By Hunt Palmer
The week before Thanksgiving produces little SEC football drama.
The Sun Belt and MAC are paraded around the conference in blowout after blowout as rivalry week looms. It’s perhaps the most deflating week of the year on the gridiron. Week 4 of the college baseball season carries that same feel.
The round-robin tournaments are over. No more Florida-Miami or South Carolina-Clemson. When Wright State-Tennessee is the league’s marquee matchup, it’s a light card.
That doesn’t mean it’s time for LSU to ease off the gas and start looking at Vanderbilt. Far from it. The Tigers need to treat this weekend like an SEC series. The pitch count limitations, within reason, are gone for the starters. The liberal platoons should be tightened. It’s important for LSU to go out and play three good baseball games against Sacramento State over the weekend.
This is a Hornet team that has not played well through 12 games. They’re 3-9 and averaging 4.4 runs per game with a 21-run outburst in one. That means in the other 11, the Hornets are scoring less than three runs per game with a team batting average of .211.
They’ve scored four runs total in their last three games and have lost five in a row. Lastly, they’re 3-1 against St. Joseph’s and 0-8 against everyone else.
This weekend is not about the opponent. It’s about LSU retuning to the form of the first two weeks and leaving this offensive lull in the rearview.
STARTS WITH STARS
LSU’s offense is going to need its best players to be its best players. With the ancillary pieces like Cade Arrambide, Zach Yorke, Tanner Reaves and Seth Dardar fighting it, Derek Curiel, Jake Brown and Steven Milam need to set the tone.
Those three saw the ball really well in Lafayette. Some big swings from them could lighten the load the others are feeling.
LSU was down 10-0 to Northeastern before they could come up for air and 3-0 at ULL after an inning. Curiel, Brown and Milam will probably hit in the first inning on Friday. It’d be nice for LSU to play from in front for the first time in almost a week. That could supply some oxygen to a lineup that has felt under pressure for 18 innings.
PAIR OF ACES
Friday night’s game features a pair of talented starters. That’s assuming Ethan Lay starts for the Hornets. He’s drawn that assignment the first three weeks of the season and has been excellent. The 6-foot-3 senior has struck out 24 and walked two over 19.2 innings early on. Opponents are hitting .189 off of him.
He is right-handed, so LSU can load its lefties up front to make things tough on Lay.
On the other side, it’s Casan Evans’s last chance at a pre-SEC tune up. He really finished on a high note last week. He set Dartmouth down in order in the fourth and fifth and started the sixth E-4 and strikeout. So, he could have easily retired the last eight he faced. The changeup was really dialed in to finish the outing.
Evans has certainly shown flashes of his brilliance, but one crooked inning has showed up in each of the last two starts. No such issues should arise against a Hornet team that has been really bad at the plate. This club only has three hitters who are batting .240 or better.
It’s a tall ask, but I’d like to see six shutout frames from LSU’s Friday night starter.
CADE’S CATCHING
LSU has got to put a cap on the free bases. If Mavrick Rizy is going to throw a pitch behind a left-handed hitter like he did on Wednesday, there’s nothing Arrambide can do. However, there have been some pitches Arrambide could have kept in front of him that have resulted in free bases.
The Tigers backstop also overran a bunt on Wednesday and probably should have handled Yorke’s throw home in the first that scored a ULL run.
Arrambide is a much better catcher today than he was last fall. Josh Jordan does a fantastic job with catching defense at LSU. Jay Johnson said Wednesday that there’s a correlation with wild pitches and passed balls going up and losing game. LSU needs to tighten that up considerably from the mound and behind the plate.
Friday’s game is set for 6:30. First pitch on Saturday is at 6:00, and Sunday’s start will be at 1:00.
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