- October 15th, 2007, 6:43 pm
#118643
This is a very interesting article and Young and some others have some very interesting quotes...it seems theres a new attitude and the players are responding well....
To me this is more important than our schedule issues...I like what I'm hearing...honestly I wasnt thrilled about the hire but if he makes the players happy and we win...that's all that matters, either way I'm supporting our guy
Flames up for some swaggerThis really stood out to me
When Liberty played South Carolina in baseball last season, Flames pitcher Dustin Umberger couldn’t help but notice the Gamecocks’ swagger.
“It was just their attitude,” Umberger said. “Everybody gets intimidated playing South Carolina, just because of their name. And they definitely hold up their end with their confidence level.
“They go into every game knowing they’re the better team.”
Umberger, of course, didn’t know he was battling against the program that would yield Liberty’s next head coach. Jim Toman was an assistant on Ray Tanner’s Gamecock staff, and Toman is trying to bring that same sort of attitude to LU.
No, Liberty doesn’t have the resume of South Carolina. The Flames have been to three NCAA regionals. USC has been to eight College World Series.
But that sort of success starts with attitude.
“I think that’s a big difference the coaching staff is bringing here to Liberty,” Umberger said. “They’re reinforcing that we are the better team than most teams. We have a lot of talent and a lot of great players. We’re better than we thought.”
The Flames will complete their first fall under their new head coach this week when they host their Fall World Series at Worthington Stadium, a six-day, five-game event that begins Tuesday at 2 p.m.
Toman, who was hired to replace Matt Royer, who resigned in June, has the pedigree that LU athletics director Jeff Barber was seeking. Toman spent 17 years working with Tanner, first at North Carolina State and then at South Carolina.
He’s quickly tried to put his stamp on Liberty’s program, which has lost in the Big South tournament champion-ship round in each of the last two seasons.
“I think they understand that all four coaches come from good programs and that we’ve been around baseball for a while, and that we’ve been to regionals, and we understand what it takes to get into a regional situation,” Toman said. “That’s why we’re here. We want to get this program consistently into the regionals.”
Though Liberty returns some key players from last year’s 39-win team, including Umberger and slugging out-fielder Garrett Young, every position was open heading into the fall.
Toman used 20 scrimmages to determine who the best players were at each position, and the players appreci-ated the fresh approach to fall practice. Royer’s emphasis was more on conditioning than scrimmaging.
“He brings kind of a fun atmosphere, but he expects a lot out of you,” Young said of Toman. “He brings a ton of knowledge, experience and the excitement, which we really didn’t have a whole lot of here last year.”
The coaching change left many players uncertain of their futures. Young was a late draft pick of the Boston Red Sox and could have opted to try his hand at pro baseball. But once he met Toman, he was immediately sold on the new direction of the program.
“When he got here, he called me and said, ‘hey I got the coaching job, and I need you to come back here,’” Young said. “After talking to him and talking to other people who know him, coached with him or played for him, I was like, ‘I need to go back and play for him, because this year’s going to be a real good year.’”
“He brings kind of a fun atmosphere, but he expects a lot out of you,” Young said of Toman. “He brings a ton of knowledge, experience and the excitement, which we really didn’t have a whole lot of here last year.”
To me this is more important than our schedule issues...I like what I'm hearing...honestly I wasnt thrilled about the hire but if he makes the players happy and we win...that's all that matters, either way I'm supporting our guy
Last edited by Hold My Own on October 15th, 2007, 9:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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