A Sea Of Red

LU travels to VT Tuesday for 7:00 game. (too late start time in my opinion). VT is 15-23 on the season. Hokies have some long ball hitters. We need to "keep ball in the park".
Hopefully our bats will wake up from the snooze at Longwood. VT was swept by North Carolina this past weekend.

7 pm is past your bed time isn’t it?

Purple Haize wrote:7 pm is past your bed time isn’t it?

Borderline, it's like a close play at first base. Can go either way. But I have to be in Salem at 8:30 Wednesday morning, therefore I can spend the night somewhere up that way, and make my appointment easier.

VT will probably pitch Jordan Dail, frosh who was HS standout for 4 years at Brookeville HS here in Lynchburg. As a HS freshmen I believe she pitched a no-hitter in the state championship final. This year she has already beaten Michigan, Penn State, Purdue, Radford and Longwood this year just to mention a few.

I am guessing Dail gets the start. . In past 2 years, I believe we have beat VT with our #4 pitcher. Going to be interesting who we start. Also I would like to see us tweak the lineup and batting order.

Ballcoach is on the road to Blacksburg, USA

Game has been moved up to 5:00. Smart move by VT.

Tied at zero in the 7th. Engler had a 2 hitter through 4.2 innings and for some reason Dot took her out for DiMartino.

Still scoreless in extra innings. VT's pitcher, Eberle, has a 1.68 ERA on the year, but she is 6-13. Talk about lack of support!

They are doing the deal where they start out the inning putting a runner on second.
And Amader is thrown out stealing.

Hokies win 1-0. Their "placed" runner scored from second on a double.

Placed runner? That is a thing?

thepostman wrote:Placed runner? That is a thing?

Yes. Starting with the 8th, every inning begins with a runner on second.

After further research, apparently the "tiebreaker" normally does not go into effect til the 10th inning. My guess is both coaches agreed to start it in the 8th since it is a non-conference game. Think Dot might be regretting that choice?

No tiebreaker rule in tournament games.

Our runner got called out at 3B on a bad Call by umpire. Even VT fans said she was safe.

But we did not hit. Via had our only hit. We have one hit in last 11 innings. Only hit one ball out of infield. Time to tweak lineup.

I would love to hear your ideas on "tweaking" the lineup. With Zavodny and Sweat out, I don't see a lot of options. The glaring hole is Taylor at DH, who is having an awful year, but is a veteran who has been productive in the past.

Ballcoach has long said that the Bishop girls need to hit in the middle of the lineup, maybe 3rd place and cleanup.

Batters 1 - 4 are 0-24 in last 2 games. I agree lineup change is needed. I'd put Autumn Bishop in the 3 hole and move Hoffman to leadoff and put Alexia Taylor in Hoffman's spot, 8 hole. Too many slap hitters at the end of the lineup.

More and more softball and baseball teams are going with their very best hitters at the top of the lineup. It's simply a matter of getting them to the plate as many times as possible over the course of the season. I'd keep the Bishops where they are, but I like the idea of swapping Taylor and Hoffman

As for lineup changes, Alexis Erich, freshman outfielder needs to be inserted into lineup.

I'm a three tier line up guy. Rank your batters from 1-9
Distribute 376-185-294.
Every inning will have a top three batter. Without failure.

It’s not that I don’t see the logic in your process, but isn’t the current trend in baseball/softball to lump best hitters together so as to minimize runners LOB?

ballcoach15 wrote:As for lineup changes, Alexis Erich, freshman outfielder needs to be inserted into lineup.

Gotta get that .143 bat in there.

The player who has actually hit well (.306) and been underutilized IMHO (only 36 AB) is Diedre See.

Give the .143 hitter some at bats and average will rise.
She has some power also.

ballcoach15 wrote:Give the .143 hitter some at bats and average will rise.
She has some power also.

I'm not saying she doesn't have talent, but she hasn't shown it so far. It seems to me that Alexia has been given every opportunity to break out of her slump, and it just hasn't happened. Give See, who has hit, some starts at DP.

The other hitter who has really fallen off is Jasmine Click. Sure, she is a slap hitter. Slap hitters are part of softball. She was a slap hitter last year, and she hit .311, was on base a ton and led the team with 22 steals. This year she is only an asset on defense. I suppose you could give Erich a shot in CF. Hate to lose Jasmin's glove though.

After looking at the stats, I think it in fact is time to make a change in CF.

Forget the fact that she is hitting .220 and all 13 of her hits are singles. Jasmine Click has struck out 22 times and only walked 3.

Both are the worst on the team, and this from a slap hitter.