[aredd33]

Just a thread for the conference season and standings along with talk about other teams.

LU off to a good start 5-1

Coastal loses first conference game in a loooooong time to UNC Ashville. Coastal seems to be leaving the door for anothing team to win the conference open so far this year (looking at how they are playing out of conference).
Radford I think is going to be pretty good this year.
I don't really know much about the other teams in the Big South (other than CSU and WU) so if anybody has seen them play it would be nice to hear about them.

[#10]

Misc.
I'm so tired of "saving our best" for the weekend. The only way we are going to post season play is to win the Conference Playoffs. Beating VA or Tech etc.. is a quality/noticeable win. Beat the big boys, win the tourny and the BS record doesn't mean much.
The current staff may have won a lot of games - just not when it counts. This years game day coaching is just plain poor. We have a lot of talent and it's the staffs job to extract , manage and motivate it. Al,Bobby and Johnny were better coaches.

[PAmedic]

and so it begins...

[BJWilliams]

havent had much reason to use this up til now...

[SuperJon]

BJ, it's amazing how clueless you really are. You can criticize and not be a hater. There are times when criticism is perfectly warranted (like after this weekend) and that doesn't make a person a hater. If we all sat around and sang kumbaya like you want us to do there would be absolutely no reason to care about a team.

[bigsmooth]

#10 beating VT is not noticeable because they are horrible this year. we do not even play UVA. if you want to compare coaches that is fine, have at it. toman has mis-managed some games this year and in the past, but he is a good coach. i think he needs help with his assistants. as far as saving your best for the weekend, of course you do. that is what most championship programs do. they put their best arms out there on the weekend. we obviously have not done well in mid-week games this year, but it took a few weeks to find out baker was the guy. should our coaches known that?? you could argue that point. but i will say i like our starting staff and the toughest conference games are behind us IMO. why not get behind coach toman instead of bringing up comparisons of coaches from the past. college baseball was way different than it was in those coaches eras.

[BJWilliams]

Jon...the fact that he is criticizing isnt why I pulled that out...but we just went through a stretch going into this weekend where we won 10 of 13 games and the pitching staff (that I agree didnt hold it down this weekend) where the starters gave us five complete games, and went into the seventh (if my math is correct) all but one time. Didnt hear a peep...not a word of credit during that stretch, and THEN he decides to come out and question and criticize after this weekend. If youre going to offer criticism when things go badly (like they did this weekend), you also ought to be willing to give credit as well when things go great (like they were for the last almost a month or so). THAT is why it sounded to me like he was a hater.

[SuperJon]

If you want to do cartwheels over beating a bunch of teams that have sub .500 records then by all means go ahead. Get your crutches because you'll need them after you're done. The truth is the only really good win we had over that month was ECU and that was negated by losing to Tech twice (who is 1-11 in the ACC), Maryland, and W&M. Oh, yay, we beat VCU. They're 10-16. Then we go and crap the bed against Coastal and just simply get bullied. Coastal never once got worried going down the stretch of those two games because they knew that they could beat us and that we'd likely do something to beat ourselves and help them out and we did: an HBP with no outs to put a runner on 2nd in Saturday's game and an error to take the lead in Sunday's game.

[The Natural]

Really Big Smooth ??

All those "old guys " who were coaching did great things with no budget. Baseball has always had the toughest schedule over all the other big 4 sports at LU. No-one can debate that. Anyone who was there would never say things that even sound like it is a tougher era now.

When MR was forced out...some of the same guys who are defending Toman now were telling all who would listen that he would bridge the gap with his superior recruiting skills and finally beat Coastal. Guess what ?? JT has twice the salary, amazing facility, huge budget, lights, cars for his staff and still...the last guy to beat Coastal 2 out of 3 games in a conference weekend series is Royer !!! Not to mention being in the championship 3 out of five years.

There is more to winning baseball games than being an assistant from South Carolina !

IMHO

[jbock13]

BJ, it's amazing how clueless you really are. You can criticize and not be a hater. There are times when criticism is perfectly warranted (like after this weekend) and that doesn't make a person a hater. If we all sat around and sang kumbaya like you want us to do there would be absolutely no reason to care about a team.

I agree SJ. I was just about to go off until I saw your post, which calmed me down.

We are 15-14. I AM SICK OF LIBERTY MEDIOCRITY.

[bigsmooth]

yay...."the natural" is back for his yearly mission of trashing the administration and toman, and to spread the gospel of how royer got screwed. im just waiting now for the spiritual aspect to come up. Lets look a a few things natural:

1st three seasons
worthington- 63-36
richardson- 55-82
hunton- 75-66-1 (one big south championship)
pastors- 94-80 (two big south championships)
royer- 78-86 (two runner-up finishes in big south)
toman- 110-66-1 (two runner-up finishes in big south)

i can tell you im appreciative of what all of our coaches have done for LU baseball. as for your arguement on facilities. the fieldhouse was built in 2001 so Pastors, Royer and Toman has access. the rest of our facility is awful. I do agree with you that the budgets have increased for toman, and so far the results are not there. If you look back in LU Baseball history, Hunton's championship team was under .500 when they made their run to winning the big south. They got hot at the right time. In regards to your talk abaout tough schedules, in Royers first three seasons they placed rice, wake, and richmond that were ranked. in year two it was VCU and UVA. In year three it was Coastal. Toman's first year it was Coastal and UVA. year two was Ole Miss, George Mason, UVA, Coastal. and year three was Coastal. And yes natural times are different. LU baseball has goen from NAIA, to D2, to DI. so yes big differences in level of play. The facts speak for themselves.

So we are in year four of Toman's tenure. I honestly though we would be better right now, but we are still in good shape right now in conference play. We can beat Coastal, we just made too many mental errors in losing those two one run games. The first game...yeah awful. Coastal has the history of championship play so no matter what the situation, i think they feel like they can win every game. I think that Toman may be a good recruiter but not a great coach. He did recruit those players that helped South Carolina win the CWS last year. Plus you have two totally different schools when it comes to recruitment. South Carolina had a pedigree for success, where LU has seen spotty success, and the Christian environment does play a role in recruiting. Im not ready to throw Toma under the bus, but i do feel like he need better assistants especially when it comes to pitching. This season is hardly over. South Carolina for instance was mediocre all of last season and got hot at the end of the season and made a run to the title. They were one of the last teams in last year. Im not saying we are going to win the BSC, but as few breaks that go our way this past weekend, we win that series. A big problem is we are a want it all now society. We do not give coaches in any sport time to turn things around. So if we do not win the Big South do you fire Toman?? I do not think so. I Think you give him one more year. but that is just me. here is hoping fo better baseball the rest of the year.

[SuperJon]

We can beat Coastal, we just made too many mental errors in losing those two one run games.

I disagree here. Toman is intimidated by Coastal and Gilmore. We get bullied by Coastal every time we play them. The only person that has stepped up to them and tried to fight back over the past few years was Chach. Coastal threw at us twice last weekend and we just stood there and took it like we were their whipping boy. I'm not saying we fire him, but I honestly think we've peaked under him.

[jbock13]

I agree. I'm not ready to can Toman, but if next year is the same result, we really need to ask ourselves if mediocracy is acceptable with the talent we have. My opinion is no.

[bigsmooth]

We can beat Coastal, we just made too many mental errors in losing those two one run games.

I disagree here. Toman is intimidated by Coastal and Gilmore. We get bullied by Coastal every time we play them. The only person that has stepped up to them and tried to fight back over the past few years was Chach. Coastal threw at us twice last weekend and we just stood there and took it like we were their whipping boy. I'm not saying we fire him, but I honestly think we've peaked under him.

im not really talking about being bullied. had we not made the error sunday we had a chance to win. saturday, i think richardson should have started the 9th.

[Rooster Cogburn]

THIS

saturday, i think richardson should have started the 9th.

[jenkins]

the pitching coach is a real problem if you talk to any of the players parents. Also, if you look at how many tommy john surgeries or major arm injuries our pitchers have had the last few years it's not pretty. I think Toman's biggest flaw is the mishandling of the bullpen, which is the most difficult thing to do in baseball. I think he doesn't trust the bullpen and therefore always tries to stretch guys too far. It's rare that he has pulled someone too early, other than maybe evans in the 3rd winthrop game the other week and then abrams comes in and throws BP.

[#10]

Misc#2 The logo says "Your School. Your Team Your Voice. "Bj,BS and I joined this forum around the same time. Their posts number in the thousands - mine 40 (not many but still one or two bother me).I was a 15,000 Club member at the beginning and been FC member since moving here. Gary may be the #1 fan but I'm up there. Like Bobby Knight I like winning, but how you get there means just as much.
Looking at the schedule and (i'd love to be wrong) it looks like the kind of standard 30 wins is going to be close. Not an improvement with a very modest schedule and a talent laden team. In fact if we won out it still wouldn't be on par with Coastal's recent level of excellence. I don't believe in change for changes sake . I do believe in getting a fair and reasonable chance. I don't believe in extensions/renewals for minimal performance.