2019 baseball
Posted: Tue Jun 26, 2018 1:24 pm
now that the draft has come and gone, a brief look at next year's team:
starting pitching: outlook... promising. we've got one more year of kenyon yovan. he'll start and match-up well with all of the pac-12's friday starters, which is something we really missed this year with matt mercer as our friday guy. kolby somers will be back for his sophomore year, probably as the saturday guy. none of his numbers pop out but that goes in both directions. he was a serviceable pac-10 starter as a true freshman, let's hope he can make the jump to above average with a year under his belt. we've had guys in the past who were forced into action and vomited all over themselves, but somers did not do that. as for the sunday or mid-week guys, your guess is as good as mine right now. quality depth is... not... good. james acuna has left the program per steve mims. cole stringer started out as the saturday guy this season but was unimpressive in 3 starts and then never pitched again. injury? i don't know. cullen kafka started 6 games this year but got drilled more often than not. i thought hunter breault (sophomore-to-be) showed promise. he had one start but appeared mostly out of the bullpen. honestly, we probably need one of the incoming freshmen, or perhaps a late addition JC kid, to be serviceable in order to get back to the postseason next year.
offense: outlook... meh. no real surprise here. we have a trio of good hitters (jakob goldfarb, who may move to catcher out of necessity now that ray soderman went pro; 1B gabe matthews; and 3B spencer steer) but it drops off mighty fast after that. johnny deluca started 54 games a freshman in the outfield. he didn't hit consistently well, but he did have 6 HR. evan williams, another freshman, lost his job to taylor travess about the time pac-12 play started. he hit a paltry .132 over 26 starts. ryne nelson started 50 games at shortstop but he hit .171. yovan DH'd 41 games and hit .233 w/ 3 HRs, which isn't anything eye-popping but sadly that line did make him one of our better hitters in 2018. none of our returning bench guys were able to take playing time away from our ineffective starters. we badly need this incoming freshman class to produce 3-4 everyday position players. BADLY. aj miller was drafted in the 37th round, he may be a candidate to start in the OF, but i don't really know much about the rest. i know the coaching staff likes this class, but i don't know what that really means. i'm sure they like most of their classes.
bullpen: outlook... unknown. yovan's a starter, parker kelly is now in the st. louis cardinals farm system. nelson has a cannon for an arm and was a late-inning specialist this year, he may be in line to close next year. after nelson, man. i just don't know. there's a lot of bodies, with 4 incoming freshman as well, but i don't know how it's going to stack up. i'm hoping yovan and somers can both go deep into games.
starting pitching: outlook... promising. we've got one more year of kenyon yovan. he'll start and match-up well with all of the pac-12's friday starters, which is something we really missed this year with matt mercer as our friday guy. kolby somers will be back for his sophomore year, probably as the saturday guy. none of his numbers pop out but that goes in both directions. he was a serviceable pac-10 starter as a true freshman, let's hope he can make the jump to above average with a year under his belt. we've had guys in the past who were forced into action and vomited all over themselves, but somers did not do that. as for the sunday or mid-week guys, your guess is as good as mine right now. quality depth is... not... good. james acuna has left the program per steve mims. cole stringer started out as the saturday guy this season but was unimpressive in 3 starts and then never pitched again. injury? i don't know. cullen kafka started 6 games this year but got drilled more often than not. i thought hunter breault (sophomore-to-be) showed promise. he had one start but appeared mostly out of the bullpen. honestly, we probably need one of the incoming freshmen, or perhaps a late addition JC kid, to be serviceable in order to get back to the postseason next year.
offense: outlook... meh. no real surprise here. we have a trio of good hitters (jakob goldfarb, who may move to catcher out of necessity now that ray soderman went pro; 1B gabe matthews; and 3B spencer steer) but it drops off mighty fast after that. johnny deluca started 54 games a freshman in the outfield. he didn't hit consistently well, but he did have 6 HR. evan williams, another freshman, lost his job to taylor travess about the time pac-12 play started. he hit a paltry .132 over 26 starts. ryne nelson started 50 games at shortstop but he hit .171. yovan DH'd 41 games and hit .233 w/ 3 HRs, which isn't anything eye-popping but sadly that line did make him one of our better hitters in 2018. none of our returning bench guys were able to take playing time away from our ineffective starters. we badly need this incoming freshman class to produce 3-4 everyday position players. BADLY. aj miller was drafted in the 37th round, he may be a candidate to start in the OF, but i don't really know much about the rest. i know the coaching staff likes this class, but i don't know what that really means. i'm sure they like most of their classes.
bullpen: outlook... unknown. yovan's a starter, parker kelly is now in the st. louis cardinals farm system. nelson has a cannon for an arm and was a late-inning specialist this year, he may be in line to close next year. after nelson, man. i just don't know. there's a lot of bodies, with 4 incoming freshman as well, but i don't know how it's going to stack up. i'm hoping yovan and somers can both go deep into games.