FB Recruiting Breaking down the Lexington Regional
- Thread starter Derek Terry
- Start date
Well, the Friday starter for Ohio seems to be Gerry Salisbury. He has a 4.36 ERA and opponents are hitting .258 against him. He has thrown 88 innings and has 71 strikeouts. He also seems to struggle a bit giving up 34 walks over the course of the season. The 19 doubles are concerning for him in the UK game. He is a good matchup for Ohio being that he is a lefty and, if anything, UK struggles more against lefties. It also means that a few of the UK switch hitters will bat from the right side and we might see a few more righties in the lineup, which helps to take away the short porch for Kentucky hitters.
As an offense, Ohio is hitting .277 as a team with their best hitter, Ibarra, leading off for them hitting .330 with 12 home runs. He, Klein (8) and Rott (10) provide most of the power, but after that there is not a whole lot to worry about in the home run department. They also aren't too apt to steal bases with only one player, Finkler, having more than 10 steal attempts. Finkler has about half of their steals on the season, and is 18 of 20 in stolen bases. So, keeping him off the bases will be key. The good thing is that he is only hitting .244. He hits 9th for the Bobcats and will try to get on base so that Ibarra, the 1 hole hitter, can knock him in. UK should be very careful with the top of the lineup (Ibarra, Black, Rott, and Klein), but after that the threat becomes much more manageable.
Defensively Ohio doesn't make many mistakes, and if they do they don't often allow opponents to score on those mistakes. Salisbury has given up 44 runs on the year and 43 of them were earned. Klein, their Saturday starter has given up 23 runs, all of them earned. So, they aren't going to give away too many runs, so UK will have to hit. We're more apt to make them pay for mistakes if we're in the bullpen than facing their starters.
Ohio has faced no one near the caliber of Kentucky. Their RPI is up 29 points from a week ago to 185th. They have faced just 2 teams in the top 100 of the RPI and are 5-2 against those teams. The two have played some common opponents:
Western Kentucky - Kentucky beat them 17-2 early in the year, and beat them 4-3 in the second meeting. Ohio played them on a weekend and won two of 3, losing the Friday game 4-5 and winning the other two 3-0.
Wright State - Kentucky beat Wright State 15-1 in the midweek. Ohio played them in a two game set and they split the set losing 6-1 in the first game and winning 4-3 in the second. Salisbury was the pitcher in the first game.
Miami (OH) - Kentucky and Ohio played the Redhawks in three game weekend sets. Kentucky swept winning 6-4, 16-3, and 14-2. Ohio won 2 of 3 by scores of 9-5, 1-3, and 3-2.
Oddly enough Ohio struggled against teams ranked 101-200 going 7-15. It is also interesting to note that 4 of their last 10 wins, and 4 of the 5 they've won in the top 100, have come over the course of the last two weekends, all against Kent State. The other teams in their 10 game stretch were Buffalo x3 (223), Ball State (162), and Eastern Michigan (191).
As an offense, Ohio is hitting .277 as a team with their best hitter, Ibarra, leading off for them hitting .330 with 12 home runs. He, Klein (8) and Rott (10) provide most of the power, but after that there is not a whole lot to worry about in the home run department. They also aren't too apt to steal bases with only one player, Finkler, having more than 10 steal attempts. Finkler has about half of their steals on the season, and is 18 of 20 in stolen bases. So, keeping him off the bases will be key. The good thing is that he is only hitting .244. He hits 9th for the Bobcats and will try to get on base so that Ibarra, the 1 hole hitter, can knock him in. UK should be very careful with the top of the lineup (Ibarra, Black, Rott, and Klein), but after that the threat becomes much more manageable.
Defensively Ohio doesn't make many mistakes, and if they do they don't often allow opponents to score on those mistakes. Salisbury has given up 44 runs on the year and 43 of them were earned. Klein, their Saturday starter has given up 23 runs, all of them earned. So, they aren't going to give away too many runs, so UK will have to hit. We're more apt to make them pay for mistakes if we're in the bullpen than facing their starters.
Ohio has faced no one near the caliber of Kentucky. Their RPI is up 29 points from a week ago to 185th. They have faced just 2 teams in the top 100 of the RPI and are 5-2 against those teams. The two have played some common opponents:
Western Kentucky - Kentucky beat them 17-2 early in the year, and beat them 4-3 in the second meeting. Ohio played them on a weekend and won two of 3, losing the Friday game 4-5 and winning the other two 3-0.
Wright State - Kentucky beat Wright State 15-1 in the midweek. Ohio played them in a two game set and they split the set losing 6-1 in the first game and winning 4-3 in the second. Salisbury was the pitcher in the first game.
Miami (OH) - Kentucky and Ohio played the Redhawks in three game weekend sets. Kentucky swept winning 6-4, 16-3, and 14-2. Ohio won 2 of 3 by scores of 9-5, 1-3, and 3-2.
Oddly enough Ohio struggled against teams ranked 101-200 going 7-15. It is also interesting to note that 4 of their last 10 wins, and 4 of the 5 they've won in the top 100, have come over the course of the last two weekends, all against Kent State. The other teams in their 10 game stretch were Buffalo x3 (223), Ball State (162), and Eastern Michigan (191).
FWIW, I just picked up my tickets today, and the ticket office said they were selling a bunch, pretty much people in line all day, at least at noon. Weather looks good especially tomorrow, so I expect really nice crowds this weekend.
I keep going back and forth on whether or not I should go. My heart says yes, but my head says that I can't. haha
@Comebakatz3
You're doing great work! Do you have any insight on the NC State game tonight?
I believe we are starting Lewis?
You're doing great work! Do you have any insight on the NC State game tonight?
I believe we are starting Lewis?
Thanks. I believe we're starting Lewis. I'll do some research and post a bit later about NC State.
NC State is a strong 3 seed in my opinion. They had a top 30 RPI (28). They played a top 25 schedule and have 35 win, and are 15 of their last 18. Overall pitching is fairly strong with a 4.02 ERA. Hitting overall is .277 (same as Ohio).
Pitching for them will be interesting. They threw their ace yesterday but after he gave up 3 earned runs in just 16 pitches they took him out. He was one of 7 pitchers the Wolf pack used last night in their 12 inning marathon. I imagine UK will see Brian Brown (3.38 era). He's a short left handed junior. Doesn't seem like his stuff is overpowering, but he does have some swing and miss stuff with 58 strikeouts in 61 innings. He seems to struggle with control at times with 31 walks. So far this year he's done a great job limiting extra base hits, but opponents are hitting .259 against them.
Common opponents are North Carolina, Louisville, and Delaware. All three were 3 game weekend series and then a ACC tournament game against UNC. They were 1-3 against the Heels. UK was 0-3. They went 1-2 against UK. Kentucky split that 1-1. They went 2-1 against Delaware, UK lost one game against them.
The biggest threat in their lineup is oddly enough their short stop who has 17 runs and hits cleanup. They score and average of 6 runs per game. Kentucky scores about 7.4. We need to be very careful with the middle of the lineup.
Pitching for them will be interesting. They threw their ace yesterday but after he gave up 3 earned runs in just 16 pitches they took him out. He was one of 7 pitchers the Wolf pack used last night in their 12 inning marathon. I imagine UK will see Brian Brown (3.38 era). He's a short left handed junior. Doesn't seem like his stuff is overpowering, but he does have some swing and miss stuff with 58 strikeouts in 61 innings. He seems to struggle with control at times with 31 walks. So far this year he's done a great job limiting extra base hits, but opponents are hitting .259 against them.
Common opponents are North Carolina, Louisville, and Delaware. All three were 3 game weekend series and then a ACC tournament game against UNC. They were 1-3 against the Heels. UK was 0-3. They went 1-2 against UK. Kentucky split that 1-1. They went 2-1 against Delaware, UK lost one game against them.
The biggest threat in their lineup is oddly enough their short stop who has 17 runs and hits cleanup. They score and average of 6 runs per game. Kentucky scores about 7.4. We need to be very careful with the middle of the lineup.
