College Baseball | The Baseball Zealot

Can wood bats make a comeback in college baseball?

Is college baseball considering making a move back to wood bats? It appears so.

Currently, colleges almost universally employ aluminum bats and its distinctive ‘ping’. Now, it looks like there might be a movement to get back to using the traditional wood bats. According to this article at the NCAA web site, Division II in particular is serious about contemplating the change:

Pitchers in high school or community college who are throwing the ball between 88 to 92 miles per hour typically are drafted into professional baseball, (Flagler head coach Dave) Barnett said, because scouts look initially for velocity. Those who either don’t sign or are not drafted who have that kind of speed will be scooped up by Division I. That leaves Division II schools being in more of a development mode, Barnett said.

That makes wood the right choice for Division II, Barnett said. He and his colleagues in the Peach Belt – especially since Brunk arrived – have talked about changing but are reluctant to do so unless the division acts collectively.

Interest on the Division I level?

But is Division II the only level considering a change? Maybe not.

This month, the Big Ten Network posted a poll on its baseball page asking, “Costs aside, should college baseball move to use wood bats or stay with sweet "ping" of metal?”. Rather odd, considering the Big Ten is comprised of Division I teams.

As far as I’m concerned, the results aren’t incredibly important. If you’re interested, Wood has the edge 70.7% to 29.3% (surprised?? yeah, I was, too).

However, what IS important is that the poll is there at ALL. It tells me two things:

1) The issue is on their minds.. that it’s even an issue at all. By “their” I mean the Big Ten Network who certainly has the close ears of the Big Ten itself.

and

2) It’s a potential way to push the issue into the public’s minds (and by “public”, I mean the small subset of the public that follows college baseball. Polls can go both ways. Yes, they may be a good way to gauge opinion but they are also a tool to throw a wet noodle issue onto a wall and perhaps see if it sticks.

From the looks of it, Division II college baseball is on their way to discussing the issue of wood bats on the diamond. It seems those conferences have more to gain from it considering the development of the players involved. Still, it will be interesting to watch this story unfold.

Illini alums who done good

Last Saturday, I had the privilege of meeting former MLB players, Donn Pall (left) and Darrin Fletcher. They’re both University of Illinois alums and they showed up for Alumni Weekend at Illinois Field.

They got a good show. Illinois starter Kevin Johnson shut out Purdue and Illinois won 7-0. See the full report at the Illinois Baseball Report.

Flippin’ for baseball

Ozzie Smith has nothing on University of Illinois shortstop Josh Parr. Parr exhibits his own pre-game acrobatics last week before the Illini game against Butler by doing a full back flip.

The confidence must have been contagious. Illinois went on to defeat the Butler Bulldogs 19-0 that night.

Illini Baseball: Trading interviews with the enemy (Michigan)

The University of Illinois baseball team is now in the throes of the Big Ten play and this weekend, they’ll be playing the University of Michigan. Any time Illinois plays Michigan in any sport, it’s a big deal. I can vouch that baseball is certainly no exception.

In anticipation of this weekend’s upcoming series, Michigan sports website, MGoBlog did a Q&A interview of me. I did the same, interviewing their baseball expert and posting the results on Illinois Baseball Report.

Illinois is a quite improved team. After losing six of their first seven games, they have an overall record of 15-13.

Go Illinois!!

Illini game at Busch Stadium

Last night I went down to St Louis to see the University of Illinois baseball team play at Busch Stadium. They were playing the University of Missouri Tigers. The game was billed as “The Battle at Busch”.

Despite a quick 4-1 lead after two innings, Illinois ended up losing 7-4. The experience was fun though. And I got to see an excellent example of a delayed double steal by the Illini. Woo!

I posted a quick summary and a few photos at the Illinois Baseball Report.

Big Ten conference play almost upon us

The University of Illinois baseball season is underway. All right, the season is over a month old but the Illini just had their home opener last night so I’m very excited.

Illinois crushed Chicago State 18-2 for their first game at Illinois Field. I have a wrap-up and photos of game over at Illinois Baseball Report. Matt Milroy, who was chosen by the Red Sox in the 2009 MLB draft, got his first win for the Illini.

Interesting note: Chicago State came in with a 13.57 ERA. Illinois still managed to increase it significantly.

The one thing more fun than a home opener is the first Big Ten series at home. Penn State comes to visit this weekend. At IBR, I did an interview with Larry Fall who blogs about Penn State baseball at Happy Valley Hardball in anticipation of the big series.

Go Illini!

Award named for Olerud; 2010 College HOF inductees chosen

John Olerud got an award named after him yesterday.

The College Baseball Foundation announced today the creation of the John Olerud Two-Way Player of the Year Award to be presented annually as part of the College Baseball Awards Show.

Olerud (right) who is now a member of the College Baseball Hall of Fame, was a pitcher and first baseman, and a pretty good one at that, with Washington State University in the years 1987-1989.

Speaking of the College Baseball HOF, the 2010 inductees have been chosen. Leading the way was former Met Dave Magadan who hit .525 as a senior for the Crimson Tide. That was 1983, the year he was Baseball America’s Player of the Year.

Also on the list:

Alan Bannister from Arizona State. He was a .355 career hitter.

George Sisler (you might have heard of him): He hit .445 his sophomore year and .451 his senior year for Michigan.

B.J. Surhoff who played for North Carolina from 1983-1985. Career BA of .392.

Others include: Bob Bennett (Fresno State, coach 1977-2002), Eddy Furniss (LSU, 1995-1998), Don Heinkel (Wichita State, 1979-1982), Charles Teague (Wake Forest, 1947-1950) and Richard Wortham (Texas, 1973-1976).

The induction ceremony will take place on July 1.

Sensationalistic Bryant Gumbel makes some accusations

Never cared for Bryant Gumbel… now I have one more reason why. He implicitly accused Jeff Bagwell, Nomar Garciaparra and Ivan Rodriguez in an open letter to Mark McGwire that he read on his show, “Real Sports”:

“In closing, guys, please feel free to share this letter with Bagwell, Nomar, Pudge and all those others who went from hitting homers to power outages overnight. Tell ’em fans are ready to accept what happened. Tell ’em we’re ready to move on. Tell ’em that most of us get it…even if they, like you, still don’t."

I’m not prepared to say one way or another if these players did or didn’t. But a person in Gumbel’s position should know better than to throw names around without proof.

Sanctimonious dolt.

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Gary Bedingfield maintains a baseball blog with a special bent. His site, Baseball in Wartime focuses on the history of baseball during wartime and baseball players who served in the military. It’s a unique idea for a blog and Gary seems to have a lot of info on the topic.

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Finally, those who follow Illinois Baseball Report know this already but we are less than one month away from regular season. If you’re talking about college baseball, that is. Usually, that’s not big news as normally teams from the north travel south to play colleges in the warmer climates.

The catch this year is that University of Illinois will be starting their season at home in chilly Champaign-Urbana, Illinois. They will be playing host to the Bradley Braves on February 20-21. It’s the first time I know about that Illinois has had a home season opener in February.

Now, if Mother Nature lets this series happen will be another thing.

Alaskan Baseball gaining favor?

Bus Leagues Baseball has a nice piece on the Alaska Baseball League. They interview Jesse Jack who covers the ABL on his site, 49th State Hardball.

Maybe it’s me but I’m getting the sense that the ABL is gaining in popularity among colleges to send their ballplayers in the summer. Even our University of Illinois firstbaseman Matt Dittman, who was playing for the Lake Erie Monarchs last year, faced the Alaska Goldpanners as part of the 104th Midnight Sun Game in Fairbanks. The Libertyville Review had a feature on his trip.

And no, it doesn’t get THAT cold in the summer there. We’re talking about Fairbanks here:

From the interview:

A “hot” day up here is in the neighborhood of 70-80 degrees, which is comfortable for almost everyone. The colder days can be a little chilly; down into the 50-degree range. In fact, at least one team has installed heaters in their grandstand! But it’s very rarely too cold or too hot to take in a ball game…

We could use that kind of weather here at UI games.

Baseball is baseball

I talked on the phone with a friend today. In a nutshell, he is a Cubs fan who lives in Chicago proper. After going round and round about the Cubs woes, I mentioned I’ve been going to see the Illini baseball team practice a couple times this week.

“Wow, you go and watch and watch them PRACTICE?”

He seemed a bit incredulous.

And yeah, from his point of view, it does seem a little hard to believe. Living in Chicago, a few hundred feet from the Red line and boom! you’re at Wrigley Field.

But I’m not in Chicago (or for that matter, St Louis) and haven’t been all summer. I need my dose of real live baseball even if it’s a loosely played split squad practice game with the coaches hitting fungoes to the infielders in between pitches.

The fact that Illinois Field is one block away from my workplace doesn’t hurt either.

Meanwhile, the way I hear it from my friend, you can’t give away Cubs or Sox tickets these days. From his perspective, fans aren’t interested in either team this late in the season especially considering how they’re doing. Now that’s harsh.

I’m hoping the situation isn’t near as bad as my friend is portraying it. Baseball is baseball whether it’s college kids taking fungoes or two teams on the downswing.