uGag, Baseball

[JacketOff]

You know who has won a regional? East Carolina (5), Rice (4), Southern Miss (2), Dallas Baptist (2), UConn (2), Baylor (1), St John's (1), Sam Houston St (1), UC Irvine (4), Kent State (2), Michigan (2), Indiana (2), Louisiana Lafayette (2), UC Santa Barbara (1), Maryland (2), Missouri St (2), Stony Brook (1), Houston (1), Minnesota (1), Pepperdine (1), VCU (1), Duke (2), Wichita St (2), College of Charleston (1), Illinois (1), Kansas St (1), Kentucky (1), South Florida (1), Stetson (1), Wake Forest (1), Notre Dame (2), Washington (1), VPISU (1), Boston College (1), Tennessee Tech (1), and Davidson (1)

So, I guess if we want to compare ourselves to Oral Roberts or Bethune Cookman or Army, we are doing about average. If we compare ourselves to East Carolina or Dallas Baptist, we are below average (Dallas Baptist has two SRs and East Carolina has five). As for our true peers, we stink compared to them in the postseason.

But, yeah, it is just luck.

How many of those teams are playing top 5 SEC teams in their regionals every year?

Everyone agrees that GT has had less postseason success than many of our peers with similar regular season resumes. Especially those in the ACC/SEC. It’s not like there’s a science behind winning a regional, though. There’s no science in winning a college baseball game in general. There isn’t a large enough sample size to create reliable analytics, and there’s too much inconsistency in game-to-game performance for it to matter anyway. You just need to have a good weekend, and if you aren’t the most talented team in the regional, you need that team to have a bad weekend. I guarantee you 95%+ of those teams you listed that have won a regional since 2006 would trade head coaches with GT in a heartbeat.

 

[Squints]

I've been trying to ask those questions on this and the other board, but I've tried to do it discreetly. I do agree that Ramsey appears to have a bright future in the coaching business, but he still has a very short resume for a good program such as Georgia Tech to consider him an obvious slam dunk hire. Lone Star Jacket indicated that he heard that Ramsey received several calls this past off-season, but listening to D1 Baseball podcasts and reading articles from them about coaching hires, the only time I have ever heard him mentioned was when Kennesaw St was looking two years ago.

In Ramsey's defense, FSU hit a grand slam with their hire of Link Jarrett, so I wouldn't expect them to consider Ramsey over him. LNJ is correct that Ramsey appears to have won over CFDH with his offensive and lineup construction philosophies, and he does appear to be a lights out recruiter. We could definitely do worse when it comes time to replace Coach Hall.

Bottomline, I wish that Ramsey had been offered the KSU job and that he was in his 2nd season there doing a good job. Then, when a 70 year old Hall retires after this latest extension ends in 2025 we would be in position to hire a 35 year old coach who had proven himself over a 5 year period as a head coach at a good mid-major school. Instead, we need to keep Ramsey around and motivated with a good carrot if we do intend to have him replace Hall in a few years.

Don't get me wrong. I'd be happy to have Ramsey take over the reins whenever/however CDH moves on. I just think it's funny how our fan base has developed a cult of personality around the guy and anointed him as the next all time great college baseball coach when we've never actually seen him coach more then a handful of games.

 

[FredJacket]

Don't get me wrong. I'd be happy to have Ramsey take over the reins whenever/however CDH moves on. I just think it's funny how our fan base has developed a cult of personality around the guy and anointed him as the next all time great college baseball coach when we've never actually seen him coach more then a handful of games.

Not to mention the irony that Hall... the inept, has-been head coach is the guy who hired/retained Ramsey & by some accounts has already ceded a lot of control to him.

 

[Squints]

My son-in-law, who is a head baseball coach for a Division III college in Georgia, tells me that he has frequently encountered and talked with Coach Danny Hall during summer ball scouting trips over the past several years. He says Coach Hall is a great guy, is approachable and easy to talk with, and is highly esteemed and respected by his peers at all levels of college baseball.

There is no higher praise than this.

It really does seem like the only people who have anything bad to say about the dude are our fans. It's very odd. Reminds me of CPJ a little bit.

 

[Home Park Jacket]

It really does seem like the only people who have anything bad to say about the dude are our fans. It's very odd. Reminds me of CPJ a little bit.

Doesn't remind me of CPJ at all. Reminds me a lot of Mark Richt.

 

[JacketOff]

Doesn't remind me of CPJ at all. Reminds me a lot of Mark Richt.

Why did UGA football start winning more games with Kirby than Richt? Is it because Kirby is a much better coach than Richt? Or is it because their budget exploded and they now spend more money on recruiting than anyone else in the country? On top of having a top 5 highest paid coaching staff?

Will Georgia Tech invest more money into baseball than 99% of our competition in order to compete for national titles once DH finally hangs em up? Doubtful. Relative to our spending, GT baseball is already overachieving. Especially now when you consider players at schools like LSU are getting paid 6 figures via NIL.

 

[Squints]

Doesn't remind me of CPJ at all. Reminds me a lot of Mark Richt.

I was making the comparison in the sense that CDH and CPJ are both highly respected successful coaches in their field but our fan base has some loud weirdos who seem to have devoted their fandom to hating them. Didn't interact with enough UGA fans during Richt's tenure to know if they had a lot of those types.

 

[78pike]

Someone walk me through the logic behind pinch-hitting Compton for Finley in the 5th inning yesterday.

I totally understand wanting to get Compton an AB and am fine with him PH, but why for Finley? Granted, Finely had not had a good series at the plate to that point with multiple Ks in Friday and Saturday games, but still, he leads the team in BA and HR.

Furthermore, you are bringing up a Compton in a critical situation (bases loaded in a tight game) and the guy hasn't had a live AB in two weeks (albeit it worked out OK, since he walked). And finally, since you are substituting him as DH (as opposed to a PH) now Finley's bat is out of the game AND if Compton gets on he has to run the bases coming off a pulled Hammy, which is not good. Why not let Finley hit, PH Compton for Ramano (depending on what Finely does ..... what if he hit a Slam?) and if he gets on let Diamanti pinch run for him and stay in the game at second?

The timing of putting Compton in there made no sense to me. My understanding is that Finley could have come out of the game (as pitcher) and stayed in the game as DH.

Maybe there was something we don't know about (injury to Finley, God forbid or something else "internal")?

SJ

I may be wrong but my understanding is that if Finley was replaced as a pitcher then whoever came in for him on the mound would have to bat in his spot in the lineup. But by pinch hitting for him Compton was able to stay in the lineup as DH regardless of who was pitching. So I think the rationale was that Finley was probably not going to last one more inning so it was better to pinch hit for him at that point than to be forced to remove King from the mound when his turn to bat came up again. And also Finley had not been seeing the ball all that great all weekend so why not give Compton a shot. Anyway, I think the move had everything to do with maintaining pitching continuity due to the DH rules rather than who was going to hit in that spot with the knowledge that Finley wasn't going to pitch more than one more inning. And don't forget Finley had just walked two batters the previous inning so maybe he was tiring.

 

[gtbeak]

I may be wrong but my understanding is that if Finley was replaced as a pitcher then whoever came in for him on the mound would have to bat in his spot in the lineup. But by pinch hitting for him Compton was able to stay in the lineup as DH regardless of who was pitching. So I think the rationale was that Finley was probably not going to last one more inning so it was better to pinch hit for him at that point than to be forced to remove King from the mound when his turn to bat came up again. And also Finley had not been seeing the ball all that great all weekend so why not give Compton a shot. Anyway, I think the move had everything to do with maintaining pitching continuity due to the DH rules rather than who was going to hit in that spot with the knowledge that Finley wasn't going to pitch more than one more inning. And don't forget Finley had just walked two batters the previous inning so maybe he was tiring.

I'm not 100% certain, but I'm pretty sure that Finley could have remained as the DH if he was removed from pitching. At the MLB level this is known as the Ohtani Rule, and I'm pretty sure college has adopted it as well. I know Finley continued as the DH after being removed as the pitcher in the Tennessee Tech game last Sunday.

 

[Squints]

Anybody can do as well as we have done since 2006.

Ramsey is a great coach. Whichever program locks him up for a long term deal will be playing for many CWS in my opinion. Certainly, more than 0 super regional appearances in 16 years.

Let's try this. Let's talk about that time frame from 2006 to the present. Personally I think anyone would have to nuts to complain about the years we had from 2006-2011 but that's a different conversation. I also think 'Anybody can do as well as we have' is peak Paul Finebaum caller hot take. That is also a different conversation.

What has happened across GT sports since the late 2000s? Money flooded college sports and schools needed to invest in their athletic associations to keep up with their peers. We did not. Hence, the bottom basically fell out of everything. We all know what happened to the football team. I'm not a basketball guy but from what I've seen that's a dumpster fire too. Even softball absolutely cratered. The baseball program also dipped. But I don't know why we would expect our baseball team to just keep chugging along at the levels it did when our resource investment was at parity with our competition while every other sports struggles.

So while you and others choose to place 100% of the blame on a single person I think it's wiser to also look at the environment he and the program are operating in. Is CDH blameless? No. Is he the be all end all to our 'struggles'? I'd say that if that was the case the baseball team wouldn't be the only team sport that was able to pull out of the nose dive our sports have found themselves in.

 

[leatherneckjacket]

More data...

In the last 16 years, the top seeded team wins 68% of the regionals. If that top seed is a Top 8 National seed, they win 75% of the regionals. In fact, a Top 8 seed makes the CWS 53% of the time.

There have 23 teams who have been the top seed in a regional at least four times. Only one program has never won a regional, Tech.

There have 25 teams who have been a Top 8 at least twice. Only one program has never won a regional, Tech. And only two teams have never won a super regional, Tech and Oregon.

An average tourney team would have won at least five Regionals in our 11 appearances, and gone to at least two CWS, as compared to our 0.

 

[CINCYMETJACKET]

I may be wrong but my understanding is that if Finley was replaced as a pitcher then whoever came in for him on the mound would have to bat in his spot in the lineup. But by pinch hitting for him Compton was able to stay in the lineup as DH regardless of who was pitching. So I think the rationale was that Finley was probably not going to last one more inning so it was better to pinch hit for him at that point than to be forced to remove King from the mound when his turn to bat came up again. And also Finley had not been seeing the ball all that great all weekend so why not give Compton a shot. Anyway, I think the move had everything to do with maintaining pitching continuity due to the DH rules rather than who was going to hit in that spot with the knowledge that Finley wasn't going to pitch more than one more inning. And don't forget Finley had just walked two batters the previous inning so maybe he was tiring.

I'm not 100% certain, but I'm pretty sure that Finley could have remained as the DH if he was removed from pitching. At the MLB level this is known as the Ohtani Rule, and I'm pretty sure college has adopted it as well. I know Finley continued as the DH after being removed as the pitcher in the Tennessee Tech game last Sunday.

Yes, Finley could have continued as DH even after he was taken out of the game as a pitcher. Unless the coaching staff screwed that up somehow. As gtbeak noted, he did that against Tennessee Tech.

My guess is that it was related to the line drive he took during the game. I think some in chat said it looked like it was off his arm, but I believe the radio broadcast indicated he took it off the upper part of his leg. Not sure what the final consensus was. Hoping for the latter. I'm hoping that the coaching staff took him out as a precaution so that he could get medical attention wherever it hit him. We had the lead, we had our best bullpen arms available, and we need Finley to continue what he did against Tennessee Tech as a hitter and against Miami and Georgia as a pitcher heading into ACC season.

Again, all speculation on my part, but why else are we here!!!

 

[LargeFO]

It really does seem like the only people who have anything bad to say about the dude are our fans. It's very odd. Reminds me of CPJ a little bit.

Constructive criticism of underachieving doesn’t equal “bad”. Or is he not allowed to be constructively criticized?

 

[Squints]

Constructive criticism of underachieving doesn’t equal “bad”. Or is he not allowed to be constructively criticized?

Where did I say constructive criticism is bad? I just don't see much of it when it comes to these conversations.

Things like 'an anchor around the program's neck', 'anyone could have done better since 2006', 'should have been fired years ago' are not constructive criticism. What a weird card to pull based on the conversations that are actually happening in this thread.

Y'all are wild when it comes to this dude.

 

[LargeFO]

Where did I say constructive criticism is bad? I just don't see much of it when it comes to these conversations.

Things like 'an anchor around the program's neck', 'anyone could have done better since 2006', 'should have been fired years ago' are not constructive criticism. What a weird card to pull based on the conversations that are actually happening in this thread.

Y'all are wild when it comes to this dude.

So you're going off of *one* thread? Great sample size there.

 

[LargeFO]

Where did I say constructive criticism is bad? I just don't see much of it when it comes to these conversations.

Things like 'an anchor around the program's neck', 'anyone could have done better since 2006', 'should have been fired years ago' are not constructive criticism. What a weird card to pull based on the conversations that are actually happening in this thread.

Y'all are wild when it comes to this dude.

Y'all act like it's some wild crazy notion to think some other coaches could've won a few regionals with the same rosters the last 12-15 years.

 

[GT Bravo]

I may be wrong but my understanding is that if Finley was replaced as a pitcher then whoever came in for him on the mound would have to bat in his spot in the lineup. But by pinch hitting for him Compton was able to stay in the lineup as DH regardless of who was pitching. So I think the rationale was that Finley was probably not going to last one more inning so it was better to pinch hit for him at that point than to be forced to remove King from the mound when his turn to bat came up again. And also Finley had not been seeing the ball all that great all weekend so why not give Compton a shot. Anyway, I think the move had everything to do with maintaining pitching continuity due to the DH rules rather than who was going to hit in that spot with the knowledge that Finley wasn't going to pitch more than one more inning. And don't forget Finley had just walked two batters the previous inning so maybe he was tiring.

That is my understanding regarding the DH and the pitching change. The TV commentators speculated something to that effect when the umpire appeared to be explaining it to Strickland.

 

[leatherneckjacket]

How many of those teams are playing top 5 SEC teams in their regionals every year?

Everyone agrees that GT has had less postseason success than many of our peers with similar regular season resumes. Especially those in the ACC/SEC. It’s not like there’s a science behind winning a regional, though. There’s no science in winning a college baseball game in general. There isn’t a large enough sample size to create reliable analytics, and there’s too much inconsistency in game-to-game performance for it to matter anyway. You just need to have a good weekend, and if you aren’t the most talented team in the regional, you need that team to have a bad weekend. I guarantee you 95%+ of those teams you listed that have won a regional since 2006 would trade head coaches with GT in a heartbeat.

Every year? We hosted four years. We played a top 5 SEC team about as many times. Those seeds win 75% of the time, which means they lose 25% of the time. We have lost 100% of the time in both scenarios.

There are plenty of data points to suggest we should have won more regionals than we have, you just choose to ignore them.

At this point I have no idea what you are even arguing other than you do not like what I am saying.

Let me add, maybe we would not face a top 5 SEC "every year" if we won more conference games instead of playing below .500 in conference over the past decade with top 15 talent. We are 150-160 in conference since 2012.

 

[JacketOff]

Every year? We hosted four years. We played a top 5 SEC team about as many times. Those seeds win 75% of the time, which means they lose 25% of the time. We have lost 100% of the time in both scenarios.

There are plenty of data points to suggest we should have won more regionals than we have, you just choose to ignore them.

At this point I have no idea what you are even arguing other than you do not like what I am saying.

I’m saying the grass isn’t always greener on the other side. See: Miami, Clemson, UGA, South Carolina, USC, Long Beach State, and many others who replaced long time coaches with plenty of success that have not replicated that success under new coaches.

 

[Squints]

So you're going off of *one* thread? Great sample size there.

No. I'm going off my nearly 10 years () of posting on this very message board and others, social media, and interacting with both GT and non-GT fans who follow college baseball. This thread was relatively tame until you showed up.

Y'all act like it's some wild crazy notion to think some other coaches could've won a few regionals with the same rosters the last 12-15 years.

I don't think that at all. It's certainly possible. I also think some other coaches could have done a lot worse and that's a more likely outcome of the two possibilities. Reasonable minds can disagree there. No biggie.

The way you've reacted to such an innocuous post is what I meant by odd. Y'all get so bowed up when someone pushes against the 'CDH is the worst' circlejerk. It's like clockwork. I feel like you and I have had this discussion like at least three times. Why don't you try engaging with what I am actually saying instead of choosing the worst possible interpretation of it and getting so aggressive?