any rain falling (looked very windy, however). I'm disappointed that tonight got cancelled as I was set to see a game on six consecutive days; Braves Tuesday, us against Western Carolina Wednesday, Braves last night, and then these three. But that's ok.... I really like a double header.... I like getting up and having nothing to do but spend the majority of the day at the ballpark. I don't know that I'd want to do it every single Saturday, but it's fun to mix that in there sometimes.
I figure tomorrow is probably the biggest day of Scott Stricklin's coaching career. The Super Regional that they played against Oregon in 2012 was obviously huge for him; Kent State's winning that is almost certainly what convinced McGarity and company that Stricklin was the right guy for our job. But tomorrow, I think, is bigger for him personally. With what's happened the last 2+ seasons, I think he really, really needs to get into the NCAAT if he's going to be back for a 4th season. That hope can virtually end tomorrow (if we get swept, the best we can do is 12-18) or we can take a huge step in the direction of sewing it up. A split tomorrow means, I think, that we'll have to win out. It's a very, very big day for this team, but also for Stricklin as it could be the difference between his continuing to coach big time college baseball, or not.
I think that the team is a good mental spot right now. The body language seems really good and they appear to possess more confidence right now than we've seen all year. Maybe I'm reading too much into two wins, but a big part of me wants to believe that a corner was turned on Sunday with that win over Ole Miss.
It's funny too how much talk there was today about that Friday night game here two years ago.... I don't think anyone who sat through that one will ever forget it. It's the one game that we've played since the start of 2014 that gets talked about the most. That was obviously more centered around the wind and brutal, bone rattling cold... We won't have elements like that tomorrow or Sunday, but maybe we do something out here this weekend that hammers its way into our collective memory of Georgia baseball.
