[flaminbaseballfan]

What was up with Toman last night? Is he going to coach/ compete today or keep his hands in his pockets again? Rumors are flying all around about his name being considered for jobs that will be opening up soon. Are they for real? Two nights in a row he has thrown in the towel very early. What was he thinking?
The bullpen is being managed very poorly, is that Toman or Quinn? The Flames have put up a 5 or 6 spots on a number of occasions, why would you give up with a 3 run deficit? The strike zone was extremely erratic last night. Was Toman on the umpire's back with his usual vocalness. it didn't seem that way. The players can compete. Can he?

[olldflame]

Oh, please

Toman upgrades our talent and leads them to 15 straight conference wins. Then we go up against CCU, a team that hasn't lost a conference game in well over a year and is #4 in the nation, and we get beat 2 in a row. Is anyone really surprised? The one real opportunity we had to do some damage last night, we had the bases loaded and a run in with one out and our 3 and 4 hitters up. Tyler and Nate both looked at third strikes. Is that Toman's fault? Sorry he didn't rant and rave enough at the umpires to satisfy you.

[flaminbaseballfan]

Just very uncharacteristic behavior thats all I'm saying. The losses are not the issue. The bullpen issues have been persistent all season, they were just a little more obvious than usual last night.
Of the three relievers, two were used the night before. Not good. One has barely thrown strikes over the course of a month. Not good. Neither of the three were given much warm up while at least two healthy unused arms sat in the bullpen and watched.

[Chris Lang]

He said he wanted Beakler, Richardson and McLeod rested for when the Flames have a lead. Of course, they haven't had one in this series.

[bigsmooth]

we finally have a known toman hater....im sure his name is being bantered around for jobs. he has been quite successful in his tenure here. keep in mind that he coached under ray tanner for years and tanner made all the decsions, so since this is toman's first head coaching job, im sure he is still learning. should he have it by now?? maybe, but im no baseball expert. to say he is not coaching is absolutely fool hardy. how in the heck do you know he threw in the towel?? did you ask him?? did he say that?? no! can we question moves all coaches make? yes!! it's what we do as fans, but to say toman is not coaching is ridiculous, and to say he quit and the team quit is a joke. have there been questions all year about how the pitching staff has been handled? sure, but before you come on a the board saying this stuff, why not do some research??

[JK37]

Rumors are flying all around about his name being considered for jobs that will be opening up soon. Are they for real?

Which jobs? If they're just rumors flying, surely you can give us a little more...

[krh44]

He stopped coaching today after he got ejected. I think he got tired of us not got any borderline call all weekend.

[flaminbaseballfan]

Absolutely no hatin' going on here....just simple observations about the energy Toman demonstrated this weekend and complaints about the ongoing questionable use of pitchers all season. He did bring a little more today but in all fairness Umberger was the one to actually get the team fired up. Too bad the bats were never ignited though.
The numbers speak for themselves, (37-15)..... An excellent record and a much improved team this year!
I agree this is just a place to post opinions and raise questions. My observations were just different from yours, no research needed.

[larrymac1946]

wow!! i never realized that there were such savvy wannabe coaches just hanging around. what surprises me is how people who are so smart never made it to the coaching ranks so they could win them all and make the right decisions every time. after all you are making the call and you have never coached these guys one day. you know nothing or very little about their situations, health, or for that matter , talent, yet you know what should have been done in every situation. it is amazing!
really, you should give up your day job and put all that talent on display as a d1 coach.
what really happened is that liberty ran into a superior team that may end up in omaha. they can be beat, but we didn't do it this weekend.
we still have 4 to go. this bunch doesn't deserve fans who want to throw in the towel with 4 games and the tournament left. it has already been a great year.........and it is not over yet.

[justafan]

... we still have 4 to go. this bunch doesn't deserve fans who want to throw in the towel with 4 games and the tournament left. it has already been a great year.........and it is not over yet.

DITTO!!!!

[jenkins]

Toman does make some bad decisions like a lot of other D1 coaches. I think the guy was just saying he would have liked to have seen some more energy around the park this weekend. I would 2nd that, our crowds are so dead a lot of times and the team just played very tight I think, which is understandable. I questioned a lot of pitching changes this weekend when they occured and most of them worked out really well or we would have gotten the doors blown off. The biggest thing I sometimes question regarding Toman is the batting order, I thought he gave up on Neufang way too early this year and really hurt the lineup when he took Negron out for about a month. Clearly Nate has had a great season but I think we would have been better off with Nate DHing a lot and Neufang behind the plate. He has a much better defenseive approach and he hit a crap load of HR"s in Juco last year for a reason. He just looks like a guy who can't function on limited AB's which happens all the time. I think that might make the next JUco guy think twice about coming because Neufang was a big get. Our track record has been very good with Juco guys as well. I think the biggest Offensive struggles this year has been Wimmer and Jefferson. I really thought Jefferson might have a breakout year this year. But hey, Toman has done a PHENOMINAL job with the team and program, let me say that again, PHENOMINAL. WE would all make poor decision if we coached the team as well, not every move is gonna work out.

[SuperJon]

Toman has brought our program back, and we are a very good team worthy of a regional birth.

While I like what Toman's doing, you gotta watch that statement. He brought the team back from what? The D1 record for wins was set two years before Toman got here under Coach Royer. We flamed out in the conference tournament a few times because of mishandling of the pitching staff, but we were a very, very good team under Royer at times. Royer brought the program back but couldn't get over the hump.

Doug Bream (.327), Nate Thompson (.322), Kenneth Negron (.363), Shawn Tuefel (10.2, 2.27 ERA), Dane Beakler (4-2, 3.27 ERA, our best reliever), and Dustin Umberger were all Royer guys. I'm all for giving credit to Coach Toman, but let's not throw Coach Royer under the bus while doing that.

[Rooster Cogburn]

***Braces for Impact***

[The Natural]

larrymac is defensive with his statements about his son in law. But he doesn't have the advantage of knowing the history around LU Baseball.

A little history of facts and nothing but facts helps the reader decide for themselves what the truth is. So here are some facts as I can best assemble them. I seem to recall larrymac when he arrived on Flames fans referring to the previous coaches players as donkeys. Well those donkeys went to the champiuonship game Toman's first year and just couldn't finish. Toman in his own words said the team he inherited was not depleted and pretty good. Royer did in fact build from nothing and get to the championship at least twice that I know of ( maybe three times ). I just don't remember.

So Barber gets " the premier recruiter " to run the program. Pays him more than double what the previous guy(s) ever made. Upped the assistants 10 to 15 K more than the previous head coach ever made, Spends hundreds of thousands on field improvements like lights, bull pens and travel budgets, recruiting funds etc and this group after three years hasn't been able to equal what the previous guy did in wins or get to a championship game other than year one with those " donkeys ". Now there are rampant legit rumors the current guy is looking to get out of Lynchburg in the midst of a 5 year contract. Royer was never given a contract ever. So much for loyalty eh ?

From my little corner of the earth...it seems to me that if all the Toman believers really are convinced the team is better talent wise...then I would argue the team is under achieving at best since the amazing money spent on the staff, talent level, and the facilities which btw are a major draw or strike against any program trying to sell LU as the place to play. Anyone with an ounce of real integrity has to admit the field looked like a dump before Toman was given the keys to the vault by Barber.

The record for wins was 39. The strength of schedule this year is not anything to write home about. But the field looks good though ! Superjon...was the harshest critc of Royer when he was at the helm. It is nice to see he has a better view a few years later. The success the previous guy had with a garbage salary, a substandard field conditions for recruiting is a testimony to a man who was at Liberty not for the money...but because he believed the Lord called him there.

I say MR was a donkey for trusting the leadership would protect him. They discarded him like trash for a big name and a couple of bow ties.

[Sly Fox]

Let's try not to turn this personal. I believe we have beaten this horse to death in the past. Suffice it to say that Coach Royer did a great job and we continue to have great coaching right now. There is no need to take sides.

[larrymac1946]

i have researched all the posts that i could have made since i have been on this site. i have never found one where i referred to the players as donkeys. i highly resent that comment. would you like to admit that the comment was a lie? if you can show me that i will apologize to every one on here and the team. if you can't , do you have what it takes to admit you purposely mislead any who read your comments??, i have adopted these guys as my team. i did say to compete like most of you want them to would take a stable of thoroughbreds. did you see the thoroughbreds that showed up from sc this weekend? ....we are on the way.
by the way, jim toman doesn't need his father in law defending him. if you haven't noticed, he can take care of himself.
as far as other jobs, he had plenty of feelers before he came to liberty. i also think he will have many opportunities in the future. he and his family feel that the Lord provided this job and led him here. they love liberty , the team, town , and the people there. i think it would take an awful good situation to entice them away. they often talk about the liberty "bubble" ...the protective hand of God that is over them there.
like i said before, this has been a great year and it's not over yet!!!!

[jenkins]

well stated..they mentioned frequently in the SID articles that Toman had been sought after many times before at South Carolina not to take the jobs. Unless something has drastically changed, why levae after you have made the improvements you have been. I would say it would difficult to take much of a step up in terms of jobs right now because the 30 to 35 programs that are better than us aren't going to be firing coaches.

[Hold My Own]

I would have to think getting the head job at any SEC school would be a step up because of the higher ceiling. He's feeling the same effects Coach Green has every year....do great in the conference and still may come up shy. If they win 40 this year and dont make it, I would think that would cause him to evaluate why and right now the main reason I see is BSC. I dont envy a coach who knows they have to win 40 or more games a year and still might not get picked. However the BSC is historically good but right now if your not beefing up the Non SOS you might be in trouble since it has slipped some. I hope he has your mindset though Jenkins, because if that's the case he'll be here a while.


Good post SJ, just read it and couldnt agree more.

[JK37]

Coastal lost at home tonight to College of Charleston, giving CofC 2 wins over CCU this year. Guess LU took everything out of Coastal last weekend.

[Hold My Own]

That doesnt help us