UK vs Gators ( Sunday )....

[CloverforkCat]

Cats go for the hard to believe, sweep of the series today @ 12:30 pm. After winning 3-0 and 7-6 in the 1st 2 games of the series, UK stands 25-16 and 10-9 on the season, and now has an RPI of 28 after last nights' win.
UK will more than likely go with Andrew Nelson on the mound, while Florida has also yet to name a starter. The Cats bullpen was very suspect last night after a brillant effort by starter Dustin Beggs.
Here is hoping for the Big Time sweep over the # 5 ranked Gators, and improving their seed for the SEC tournament.

 

[sluggercatfan]

Cats go for the hard to believe, sweep of the series today @ 12:30 pm. After winning 3-0 and 7-6 in the 1st 2 games of the series, UK stands 25-16 and 10-9 on the season, and now has an RPI of 28 after last nights' win.
UK will more than likely go with Andrew Nelson on the mound, while Florida has also yet to name a starter. The Cats bullpen was very suspect last night after a brillant effort by starter Dustin Beggs.
Here is hoping for the Big Time sweep over the # 5 ranked Gators, and improving their seed for the SEC tournament.

CC...The RPI thing is great , but if the CATS don't make the SEC tourney then they will have a tough time making the tourney despite the RPI... to get there they are having to go thru the top three teams in the division at this point...They guys are surely playing well and a win today would be big and they cannot be swept by anyone and would be great if they can win another series at home especially if they can sweep someone...

 

[STUCKNBIG10]

CC...The RPI thing is great , but if the CATS don't make the SEC tourney then they will have a tough time making the tourney despite the RPI... to get there they are having to go thru the top three teams in the division at this point...They guys are surely playing well and a win today would be big and they cannot be swept by anyone and would be great if they can win another series at home especially if they can sweep someone...

Would take an upset not to make SECT. The top 12 teams go. As it stands, UK is well ahead of UT, Georgia, MSU, and Alabama. Now 1.5 games ahead of South Carolina. Also ahead of Ole Miss by a half game, and within a half game of Arkansas. Certainly, there is work left to do, and still some tough series ahead (notably Vandy next week), but UK has put itself in a good position. Get the sweep today, and Cats are in excellent shape.

 

[CatsFanGG24]

Really solid series! Excited that these guys have come together.

 

[sluggercatfan]

Would take an upset not to make SECT. The top 12 teams go. As it stands, UK is well ahead of UT, Georgia, MSU, and Alabama. Now 1.5 games ahead of South Carolina. Also ahead of Ole Miss by a half game, and within a half game of Arkansas. Certainly, there is work left to do, and still some tough series ahead (notably Vandy next week), but UK has put itself in a good position. Get the sweep today, and Cats are in excellent shape.

S10...As of Friday D1Baseball.com--great site--has UK and Ala. on the bubble out as far as the ncaa tourney is concerned with 9 SEC teams making the field...Hope CATS stay hot

 

[Comebakatz3]

Sluggercat, here is a write up on d1basebal after yesterday's win. They are now saying that if the season ended today UK would be in.

http://www.d1baseball.com/analysis/ten-thoughts-saturday-april-25/

 

[Comebakatz3]

We are currently sitting in 7th. There is a race at the bottom between Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi State. Alabama still has to play red hot Arkansas and Vanderbilt. That will not be easy and unless they sweep Auburn it is unlikely that they get to around 12 wins. Tennessee, with just 6 wins, has to play both TAMU and Arkansas. So those are going to be hard to win weekends. Then they finish with MSU, so that is going to be a positive for us because only one of those teams can get those wins. Lastly you have Georgia... they just got swept by Auburn. They next face Florida, who will likely be very mad about the series with us, and then us followed by Arkansas. So, that definitely favors us.

Point being, we just have to, at the very least, stay above 2 of those 4 teams to make the tournament. With the remaining schedules it would be hard for us to not stay above those guys. We usually fall apart in the end of the year, but this would have to be one epic meltdown to finish 13th or 14th.

 

[Comebakatz3]

UK down 5-1. I believe it's the bottom of the fourth. Cats really need to find a third and fourth pitcher if they want to have any post season success. Brown and Beggs seem to have solid outings most the time. Nelson is hit or miss and Cody is a train wreck.

 

[Comebakatz3]

By the way, nothing annoys me more than scoring runs in the top of the inning and then turning around and giving up runs in the bottom half.

 

[Comebakatz3]

7-1 now

 

[CloverforkCat]

Final score UF 10 Cats 1, oh well, we won the series and that is what counts. Have a tough next 4 games with uofl on tues. and Vandy next weekend. On a bright note all of those games are at the Cliff !

 

[Comebakatz3]

Definitely need to get at least 2 of these next 4. Doesn't matter which ones. May even be better to get two Vandy wins, but getting 2 would be a nice boost to our RPI and help us to make the tournament, again, as long as we don't have some crazy collapse.

 

[sluggercatfan]

Sluggercat, here is a write up on d1basebal after yesterday's win. They are now saying that if the season ended today UK would be in.

http://www.d1baseball.com/analysis/ten-thoughts-saturday-april-25/

Yes ...I had already read the article and UK pretty much controls its own destiny...After to there is a log jam of teams in the 9-12 win range...SC 9..UK..10..ole miss..10 aub..10..Ark. 11 ..Mizzu..12...UK has by far the toughest remaining in conf. schedule left, but UK's is the only one I know and actually worry about starting next week starting with a Tues. game against the filthy chickens which would be a huge win for the rpi..

 

[sluggercatfan]

Final score UF 10 Cats 1, oh well, we won the series and that is what counts. Have a tough next 4 games with uofl on tues. and Vandy next weekend. On a bright note all of those games are at the Cliff !

ul game has been move to a home game for them..

 

[CloverforkCat]

ul game has been move to a home game for them..

I saw that just a little bit ago, why did they do that ? The game in Louisville was rained out about 3 weeks ago....do not understand this !

 

[CloverforkCat]

UK down 5-1. I believe it's the bottom of the fourth. Cats really need to find a third and fourth pitcher if they want to have any post season success. Brown and Beggs seem to have solid outings most the time. Nelson is hit or miss and Cody is a train wreck.

Amen to that, Brown and Beggs and then laid eggs. We really need to find that 3rd starter, I am for giving Dylan Dwyer a shot. K Cody is struggling right now, and Nelson is hit and miss !

 

[sluggercatfan]

I saw that just a little bit ago, why did they do that ? The game in Louisville was rained out about 3 weeks ago....do not understand this !

CC...This game replaces the home game for Otis and then they play again in Lexington on 5-6..

 

[Derek Terry]

Amen to that, Brown and Beggs and then laid eggs. We really need to find that 3rd starter, I am for giving Dylan Dwyer a shot. K Cody is struggling right now, and Nelson is hit and miss !

Dwyer got hurt last season and hasn't been the same. Nelson is still a better choice than he is. Really disappointing how bad Cody has been this season. If Cody had lived up to his preseason hype then UK would be really tough to beat on the weekends.

 

[Comebakatz3]

Well we have to figure something out for Sunday. Last weekend against Tennessee it was fine, but this weekend didn't show us much promise against solid teams. The concern is that when you play in the post season your three starters and a weekday starter become huge factors. You need at least 4 solid starters to make deep runs and Kentucky the past two years has only really had two, and really it was more like one last year. We've not had 3-4 good solid pitchers in a good long time. Need to fix that and this year it is pretty bad with only having Beggs and Brown. After those two there really isn't even anyone to rely on heavily in the pen.

 

[sluggercatfan]

Well we have to figure something out for Sunday. Last weekend against Tennessee it was fine, but this weekend didn't show us much promise against solid teams. The concern is that when you play in the post season your three starters and a weekday starter become huge factors. You need at least 4 solid starters to make deep runs and Kentucky the past two years has only really had two, and really it was more like one last year. We've not had 3-4 good solid pitchers in a good long time. Need to fix that and this year it is pretty bad with only having Beggs and Brown. After those two there really isn't even anyone to rely on heavily in the pen.

What on earth has happened to the Cody kid?...Thought he would be a blockbuster this year

 

[CloverforkCat]

Dwyer got hurt last season and hasn't been the same. Nelson is still a better choice than he is. Really disappointing how bad Cody has been this season. If Cody had lived up to his preseason hype then UK would be really tough to beat on the weekends.

Dwyer is 2-0 with a 2.54 era, and has 19 strikeouts in 21 innings pitched......not too bad !

 

[Derek Terry]

Dwyer is 2-0 with a 2.54 era, and has 19 strikeouts in 21 innings pitched......not too bad !

And a 12.27 ERA in 3.2 innings pitched in conference play. He's allowed five runs while facing just 18 batters in the SEC. There's a reason that he doesn't pitch much when it matters.

 

[UKnVT]

This team has been hard to figure. Really struggled in the non conference compared to recent years, but seem to be faring better in SEC play (albeit, still at .500). They do control their own destiny, which is good, so I hope they can clamp down and stay at or above .500 in SEC play, and take 1 of 2 against UofL (and beat NKU) .... that should take care of it.
Still infuriating to me that a team coached by a "pitching guy", can't seem to develop a better pitching rotation ...I wince every time they have to go to the bullpen (of course, I also wince when Hendo leaves guys in for too long ... what do you do?).