Michael Bacigalupi
By Hunt Palmer
No one saw this coming.
The defending national champions are in a tailspin, and the unforgiving SEC is punishing every mistake. LSU has lost nine straight league games for perhaps the first time in program history, and postseason hopes are all but erased.
National pundits pegged this team among college baseball’s elite. The Tigers were ranked as high as second nationally after two weeks of play. Now only Missouri has a worse league record.
“It hurts,” said junior Eddie Yamin. “It hurts a lot. We’re trying. The results obviously haven’t shown the amount of work we’ve put in. Everybody knows we’re running out of time. It’s not like that’s a secret.”
Three weeks remain. Eleven games are all that’s left before LSU likely plays for its season at the SEC Tournament in Hoover.
The group continues to work though the results haven’t improved.
“Everyone wants to compete,” said freshman Omar Serna. “It’s not like we’re trying to do the things we’re doing. Everyone is keeping a positive mindset even when we’re down. We’re still in there cheering on our guys and getting behind our guys.”
The fight has shown. LSU took a 3-0 lead in all three games over the weekend in Starkville. The Tigers lead with one out to record on Friday, by five in the sixth on Saturday and by three in the sixth on Sunday.
Effort is not the issue. Nor is focus. It’s the performance that has suffered. Head coach Jay Johnson lauded his offense on Sunday despite dropping all three games.
“I thought it was outstanding,” he said. “They have a good bullpen. That’s a strength of their team. That was the clear separation of the two teams. They were just able to come back, frankly, because they got enough zeros from those guys. If I was going to be picky, we couldn’t quite get to their pen, but we did a great job against their three starters. SEC road series, I’ll take eight, eight and eight all day long. You don’t expect to go 0-3 when you score eight in every game.”
Injuries have destroyed LSU’s lineup. Jake Brown, Chris Stanfield, John Person and Seth Dardar are unavailable. Young players and little used veterans are having to pick up the slack. William Patrick delivered a bullet RBI single on Friday to give LSU a ninth inning lead. Yamin belted a three-run homer on Saturday. He’s playing a new position in left because of the injury to Stanfield.
“I treat every at bat like it’s going to be my last one in this jersey,” Yamin said. “You really never know. Take guys like Stanfield who comes back as a senior, and he’s been hurt twice. It’s totally out of his control. It would be totally an utterly disrespectful for me to do anything but work hard and compete as hard as a I can when I’m wearing this jersey.”
The bats produced 24 runs over the weekend, and it wasn’t enough to get a win. Last week, LSU pitching was able to subdue a potent Aggie offense at times, holding them to five runs on Sunday and seven on Saturday. The offense only pushed eight runs across for the entire weekend.
When one side shows up, the other vanishes.
“A lot of great players in this locker room,” Yamin said. “Whether or not the results have shown that, a lot of great players, a lot of really talented young men that work really hard while they wait. Guys like Jack Ruckert, Mason Braun, they’ve hit more baseballs than I think I’ve ever seen anybody hit in my life. They’re in there all day every day. It’s not like we’re pressing or anything. I feel like guys have played more free in the last couple of weeks than we have the whole year. Guys are putting together great at bats. Pitchers are throwing good pitches that kind of aren’t going their way sometimes. That’s just baseball. Sometimes you’ve got to do more.”
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