Baseball America | Blog | Baseball America College Blog

OMAHA—It’s raining here at Rosenblatt Stadium, and the start of the Louisiana State-Arkansas game will be delayed at least an hour. We’ve been very fortunate with the weather so far, as not one game has been delayed through the first six days, but Day Seven has gotten off to an inauspicious start.

Speaking of inauspicious starts, does anyone really care what teams I pick at this point? It seems everything I touch turns to ruin. But at least I went down with the ship yesterday, instead of deserting my national champion pick like some other picker. Let’s see what John’s got for us today:

John: As you pointed out yesterday, Aaron, Arizona State was my national championship pick, so I suppose i should have stuck with the Sun Devils yesterday. Maybe if you’d told me they were using Josh Spence; I’m sure you weren’t holding out on me to try to win this picks contest . . . Anyway, I’m going chalk today. No matter who starts for Arizona State, Texas is rested, its offense has been better than it was all year, and the Longhorns should have supreme confidence after the way they stormed back to beat the Sun Devils the other night. I’m picking Texas there, and then Louisiana State to top SEC rival Arkansas. In the eight games I saw out there, LSU was the best team, and Arkansas’ pitching looks pretty thin. Looks like B.C. Wholestaff (after Bill Clinton, naturally) will get the call for the Razorbacks today, who have been both gritty and gutty in their 2009 Omaha appearance. Looking like an LSU-Texas final to see if the Tigers can join the Longhorns and Southern California in the six-titles club, or if Texas can pick up championship No. 7.

John’s Picks: LSU, Texas.

Aaron: My confidence is rattled, but I still feel pretty strongly that LSU is going to wrap up its bracket today. Arkansas will start closer Stephen Richards today and will try to patch together a start, while LSU counters with Anthony Ranaudo on nearly full rest. LSU is the better team to begin with, and Arkansas must play without its leader and best player, senior shortstop Ben Tschepikow, who broke his finger Wednesday. The Razorbacks will slide freshman Zack Cox from third base to shortstop, move Andy Wilkins across the diamond to third, and insert Jacob House at first. That’s some nice creativity from Dave Van Horn, but I suspect this is the end of the line for the Hogs.

I think Texas is the smarter pick on the other side, but when I have I been known to make the smarter pick? Not very often this week. I think ASU’s momentum and grit will carry it to a victory today behind Seth Blair, who must be better today than another talented sophomore righty, Matt Harvey, was for North Carolina yesterday. The key to yesterday’s win for the Sun Devils is that they didn’t have to use Mitchell Lambson out of the bullpen, so I expect to see a healthy dose of Lambson today.

Aaron’s Picks: LSU, Arizona State.

Yesterday:

Aaron: 0-1
John: 0-1

Overall:

Aaron: 3-7
John: 5-5

Texas already has 6 national championships in baseball. LSU has 5.

Posted by jq2122 | June 19, 2009 at 2:49 pm | Shortcut

That’s right, Texas is shooting for national championship number 7 (1949, 1950, 1975, 1983, 2002, 2005, and 2009?). Hook ‘em Horns! Time to take out “new money” LSU. I know that the “experts” will generally pick LSU, but I wonder how LSU will respond to some real adversity. I mean, it’s been many weeks since they lost a single game. How will LSU respond if Coleman is pitching and they’re down to Texas by a score of 5-0? I have no doubt about LSU’s raw talent, and I also have no doubt about Texas’ mental toughness and their ability to win close games. I still think that LSU only has three good pitchers, and if they’re forced to use their bullpen, the advantage could swing to Texas. We’ll see what happens. Hook ‘em Horns!

Posted by Jim Fletcher | June 19, 2009 at 4:04 pm | Shortcut

AARON!!! What the heck are you doing to us here in Tempe? It’s not too late to pick the Horns and sprinkle your black magic all over them! ;)

Posted by Mark | June 19, 2009 at 5:37 pm | Shortcut

Hah! Well, I am now 0-3 picking Arizona State games this week (even when I pick the Sun Devils, as I did against Texas, I can’t get it right). But I’m also 0-2 picking Texas games. How long can this possibly continue?

Posted by Aaron Fitt | June 19, 2009 at 6:02 pm | Shortcut

I think that Aaron would predict a Texas loss even if the Longhorns were playing Visigoth State. Aaron seems to have no confidence in Texas’ offensive ability, rarely complements the Longhorns’ excellent pitching staff, and is very reluctant to give Augie Garrido much credit for anything. That’s fine with me. The Baseball America staff members may know more about college baseball in general than I do, but I know much more about Texas Longhorn baseball than they do. Hook ‘em Horns!
Jim Fletcher, 1997 UT-Austin alumnus

Posted by Jim Fletcher | June 19, 2009 at 6:23 pm | Shortcut

I’ll remind you, Jim, that I had Texas in my 8 for Omaha this time a year ago, and we had them ranked No. 4 in the preseason, and I thought they were a very deserving No. 1 overall national seed heading into the postseason. I like Texas quite a bit, I think their offense is fine and their pitching is outstanding. We said all kinds of great things about Augie after that comeback against Arizona State.

Posted by Aaron Fitt | June 19, 2009 at 6:33 pm | Shortcut