NU not ranked in pre-season

[HANC]

Correct me if I am wrong, but I am pretty sure that I read in the Omaha paper that NU isn't ranked in the top 25 in the Collegiate Baseball poll. This is pretty sad. I don't understand why we can't establish tradition here. Are we just "flashes in the pan". We have a few good years, then fall off?

 

Someone explain to me WHY Anderson can't build a program to stay on top, or hell, at least in the top 15. We have the best facilities of many northern schools, recent success, former players flourishing in MLB, and it's in the State that hosts the CWS. Is Anderson going to be able to do this, or is he not the right guy for the job.... I personall thought that Childress was the mastermind behind ALL of our success, even when Van Horn was here. AM is ranked 9th right now.

 

The whole northern team excuse doesn't cut it either.........MIssouri, ND, Michigan, Missouri State, Wichita St are all in top 25.....granted, northern teams are at a HUGE disadvantage, but you can still put together a top 15 team year in and year out. Especially with the facilities of NU.

[Drowning_in_the_Sea_of_Red]

Doesn't help that our pitching staff has been raided by the draft the way it has the past couple of years. Plus the few pitchers that turned down scholarships to sign contracts.

 

We have one senior pitcher and three juniors on this year's roster. We're very young. That might have something to do with the ranking. But other than that, I really don't know.

[redout22]

Right now I can see why Nebraska isn't ranked. We are too young and I could see why we aren't ranked. Hopefully Nebraska can establish themselves during the season

[WIHusker]

Pretty sure we weren't ranked to start last year either, and we made it all the way to #4...so no big deal.

[huskerswrkhavoc]

last year, we over achieved. this year, if we want to host a regional, we will have to over achieve probably TWICE as much. Seriously, if you followed baseball, you would understand why we are not ranked pre-season and why A&M is 9th. A&M is stacked. They will crush us this year. But not necissarily just because Childress was the "mastermind" of what was going on. Anderson is one helluva coach. It's funny, 2 years ago people were calling for his head, and last year they were praising him for all he was doing. If you pay attention to any college baseball, you woulda seen Husker fans were being ridiculed by fans across the nation for the volatility of this exact motion. Anderson is going to do well, i mean, last year, we weren't supposed to do ANYTHING. We had Johnny Dorn though. The difference between last year and this year is Johnny Dorn, or that caliber arm. However, our offense is better, not a ton, but it is better. If Tezak can stay healthy that will play a huge role. Our outfield should be stacked. Depending on the contributions of Cooper, we may have him starting in center field, leaving Belfonte in right and the cluster out in right with a couple very talented players in Stewart, Farst, and Sullivan. We don't need to worry about that to be honest. However, it's tough to win ball games when you don't have a pitching staff. We have nobody with proven ability to start a weekend game. Our 4 best starters from last year are gone. We have Erik Bird, who proved to be good for 5 innings at best last year. We do have Mike Nesseth, who I would assume be the favorite to help anchor the bullpen. If we can prove to come out with 3 solid weekend starters, then i think we will rapidly gain respect, and with that, votes. But without the pitching staff, there is nothing to argue about with rankings... Look how many of our staff jumped ship when the draft came calling, along with recruits.

 

 

Don't look at the other Northern teams in the rankings. Notre Dame is over rated every year, just as they are in football. Michigan is probably the most over rated team, however. They seem to host every year but seem to get beat ever year also... They aren't good. The big 10 BLOWS in baseball. Wichita St is a solid baseball program and have been good longer than we have. They deserve more 'respect' as a 'program' than we do.

[hastingshusker]

The biggest problem we will ALWAYS have in establishing a tradition here is that Anderson can't recruit for anything. I understand that baseball is much different from other programs in that your recruits can just bolt without ever coming to school. If that is the case then they need to take walk-ons with the program, something that they do NOT do. If you are always going to have your program raided by the draft (which is a good thing) you need to have reserves ready to step in.

 

IMO we need to get rid of Anderson because he has proven that he cannot take our team to the "next level"

[huskerswrkhavoc]

The biggest problem we will ALWAYS have in establishing a tradition here is that Anderson can't recruit for anything. I understand that baseball is much different from other programs in that your recruits can just bolt without ever coming to school. If that is the case then they need to take walk-ons with the program, something that they do NOT do. If you are always going to have your program raided by the draft (which is a good thing) you need to have reserves ready to step in.

 

IMO we need to get rid of Anderson because he has proven that he cannot take our team to the "next level"

 

 

Because winning the 1st CWS game in team history isn't the next level. Right. Anderson has done a great job here. What were we supposed to do last year? Oh that's right. NOTHING. And he turned us into a team that competed with the best in the big 12. Seriously he has done a great job. He recruits well. You don't have to get a lot of talent outside the midwest for baseball because there is some decent talent in the midwest. It's not like football, like you said. He has done a lot for this program and has done nothing to show that he doesn't deserve to be here. But please, show me the PROOF that he can't take us to this "next level" you speak of, since you did say he has proven it.

[hastingshusker]

Because winning the 1st CWS game in team history isn't the next level. Right. Anderson has done a great job here. What were we supposed to do last year? Oh that's right. NOTHING. And he turned us into a team that competed with the best in the big 12. Seriously he has done a great job. He recruits well. You don't have to get a lot of talent outside the midwest for baseball because there is some decent talent in the midwest. It's not like football, like you said. He has done a lot for this program and has done nothing to show that he doesn't deserve to be here. But please, show me the PROOF that he can't take us to this "next level" you speak of, since you did say he has proven it.

 

 

I will give Mike Anderson credit for winning a game at the CWS. That is an impressive feat. When referring to the next level I count that as post season success. Lets look at them:

 

2003 Big 12 Tourney 2-2 as the 7th ranked team in the nation Runner up to Baylor (16th)

Regionals 3-2 as the 9th team in the nation Eliminated by SMS\

 

2004 1-2 in the Big 12 Tourney while not ranked and did not qualify for regionals

 

2005 5-1 Winning the Big 12 (4)

Regionals 3-0, Super Regionals 2-0, CWS 1-2 (Losing to Arizona State in 11 to end the series for us)

 

2006 3-1 in the Big 12 Tourney (14)

Regionals 0-2 (6)

 

2007 1-2 in the Big 12 Tourney (NR)

2-2 in Regionals

 

2008 1-2 in the Big 12 Tourney (7)

1-2 in Regionals (10)

 

 

My point is not that he can't win ballgames because he has proven he can. My point is that he has not succeeded in the postseason. Anderson is 13-10 in Big 12 Tournament play and 11-10 in Regionals, Super Regionals and the CWS. If you take out 2005 which was a remarkable year he is 8-9 in the Big 12 and 5-8 in Regionals while not advancing to a super regional. Except for 2007 where we were unranked in Regional play Nebraska has been no lower then 10th going into regionals and we did not advance to be in the 16 team round of the NCAA tournament.

 

Last year the team was suppose to be terrible and he did do an incredible job at making the team play very well. I hope he can continue to do that this year. But, again, my criticism is that he cannot take us to the next level which is winning in the postseaseon. In big time NCAA sports championships equal success. I am not saying we should be winning the Big 12 year in and year out but we should at least be putting up a fight in regionals while advancing to the supers more then once in 6 years.

 

Anderson has become a victim of circumstance. He has raised the bar for baseball which is great. I LOVE baseball and want them to succed at Nebraska a place you "cant play baseball at" by some national standards. I genuinely hope that Anderson can turn it around. As of now though he hasn't done that. I wish him and the baseball team the best, but if the program is going to be a national powerhouse we can't live off "winning the 1st CWS game in team history" forever.

 

To put it in football standards (which seems to work well for some people...not a shot at you havoc) if we look at the regionals like making a bowl game the football team would be 1-5 in bowl games winning soundly, losing a tight game twice, losing a decent game once, getting beaten soundly. Hows that sound for a bowl stretch.

 

Next level = post season success

[huskerswrkhavoc]

to be completely honest, i probably pay more attention to baseball nationally than almost anyone on this board, so i'm not going to take offense to that because baseball is NOT football...Completely different monster. What coach do you think you are going to get to come in here now? What coach that you can say WILL take us to this "next level" you are speaking of?

 

2003 honestly surprised me that we got knocked out so early. SMS came in here and took it too us, they DID go to the CWS that year. Not a fluke, plus Anderson's learning experience year. (note, we went 14 innings with baylor, almost won the conference tourney if we pulled that out..)

 

2004 we did not have a good team, no surprise. MANY people started questioning the ability of Anderson and the decision to take him over Childress as HC.

 

2005 GREAT season by the Huskers. Flat out best season we've had. EVER. Sure expectations were higher than they were when we made it to the CWS in 00 so maybe beating a rice team here in Super's was good, but this honestly was a great season. 1-2 in the CWS w/ that back n forth game w/ ASU.

 

 

2006 started out with a lot of promise, very high expectations. However the team def. stumbled down the stretch, bounced back in the Big 12 tourney losing to KU in the championship game (great fluke w/ KU bein there btw), but continued that losing spiral they finished the regular season on in regionals by losing to Manhattan (solid Ace of staff) and then San Fran (which isn't THAT bad of a loss, good west coast team building a solid program). But still def a disappointing season, will not lie there.

 

2007 up and down season all around. Went down to Tempe (as a 3 seed) for the regional (VERY tough place to win) and got beat out of the gate by Riverside and then beat Monmouth, stepped back and smacked a very good Riverside team in the mouth 11-1, then turned to the night cap and stuck with ASU for a couple of innings before our lack of available pitching hit us and their solid offensive ball club stuck it to us.

 

2008. No expectations what-so-ever. We have Johnny Dorn returning for our pitching staff, decent defense, but no great offense returning. Lost Jeff Tezak, arguably our BEST offensive player for the season, and then lost Craig Corriston for much of the back stretch, and he barely was healthy in the big 12 tourney/regional. With both those players this team goes to a super, quite possibly even the CWS. Still played a great game losing 3-2 to a very under rated Irvine team. Irvine was actually the favorite in the regional, for those that didn't know. Their staff was down right nasty.

 

2009. Expectations probably the lowest in Anderson's era. No pitching at all. Erik Bird is the only pitcher returning with actual starting experience. However, there is hope. Anderson should have a solid offense and defense returning. Belfonte will either jump on over to center field to replace the void left by Nimmo, or Khiry Cooper could step in and play center field and leave Belfonte over in right, thus leaving Nick Sullivan, David Stewart, and Tyler Farst fighting and almost certainly splitting time in left. Kline and Mort will certainly anchor the left side of the infield, while Tezak will DH and be in the mix at 2nd. 2nd and 1st will be interesting to see who emerges.. I'm sure we'll see Tyler Rank get some playing time at 1st as he did last year. Someone will have to step up on the right side, unless someone shows great flashes at 3rd, and we move more over to 2nd.. Neer will catch. Like I said above, I would assume Nesseth will be the closer, but who knows with our staff what will happen. I'm sure anderson and newman will figure out something.

 

 

We have a pretty damn easy schedule set up next year. Take a look at this.

 

@ LA-Lafayette could prove tough early, they are a solid program that has fallen on a tough couple of years lately.. played a bit better down the stretch last year.

vs Cal State Northridge. Should be 3 maybe 4 wins against a California school, always solid. They aren't the greatest team but won't be a walk over either.

 

Then we open conference play @ texas tech, not a team that is overly difficult on the road. Much rather them than texas.

 

that week we play @ Arkansas. very tough mid-week games down there against Van Horn's crew, would be huge to get 1.

 

then we are home vs Okie St (looks almost certain they lose Oliver for next season, good team still, but at home.) @ OU, again another team I dont mind facing on the road. Home vs K-State, should be sweep.. Home vs Texas, they will be SOLID. home helps, gotta play them anyways. @ A&M. 1 of 3 would be amazing in this series. obviously that's not the goal, but i'd be satisfied with a win on either Friday or Saturday, Sunday wins are too blah once a team is up 2-0....@ KU, home v Mizzou, then a break in conference play at home vs Cal State Bakersfield, another easy weekend, but still, west coast schools are not pushovers.. then finishing up conference play at home vs Baylor.

 

 

if you look at how the big 12 is supposed to fall

 

@Texas A&M

vTexas

vOSU

vBaylor

vMizzou

 

We play 4 of the top 5 times at home. I honestly think Texas tops A&M also, but we'll see. Anyways, that could mean they are THAT much better than us and will beat us anyways, and we'll struggle against the bottom teams on the road and struggle all year, or, we'll be better than we expect, and be able to compete in these games because they are at home against. I hope it's the competing part.

 

 

Not trying to be an ass or anything either, just enjoy actually talking about baseball and it's tough to find people willing to talk about Husker baseball and actually know much about it..

 

 

And do you believe that Stoops should be fired from OU? I mean, he won the big one once, but he's lost 5 straight BCS bowl games. 1-5.

[huskerswrkhavoc]

double sorry.

[hastingshusker]

I personally thought we should have kept Childress honestly. I think Anderson is a great hitting coach (he did take over again this last year and we showed significant improvement) but I just don't think he is the right man for the head job.

 

No offense taken bro, I would guess I follow national ball almost as much as you (my job prohibits alot of watching) so it is GREAT to have a discussion about baseball on a football dominated board

 

The early non conference schedule should be a great gauge as far as how the season will shake down. You nailed it with those schools...i think they are an injury or two away from being big time schools.

 

I agree and think Texas will top A&M as I love the job Augie does down there...one helluva coach. I think this season really should be a type of swing season (no pun intended) with the future of our program. The big names of the past few years are gone (i.e. draftees) leaving us with a young group of kids that Anderson and Co. will be able to mold.

 

I really just question alot of things. At this point I would be genuinely satisfied with making it to the Supers once every 2-3 years. I think that is a reasonable job at sustaining for a program like Nebraska. It never helps us that we can't play quality games at home until April with what 1/2 the season gone? but that's the climate we live in.

 

And do you believe that Stoops should be fired from OU? I mean, he won the big one once, but he's lost 5 straight BCS bowl games. 1-5.

 

No I don't think he deserves to be fired as making a BCS game shows success (winning the conference), but I do NOT believe he still deserves the nickname "Big Game Bob" or the levels of Switzer like comparison in Oklahoma. I have relatives there and you would think that Stoops was the second coming. Its hilarious that he now has a record for consecutive losses and most of there fans will do nothing but discuss regular season. You bring up post season and they stick their heads in the sand.

 

There are many problems with the current system, but you have to wonder if we didnt have the BCS hype machine and Oklahoma was just playing in bowl games at the end of the year and having the same results (I know the conference tie ins and all that) would people be that happy with him? I really doubt that...

[bbhusker]

I agree with what both of you have said. For me this season will be very telling of how good of a coaching staff we have. We don't have any true "studs" established on this team but some solid players. Attention to detail is going to be very important this year because our inexperience is really going to hurt us. What I mean by attention to detail is this (which I'm sure I don't have to tell you this but what the hell): playing small ball, solid defense, make the correct throws, pitchers executing pitches and not trying to out muscle a hitter, (and the biggest) play as a TEAM. This team needs to play GREAT fundamental baseball this year to have a chance to go to a regional.

 

We don't have a JD to rely on and get away with a bad hitting day anymore. We don't have a "Matt Hopper" bat in the lineup to bail us out. What I'm trying to say is over the last few years we have lost our game changers. This is why I agree with the statement about a drop off in recruiting. I like Mike Andersen but with the talent on the team right now, "coaching" couldn't be anymore important than it is right now.

[huskerswrkhavoc]

I agree with what both of you have said. For me this season will be very telling of how good of a coaching staff we have. We don't have any true "studs" established on this team but some solid players. Attention to detail is going to be very important this year because our inexperience is really going to hurt us. What I mean by attention to detail is this (which I'm sure I don't have to tell you this but what the hell): playing small ball, solid defense, make the correct throws, pitchers executing pitches and not trying to out muscle a hitter, (and the biggest) play as a TEAM. This team needs to play GREAT fundamental baseball this year to have a chance to go to a regional.

 

We don't have a JD to rely on and get away with a bad hitting day anymore. We don't have a "Matt Hopper" bat in the lineup to bail us out. What I'm trying to say is over the last few years we have lost our game changers. This is why I agree with the statement about a drop off in recruiting. I like Mike Andersen but with the talent on the team right now, "coaching" couldn't be anymore important than it is right now.

 

 

only reason I tend to disagree with the recruiting aspect is because look at what we've lost to the draft. I know I said football isn't baseball, and this is why. We lose kids that never get here. We lose kids that would never leave in football. Solid players, solid pitchers, that want to take that shot in the draft.. get their signing bonus, come back to school if and usually when it doesn't pan out for them. Plus we just lost Gordon's cousin this past year because he's an absolute idiot. Anderson pulled his scholly offer. Kid coulda been a stud too, just not the kinda kid we want on this team, and honestly that just shows even more why Anderson is the guy. We are a very young team. Watch for the Huskers to do damage in 2010.

[hastingshusker]

only reason I tend to disagree with the recruiting aspect is because look at what we've lost to the draft. I know I said football isn't baseball, and this is why. We lose kids that never get here. We lose kids that would never leave in football. Solid players, solid pitchers, that want to take that shot in the draft.. get their signing bonus, come back to school if and usually when it doesn't pan out for them. Plus we just lost Gordon's cousin this past year because he's an absolute idiot. Anderson pulled his scholly offer. Kid coulda been a stud too, just not the kinda kid we want on this team, and honestly that just shows even more why Anderson is the guy. We are a very young team. Watch for the Huskers to do damage in 2010.

 

Totally agree with the 2010 comment. The recruiting is a beast in college baseball. The NCAA hampers teams with the 35 man roster. THe thing that Anderson could do at UNL is to use the club system to replace those players that bolt early. Some of the best players at UNL are playing club baseball because they are not given a shot to walk on with the main team. I know from personal experience that Anderson rarely acceptys walk-ons.

 

What I believe should happen is the big team should put together a club team of kids that want to play and constantly be evaluating the talent playing in that league. There is a level of arrogance among the baseball team that is shooting themselves in the foot. I am not bashing the players that are there because I think they do get quality guys. The problem, as we learned in football, is sometimes the best talent doesnt pan out...sometimes it takes the biggest heart. Most of these kids are here to get to the next level and God bless them for that but we need a few more players that are here for the University rather then themselves. Not saying we need a whole team...but some role players would be nice. If they would just look around the club teams they would find some outstanding talent that could benefit the big club.