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Gonna Hold My Own Tournament, So There

Publication Date: May 15, 2007

The Annual How I Wish It Was Column

Maybe someday I won't have to do this (OK, I suppose I don't have to do it now, but you know what I mean), but here's my annual last dip into what should be rather than what is. There are some signs of hope, as the committee becomes more diverse and better educated, but I don't think the real field will look much like this in a couple of weeks. For those of you who just joined us this year, this is my annual fantasy field, the one that I would draw up if I were in charge and the season were over today.

  1 Rice                           16 Missouri
 32 Kansas State                   17 Coastal Carolina
 34 Minnesota                      48 Washington
214 Southern                       49 College of Charleston

  2 Long Beach State               15 Louisiana-Lafayette
 31 East Carolina                  18 Arkansas
 35 Oklahoma                       47 Georgia Tech
175 Stony Brook                    56 North Carolina-Charlotte

  3 Arizona State                  13 South Carolina
 30 Clemson                        19 Texas Christian
 33 Southern Mississippi           46 Baylor
174 Brown                          57 Louisville

  4 Vanderbilt                     14 Cal State Fullerton
 29 Creighton                      21 Mississippi State
 36 Michigan                       45 Oral Roberts
163 Monmouth                       62 Texas-San Antonio

  5 Texas                          12 Arizona
 28 UCLA                           20 UC Riverside
 37 Cal Poly                       43 Gonzaga
158 Lafayette                      67 Fresno State

  6 San Diego                      11 Florida State
 27 Virginia                       22 Pepperdine
 38 Stetson                        44 Kentucky
154 Bethune-Cookman                68 Central Michigan

  7 Texas A&M                      10 North Carolina
 26 Mississippi                    23 Oklahoma State
 39 North Carolina State           42 Western Carolina
138 LeMoyne                        85 Austin Peay State

  8 UC Irvine                       9 Oregon State
 25 Southern California            24 Wichita State
 40 Miami, Florida                 41 Nebraska
117 Virginia Commonwealth         111 Illinois-Chicago

Tournament Watch

This means absolutely nothing, ignore it.

This is one generic layman's predictions for who gets in the tournament. I'm not going to bother picking a team from the one-bid conferences, since the conference tournament will just be a crapshoot, but if I only list one team from a conference, they'll get an at large bid if they don't get the automatic bid.

America East    Florida State         St. John's            Oregon State
Atlantic 10     Virginia              Coastal Carolina      Southern California
CAA             Clemson               Minnesota             UCLA
Horizon         Miami, Florida        Michigan              Vanderbilt
Brown           North Carolina State  Long Beach State      South Carolina
MAAC            Georgia Tech          UC Irvine             Mississippi
MAC             Wake Forest           Cal State Fullerton   Arkansas
MEAC            Stetson               UC Riverside          Mississippi State
Mid-Continent   Texas                 Rice                  Florida
NEC             Texas A&M             East Carolina         Louisiana State
OVC             Missouri              Southern Mississippi  College of Charleston
Southland       Nebraska              Wichita State         Western Carolina
Lafayette       Kansas State          Creighton             Louisiana-Lafayette
SWAC            Oklahoma State        Texas Christian       San Diego
WAC             Louisville            Arizona State         Pepperdine
North Carolina  Rutgers               Arizona               Gonzaga

Pitch Count Watch

Rather than keep returning to the subject of pitch counts and pitcher usage in general too often for my main theme, I'm just going to run a standard feature down here where I point out potential problems; feel free to stop reading above this if the subject doesn't interest you. This will just be a quick listing of questionable starts that have caught my eye -- the general threshold for listing is 120 actual pitches or 130 estimated, although short rest will also get a pitcher listed if I catch it. Don't blame me; I'm just the messenger.

Date   Team   Pitcher   Opponent   IP   H   R   ER   BB   SO   AB   BF   Pitches
5/10 New Mexico Stephen Smith Nevada-Las Vegas 9.0 11 4 4 2 4 38 40 124
5/11 Florida Atlantic Chris Salberg Bethune-Cookman 9.0 4 2 1 3 13 30 34 130
5/11 Oral Roberts Chance Chapman Centenary 9.0 3 1 1 4 19 28 34 150
5/11 Wagner Joe Testa Central Connecticut State 8.0 8 2 2 4 9 28 34 148
5/11 Delaware Billy Harris Virginia Commonwealth 6.0 11 5 5 6 8 25 34 128
5/11 Missouri State Ross Detwiler Indiana State 8.0 6 2 2 2 14 32 34 123
5/11 East Tennessee State Brandon Langston Jacksonville 8.0 7 4 4 4 9 29 35 132
5/11 Kentucky Chris Rusin Mississippi 9.0 6 1 0 3 4 32 37 131
5/11 Arkansas State T. J. Brewer Louisiana-Monroe 9.0 5 5 5 6 9 32 39 142
5/11 College of Charleston Nick Chigges North Carolina-Greensboro 9.0 5 2 2 3 5 32 35 126
5/11 Loyola Marymount Brad Meyers Portland 9.0 6 1 1 0 11 32 34 133
5/11 Tennessee James Adkins South Carolina 7.0 6 5 4 4 11 24 30 122
5/11 Texas A&M Kyle Nicholson Kansas State 9.0 6 2 2 2 9 32 37 133(*)
5/11 Central Arkansas Matt Whitaker Texas A&M-Corpus Christi 8.0 7 3 3 4 10 27 34 139
5/11 Wright State Erich Schanz Cleveland State 9.0 4 0 0 2 6 32 35 122
5/12 Murray State Michal Perconte Austin Peay State 7.1 9 5 2 2 8 29 32 122
5/12 Butler Brian Deter Illinois-Chicago 8.0 11 4 2 3 6 34 38 139
5/12 Delaware Chad Kerfoot Virginia Commonwealth 8.0 7 1 1 1 5 29 31 122
5/12 Fairfield Ed Kamintzky Marist 9.0 11 2 2 2 7 36 40 137(*)
5/12 Gonzaga Clayton Mortensen Pepperdine 9.0 5 1 1 3 15 32 36 144(*)
5/12 Kennesaw State Dan Dale Belmont 8.2 7 2 2 2 5 31 34 127
5/12 Akron Billy McKinney Kent State 8.2 10 6 6 4 7 34 40 138
5/12 Fresno State Justin Wilson Louisiana Tech 8.0 6 1 0 6 9 26 35 135
5/12 Morehead State Henry Mabee Southeast Missouri State 8.0 7 3 2 4 2 27 36 125
5/12 College of Charleston Brian Schlitter North Carolina-Greensboro 7.0 6 3 2 2 5 25 28 123
5/12 Southern California Brad Boxberger Arizona 7.0 7 3 3 1 8 27 28 126
5/12 Arizona Preston Guilmet Southern California 9.0 9 2 2 1 9 33 35 131
5/12 Central Arkansas Jeremy Cloud Texas A&M-Corpus Christi 12.0 11 3 3 3 4 42 47 154(*)
5/12 UCLA Tim Murphy Arizona State 8.0 6 3 3 5 14 28 36 145
5/12 Arizona State Josh Satow UCLA 6.2 6 4 4 5 4 24 30 131
5/12 Villanova Mike Loree Georgetown 9.0 12 6 6 1 4 36 38 123
5/12 Wright State Kyle Kearcher Cleveland State 8.0 10 1 1 3 7 31 34 126
5/12 Western Kentucky Bart Carter South Alabama 9.0 7 5 5 4 9 33 38 134
5/13 Wagner Bobby Tretola Central Connecticut State 9.0 7 3 2 3 1 30 41 135
5/13 Nevada Rod Scurry Hawaii 6.1 8 3 3 0 7 26 28 123
5/13 Miami, Florida Enrique Garcia Wake Forest 9.0 7 1 1 5 9 29 37 137
5/13 New Jersey Tech Rob Pietrocola Binghamton 9.0 3 1 1 7 5 30 39 143(*)
5/13 Northeastern Trevor Smith Hofstra 8.1 6 2 2 3 6 29 33 122
5/13 Loyola Marymount Daniel Macias Portland 9.0 6 1 1 1 7 32 33 124
5/13 Pittsburgh Nate Reed Rutgers 7.0 5 4 4 5 4 27 32 125
5/13 Nicholls State Michael Bartek Texas-San Antonio 9.0 7 2 2 3 8 32 37 129
5/13 UC Davis Bryan Evans Cal Poly 6.2 8 8 8 5 5 27 35 130
5/13 Cal Poly Thomas Eager UC Davis 9.0 14 5 5 3 5 39 43 141
5/15 Tennessee-Martin Jacob Smothers Memphis 6.1 7 4 4 5 4 26 31 132
5/16 Utah Valley State Marcus Moore Arizona State 7.2 16 11 8 2 10 38 43 152(*)

(*) Pitch count is estimated. As always, I welcome actual pitch count corrections.

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