USA Baseball has announced the first 12 college players who have accepted invitations to the national team trials to be held June 11-13. Cal State Fullerton and Tennessee lead the way with two players apiece: outfielder Josh Fellhauer and shortstop Christian Colon from CSF and outfielder Kentrail Davis and lefthander Bryan Morgado from UT. There are eight sophomores and four freshmen on the initial list, which will eventually be expanded to 32. At trials, a 22-man roster will be selected.

Vanderbilt sophomore lefty Mike Minor is the lone player among the first 12 who played for Team USA last summer. The other sophomores are Fellhauer, Missouri righthander Kyle Gibson, San Diego righty A.J. Griffin, Arizona State righty/utilityman Mike Leake, Oklahoma State lefty Andrew Oliver, Missouri outfielder Aaron Senne and Arizona righty Jason Stoffel.

The freshmen are Morgado (a redshirt freshman), Colon, Davis and Auburn first baseman Hunter Morris.

The changing of the guard in the Ivy League continues. A year after Brown won its first-ever Ivy title to reach its first regional, Columbia has won its first Ivy title since 1977, when it was co-champion with Cornell. The Lions are the nation’s first team to punch a ticket to the NCAA tournament–their first appearance since 1976.

Be sure to check this past Monday’s Three Strikes for more information about Columbia. The Lions split a high-scoring doubleheader Tuesday in the Ivy League championship series against Dartmouth, setting up Wednesday’s decisive Game Three. The Lions trailed 5-3 in the sixth inning Wednesday, but freshman shortstop Alex Ferrera launched a three-run homer with two outs to give Columbia the lead for good. The Lions held on for a 7-5 victory.

"It was a tough series with two evenly matched teams," Columbia coach Brett Boretti said after the game. "The level of play is continuing to rise across the Ivy League, and hopefully we can do our best to represent the league well in the regionals."

Elsewhere Wednesday, Arizona State might have found a remedy for its lack of pitching depth. Freshman Matt Newman, who has mostly played outfield this year, made his third career pitching appearance and first career start at Wichita State. The righthander held the Shockers to one run on five hits and two walks while striking out two over 6 2/3 strong innings, before handing off to sophomore ace Mike Leake, who worked the final 2.1 innings to nail down a 6-1 win.

One final note to pass along: Michigan ace righthander Zach Putnam will not make his scheduled Friday start against Minnesota because of a viral infection. The Wolverines lead Purdue by three games in the Big Ten standings and might be able to wrap up the regular-season conference title this weekend.

Tuesday was primary day here in North Carolina, and I think I would have voted for Pedro if he were on the ballot. The nation’s best prospect, Vanderbilt third baseman Pedro Alvarez, belted two home runs in an 8-0 win against Memphis yesterday, giving him five on the year. He’s starting to find his stride after being sidelined for the first half of the season with a wrist injury, and that’s bad news for the rest of the Southeastern Conference. We’ll have more on Vanderbilt in Weekend Preview on Friday, but for now, let’s hit the mailbag:

This might be the only time in my life I can ask, but as a UC Davis student and avid BA reader, can you tell me if we will see them crack the top 25 this year? They seem to be on the cusp, and their team absolutely rakes.

Ross Fenstermaker
Davis, Calif.

As a sign of how good of a season UC Davis has had, Ross actually submitted this question on April 14, after the Aggies took two out of three at UC Santa Barbara. We strongly debated ranking Davis that week, and three weeks later we found ourselves talking about the Aggies again in Monday’s top 25 meeting. As it turned out, winning two of three against Long Beach State wasn’t quite enough to put UCD into the rankings in light of series losses the previous two weeks against Cal Poly and Cal State Fullerton, but even after a loss to California yesterday the Aggies are knocking on the door. And that’s a testament to the terrific job coach Rex Peters and his staff have done building that program. [...] Continue Reading »

Strike One: Resurgence In The Bayou

Heading into the 2008 season, Paul Mainieri talked cautiously but optimistically about how nice it would be to end the Alex Box Stadium era at Louisiana State by hosting a regional. The Tigers had gotten a major talent infusion from the nation’s deepest recruiting class, so Mainieri’s musings were not outlandish, but the goal did seem like a longshot. As recently as April 19, when LSU was 23-16 overall and 6-11 in the Southeastern Conference, it seemed like the Tigers might have a hard time just getting to a regional, nevermind hosting one.

But two weeks later, LSU finds itself perched atop the SEC’s Western Division and ranked in the Baseball America top 25 for the first time since late March of 2006. The Tigers have swept back-to-back conference series for the first time in a decade, and both have come against ranked opponents. And with a strong Ratings Percentage Index (23rd) and a manageable closing stretch (home against Mississippi State and at Auburn), all of a sudden that dream of hosting a regional doesn’t seem so far-fetched.

"Everything’s kind of coming together at the right time for us," Mainieri said. "With seven games remaining, if we can continue to play good ball–I know a lot of people thought it was a pipe dream not too long ago that we could host a regional in the last year of the Box, but I think it’s not so much of a pipe dream now. It would be neat to do it one more time in the old Box." [...] Continue Reading »

Just a week after Arkansas-Little Rock coach Jim Lawler–Baseball America’s 2003 assistant coach of the year while at Texas A&M–announced he will resign at the end of the season, another Division I head coaching job has opened up. Central Florida abruptly fired longtime coach Jay Bergman on Thursday with three weeks left in the regular season. Associate head coach Craig Cozart will serve as interim head coach for the remainder of the season, and a national search for a full-time replacement will begin immediately.

Bergman, who has a 994-594-3 career record in 26 seasons at UCF and is the namesake for the Knights’ baseball stadium, did not accompany the team to New Orleans for its weekend series against Tulane. Since starting 19-1 against a soft nonconference schedule, the Knights have gone just 8-18 and currently sit at 5-13 in Conference USA.

"We’re all disappointed at the way things have worked out, but as a coaching staff and as a team we’re grateful for what Coach Bergman has meant to us," Cozart, who also pitched for Bergman at UCF, told the Orlando Sentinel. "For what he has done for us in our lives and our careers . . . he’s in our hearts. Our guys are ready to play hard and finish out the season in a way that exemplifies how we were taught."

Also last week, Florida Atlantic announced the retirement of Kevin Cooney, best known for his regular Bruce Springsteen lyrics quoting and for leading FAU on a Division I record-tying 34-game winning streak in 1999. Longtime assistant John McCormick has the track record as Cooney’s assistant for 17 years to succeed him and maintain the program as a consistent regional threat.

The city of Omaha and the NCAA have agreed in principle to keep the College World Series in Omaha through at least 2030. But starting in 2011, Rosenblatt Stadium will no longer be the home of college baseball’s marquee event. That’s when the CWS will move to a new $140 million downtown stadium.

The 20-year agreement is an unprecedented step. Omaha has hosted the CWS since 1950 but has never had an agreement longer than five years at any given time. Key to the agreement were provisions intended to protect the city’s taxpayers: revenues from the new stadium will first be used to make annual payments on the construction debt.

The Omaha World-Herald, which has covered this long process in terrific detail at every step along the way, has plenty more on this very significant agreement (see link above).

It’s been an unusual year for Texas. The Longhorns, after all, are true college baseball royalty–they’re not used to sitting in fifth place in their conference with a 10-11 mark. But with two conference series left, Texas might finally be gathering some momentum.

Junior righthander Kenn Kasparek, who’s had an up-and-down year in his return from Tommy John surgery, threw a no-hitter in UT’s 10-0 win against Texas State on Tuesday. He struck out nine without issuing a walk, and was perfect except for a hit batsman in the seventh inning. It was the 20th no-hitter in the storied history of Texas baseball, but it was one of the first things for the ‘Horns to get excited about in 2008. [...] Continue Reading »

Texas Tech has made it official: Dan Spencer will take over for Larry Hays at Texas Tech. No one is saying when that will be, but the former Oregon State assistant is a Red Raiders alumnus and has the perfect combination of experience, understanding of the unique nature of Texas Tech and the winning background with the Beavers to become a successful head coach in the Big 12.

The Texas Tech announcement comes just days after long-time Florida Atlantic coach Kevin Cooney announced he will retire after this season, his 21st at the helm of the Owls. Like Texas Tech, the Owls seem to have a natural in-house replacement in associate head coach John McCormack, but no announcement has been made yet about who will succeed Cooney.

On to this week’s mailbag:

Hey Aaron, I was just curious which college pitchers you thought had the best sink on their ball in this draft.

Sean

The 2008 draft class is rich with quality righthanded sinkerballers. For the purpose of this exercise, let’s consider just players who throw a sinking fastball, and not those with outstanding sink on a split-finger (like North Carolina State’s Clayton Shunick or Georgia Tech’s David Duncan) or cutter (like Mississippi’s Scott Bittle). [...] Continue Reading »

Strike One: Just Another Big Weekend For UNC

CARY, N.C.–Sunday was Senior Day for North Carolina–the final home weekend game for seniors Chad Flack, Rob Wooten, Kyle Shelton, Mike Facchinei, Tyler Trice and Seth Williams. That group has won a lot of games in four years–190 of them, to be precise, including a national-best 149 over the last three years. And while those six seniors won’t be playing any more weekend games at UNC’s 2008 home, the USA Baseball National Training Complex, they still have three more midweek games in Cary, and they’re certain to play a home regional after that. If the Tar Heels can win that regional, the chances are very good that they’ll have a home super-regional the next week.

Winning two out of three games against then-No. 3 Florida State this weekend went a long way toward ensuring the Tar Heels will earn one of the eight national seeds, which would make their road to a third straight College World Series appearance considerably smoother. The Florida State series was critical, because the Tar Heels are on the road against Virginia and Miami the final two weekends of the season.

"I didn’t want to put a great deal of emphasis on this game today, but I think deep down I knew this was a huge game for us because of what we have to do the last two series at Virginia and at Miami," North Carolina coach Mike Fox said. "This was one we really needed. I didn’t tell the players that, it was kind of a regional, super-regional type atmosphere, where you get down to the last game and there’s a lot at stake. I didn’t want to put that much measure on it, but it was an important game for us." [...] Continue Reading »

It was easy to imagine a lot of endings like this for Cal State Fullerton when its stellar freshman class arrived on campus last fall. Gary Brown and Christian Colon will be dynamic college baseball players for the Titans, and they showed a glimpse of their value Tuesday against No. 6 Arizona State. With the score tied 9-9 in the ninth inning, Brown laced a one-out triple into the right-field corner, and Colon singled him home two batters later to give Fullerton a 10-9 win. The Sun Devils, meanwhile, seem to be running out of gas on the mound. They started senior lefty Josh Satow on Tuesday, and he allowed seven runs on eight hits over five innings, just three days after throwing 93 pitches and allowing seven runs on five hits over 4 1/3 innings in Saturday’s loss to Oregon State.

Elsewhere on the West Coast, UCLA is dealing with its own arms shortage, and the Bruins might have found a remedy Tuesday against Nevada-Las Vegas. After Garett Claypool limited UNLV to three hits and no runs over the first six innings, the Rebels stormed back with seven runs against four UCLA relievers to tie the score at 7-7 and force extra innings. The Bruins turned to shortstop Brandon Crawford to stop the bleeding, and Crawford responded with 2 2/3 innings of scoreless relief in his first career mound appearance. He struck out four without issuing any walks and allowed just two hits, and UCLA sports information director Alex Timiraos reports that Crawford was hitting 92-93 mph on the radar gun. In the 11th, Crawford doubled and scored the winning run on Mickey Weisser’s pinch-hit single.

One other note from Tuesday before we get to this week’s mailbag. Elon reached the 30-win plateau for the ninth straight season in impressive fashion, as freshman left fielder Greg Annarummo went 4-for-5 with three home runs and 10 RBIs in a 19-10 win against Wake Forest. His first-inning grand slam into the trees behind the left-center-field fence got the Phoenix off and running, and he later added a two-run shot and a three-run shot.

This week, we’ve got a double mailbag of sorts, dealing with the Big Ten’s postseason chances:

[...] Continue Reading »