Monday, June 2, 2008

That THUD was NU Baseball....

Mike Anderson is hearing it today from Nebraska baseball fans who are upset with the way the season ended....but to be honest - nobody expected NU to be any good this year. Very low expectations of this team allowed them to gel and become a nice unit. However, when the chips were down - we saw why many thought this team would struggle. Not enough offense, not enough starting pitching, and no bullpen really hurt NU. They end the year 2-7!

UC Irvine won the regional like I thought they would because of pitching. When you have the No. 2 ERA in the nation - that should tell you about their arms. Good pitching beats good hitting and thus - Oral Roberts got sent home last night after a 8-0 win by Irvine. They will play LSU in the Super Regional. Let's hope they come back to Omaha - they were the story of the series last year.

15 comments:

Steve said...

I'm still pulling for LSU. They bring an amazing tailgate! I am, however, thankful for Irvine for beating the huskers. Three cheers for no husker morons at the CWS this year!

CubsNSkers05 said...

so how did Creighton and UMass do in the post sesaon?

Steve said...

Quality burn there! And I ask, who cares?

Matt Perrault said...

Um...UMass went to NIT Finals....and NU went where?

Were you trying some kinda come back for saying NU over-reached and then fell flat? Am I wrong?

Steve said...

I was actually waiting for an "At least we won a national championship in football" comment.

Andrew said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Andrew said...

1. matt - is that collar pop at the bottom of your page for real? serious question.

2. steve - Three cheers for no husker morons at the CWS this year! God forbid I would want to watch a team from my own state play. I love watching teams play that I know absolutely nothing about. It is my favorite!

Steve said...

There are quite a few reasons why myself and most people I associate with are ecstatic the huskers won't be in Omaha...

1. People at Rosenblatt will be baseball fans, not husker fans

2. Tickets will be much easier to get a hold of. husker fans that can't name three players on the team won't devour them.

3. More people coming from out of town for the event. I've been to the CWS when the huskers have been there and it isn't fun. I know plenty of people who won't go near Omaha when they are in the series. It's not a compliment to their fans.

Matt Perrault said...

Answers - 1. For real? If you are asking was it a fashion statement - No. If you live in the South you know about the sun...it was CRAZY hot in Georgia and it was CRUSHING my neck...that's why the collar went up. Lots of people do it...but you gotta feel it to understand...

2. I would have liked to see NU at the CWS again...it was fun 2 years ago to have them there.

sublime_fan27 said...

If I were omaha, I would just be happy people came to their filthy city to pump money into it. Anytime I'm east of 72nd Street I have this overwhelming urge to take a shower. Perhaps they can use some of the CWS revanue to put up a few dentist offices.

Matt Perrault said...

Maybe you need to take a shower because you are using a handle of a band that hasn't been around for 10 years.

sublime_fan27 said...

Are you serious? That might be the gayest comeback I have ever seen in my entire life.

Matt Perrault said...

Nice, use a homophobic slur to defend yourself...are you sure you're 27 and not 7?

Wes134 said...

Sublime, i worked down town for over a year, and i live in west O all my life. Your Filthy comment is unfounded. Omaha for the most part is a pretty clean city, and i have no problems going through any part of Omaha. I also think your name is the "gayest" name on here, and you should change it to urge_fan27. They were a much better band..........

CubsNSkers05 said...

You can't tell me that Nebrsaka had a team that should have even earned a host bid this season.


Lets take for instance the lineup of 8th place Oklahoma in the Big XII in their regional games to the lineup of Nebraska in their regional games.

Ok here we go.

Nebraska 3rd in Big XII

Nimmo .289 1 HR 28 RBIS
Mort .262 1 HR 13 RBIS
Opitz .339 11 HR 50 RBIs
Abeita .337 10 HR 49 RBIs
Farst .280 2 HR 15 RBIs
Belfonte .241 1 HR 37 RBIS
Corriston.277 5 HR 33 RBIs
Johnston .260 0 HR 11 RBIS
Kline .253 0 HR 23 RBIs

31 HR's 259 RBIS
2 Batters over .300
Team average of .276

Oklahoma 8th in Big XII

J Johnson .344 5 HR 27 RBIS
Davis .345 2 HR 40 RBIs
Gosse .368 8 HR 52 RBIs
C Johnson .346 4 HR 24 RBIS
Baker .315 9 HR 61 RBIS
Wise .278 7 HR 48 RBIS
Selby .280 8 HR 36 RBIs
Hernadez .337 1 HR 17 RBIS
Haruaghty .273 2 HR 27 RBIS

46 HR's 332 RBIS
15 more homers and 73 more RBIS

Team batting average .312

Now why you may ask did Oklahoma finish worse?

My take Nebraska during the year had so many clutch hits during games that won them games time and time again. If you looked at a lineup like that at the end of the year how many games would you say Nebraska won?

I could venture to say you sure as hell would not say 41 wins, would you?

Clutch hits and stout pitching up until the last month got us that many victories.

Our pitching up to the start of the A&M series.

Held teams to 4 or less runs in 33 of 45 games. Only 12 times did they give up more than 4 runs...
A percentage of 73.3% of the time we held teams under 4 runs.

Now what happened late in the year starting with the A&M series.

Pitching and Clutch Hitting caught up with them.

In our final 13 games we only managed to hold 2 opponents under 4 or less runs. A percentage of 15.4% see the difference?

Things Nebraska overachieved in all year pitching and clutch hitting came back to the real world in the final month of the season and they could never get that swagger back.

IMO it wasn't quite the THUD you explain it to be. This team was picked to finish as low as 7th in the BIG XII and the highest 5th by one person, most picked this team to finish 6th in the Big XII.

If you watched the season or listened to any of it, you would realize how many times we had clutch hit after clutch hit to win close games.

Record in games decided by 2 or less runs 16-3 That right there tells you a lot if the game is close Nebraska often got clutch hits to win the game.

Something you saw when we played Eastern Illinois and didn't see when we played UC Irvine. We were not consistent in the last month of the season. If I am wrong about this please correct me.

But IMO it was not the THUD that you described.