Diamond Vol 3-2-1: Vol looking to bounce back from a rough weekend
It was a tough weekend fo the Vols as they were swept in their SEC opening series at Auburn in frustrating fashion. Let’s look back on a weekend to forget and ahead to a massive second weekend of conference play.
THREE OBSERVATIONS
1 -Bad base running and really bad fielding- With two good pitching staffs on the mound this weekend, each game was likely going to come down to a couple plays. Tennessee made mistakes this weekend that it hadn’t all year, and its base running and fielding were the two biggest areas that showed up.
On Friday, with the game tied at zero in the top half of the seventh, Jake Rucker was able to reach base with a throwing error that went past the first baseman. Derkay tried to reach third from first on the play, but was thrown out to end the inning.
A pair of double plays with runners in scoring position cost the Vols on Sunday. First a line out to the pitcher with the bases loaded allowed for an easy double play to end the inning.
With Tennessee leading by one run in the top half of the eighth, the Vols tried to tag up Jake Rucker from third on a fly ball down the left field line. An excellent throw beat Rucker to the base and stopped Tennessee from stretching its lead to 4-2.
Tennessee came into the weekend with just 19 errors on the season but committed six in the three game series against the Tigers.
Three errors in the seventh inning of Friday night’s game squandered an excellent Garrett Stallings start as the Tigers got two unearned runs. Auburn would hold on to take Game 1.
Auburn picked up another unearned run to start Saturday’s game as they tied the game at 1-1 in the fourth inning.
With Tennessee trailing 4-3 in the eighth inning, the Vols had a chance to end the inning, but a Ricky Martinez throwing error allowed the Tigers to get an insurance run.
The Tigers also stole six bases in Saturday’s win
Tennessee has been better in 2019, but the Vols don’t have the luxury to give opponents free runs in this conference.
2 -Can’t ask much more from the pitching- Tennessee only gave up eight earned runs on the weekend. Going forward Tennessee has to win series when that is the case.
Stallings was the ace the Vols needed Friday night, keeping them in a game against one of the best pitchers in the league. Stallings gave the Vols 7.2 innings and, though he allowed seven hits, he worked around them well and struck out seven Tiger batters.
Zach Linginfelter didn’t have his best stuff on Saturday, as the junior struggled with his command walking five batters and pitching only 4.2 innings. The bullpen did good work pitching a scoreless final four frames and keeping Tennessee in the game if the offense could've strung some runs together.
On Sunday, Will Neely was solid for the Vols as he threw 4.1 innings before leaving two runners on for Garrett Crochet.
Crochet surrendered those two runs and allowed five hits as the Tigers were able to pick up enough runs to get the sweep.
The pitching wasn’t perfect this weekend, but they did enough to win some games. They got the outing they were looking for from Stallings and Neely but weren’t able to capitalize.
3 -Al Soularie stays hot- Al Soularie is solidifying his spot as one of the best bats in the Tennessee lineup as the sophomore went 7-for-19 on the week with three more home runs.
The junior college transfer hit a huge go-ahead homer in the eighth inning of the Vols' 5-3 loss on Sunday.
Soularie is now hitting .367 on the year and has a team-leading six homers as well as 17 RBIs. His OBP of .475 is good for second best on the team.
Soularie has proven he has the power that the Vols really need in its lineup. This lineup hasn’t had enough consistent solid bats, but Ammons, Lipcius, and Soularie at the top of the order is strong for the Vols.
The Vols need to match the success of the top four hitters with some consistency from the back half of the lineup.
TWO QUESTIONS
Where does Tennessee turn to replace Luc Lipcius?
Luc Lipcius was playing better baseball this year than he had at any point previously in his Tennessee career.
After his sophomore campaign was derailed by injury, Lipcius bounced back strong in 2019 hitting .347 with three homers and 14 RBIs in the first 16 games before fracturing his foot against Fresno State.
The Vols now are forced to replace a solid bat in the back of the order right as SEC play starts.
Pete Derkay, who played in Lipcius absence last year, started all three games of the Auburn series at first and went just 1-for-10, with the one hit being a solo homer.
Freshman utility man Max Ferguson saw action at first base in two of the games for the Vols this weekend. Ferguson had perhaps his best game in a Tennessee uniform Sunday going 2-for-3 with a triple and a walk.
Vitello said that the amount of cross-training the Vols did in the fall was going to pay off now with Luc Lipcius’ injury. I’d expect Vitello to continue to roll with Derkay at first, but if he continues to struggle at the plate, don’t be surprised if the Vols try out some different options there.
HOW WILL TENNESSEE RESPOND?
Tony Vitello talked Tuesday about this team really seeing adversity for the first time last weekend against Fresno State. Well they got a whole lot more of it this weekend.
Tennessee followed up its great non-conference start by laying an egg and getting swept at Auburn. For Vol baseball fans, they know that feeling all to well. The question now becomes how much will it bother the team?
Personally, I don’t think it will be a major problem going forward. Vitello is a coach that will give his team some confidence, and a lot of these Tennessee players haven’t been here long enough to know the frustration of squandering a good start.
Now that doesn’t mean Tennessee is going to bounce back and finish in the top half of the league, but I don’t expect the Vols to go down without a fight. For much of this weekend they proved they were just as good as Auburn, but they can’t make the same little mistakes that they made this weekend.
It will be interesting to see how this team responds, and it really needs to be a good one.
ONE PREDICTION
This weekend’s series against South Carolina will prove to be the biggest of the season
Tennessee and South Carolina were both ranked in the Top 25 this week, and both squads got swept in the opening weekend of SEC play.
The series is in Knoxville and one the Volunteers desperately need to win. If Tennessee can right the ship and pick up two or three wins I think that would do a lot to steady this team and prove to them that they are as good as they thought going into Auburn.
With another poor outing things could spiral for the Vols as they travel to West End the next weekend to face one of the nation’s best teams in Vanderbilt.
While the Gamecocks have some solid arms, they don’t boast a dominant starter and Tennessee should be able to supply more runs of support for its pitching staff.
On top of all of that, South Carolina is a team that Tennessee will be competing with for seeding in the SEC Tournament and a possible NCAA Tournament spot. Clinching the tiebreaker over the Gamecocks could be big for Tennessee going forward.