Around the Horn: Gators feast on Tiger pitching in sweep

By Hunt Palmer

Jay Johnson warned us on Wednesday.

The Tiger coach said he was going to hold his weekend starters for Hoover. William Schmidt wasn’t on the roster. Casan Evans was limited to a Friday bullpen role. Zac Cowan did start Saturday, but it didn’t go well.

Florida annihilated LSU pitching for three days. It’s a Gator lineup that had scored 10-plus four times in 27 league games. They did it all three over the weekend in Baton Rouge. The Gators hung crooked numbers in 10 of 25 at bats.

This is a Florida offense that entered the weekend 11th in the SEC in scoring and 10th in batting average against league pitching.

PITCHING PROBLEMS

Against SEC competition, LSU finished the year dead last in ERA, WHIP, runs allowed, walks and wild pitches. In the final six games of league play, LSU allowed 10-plus runs in every game and 73 runs total. Georgia only hit 22 times due to being the home team and winning by run rule on Saturday. Florida threw in a mercy rule game, too. Those two scored the 73 runs in 47 at bats, That’s a run and a half per inning.

LSU gave up 10-plus in 13 of 30 SEC games, nearly half. The Tigers’ SEC ERA was over 7.00. That’s really hard to fathom.

Grant Fontenot is the only pitcher (other than Cooper Moore who only threw eight SEC innings) on the roster who kept his ERA under 4.00 for the season. His was at 3.90. Based on that number, you could suggest there wasn’t a single pitcher on LSU’s staff that had a good year.

SUMMER STEVE

Three years is a long track record in college.

For the third straight year, Steven Milam heated up with the weather. Monster had six more hits over the weekend to raise his average to an even .300. Perhaps his final swing at The Box was a hooking home run that slammed into the bleachers in right field.

Milam is 14-for-36 (.389) over his last 10 games. Only one of those was out of the league. He homered in all three games over the weekend to lift his season total to 10. In 2024, he may have been LSU’s best hitter by the NCAA Tournament. He shook a slow start to borderline carry the offense through the postseason last year, and he’s done it again.

He played 56 games with three errors, a .300 batting average and 10 homers. That’s a strong sentence, and I’m told he’s done this without being very healthy. Hell of a season for the junior shortstop.

BRING THE BROOMS

LSU was swept five times in Johnson’s first four seasons. LSU was swept five times in six weeks to finish this season.

Honestly, this season might be talked about with the national title years. It was that noteworthy. In an illustrious 40-year history of success, no LSU team has performed like this. Plenty of teams have fallen short of expectations or dropped heartbreaking regionals. None has limped to a 9-21 SEC mark courtesy of five sweeps.

Smoke Laval’s last team won 13 SEC games. Paul Mainieri’s first won 12 with a tie. This group only managed nine and lost 15 of its last 18 SEC games.

Maineiri’s first team was not good, but Blake Dean, Sean Ochinko, Jared Mitchell, Ryan Schmipf and Louis Coleman got valuable reps. They paved the way for an Omaha team in 2008 and a national title in 2009. The hope is that some of the young players on this team used this season in a similar way.