Big 12 Baseball Coaches Teleconference
1/23/2004 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
Jan. 23, 2004
Steve Smith, head coach of Baylor's 11th-ranked baseball team, addressed the media Friday during the eighth-annual Big 12 Conference Preseason Coaches Teleconference. The following is a transcript of Smith's comments.
BAYLOR HEAD COACH Steve Smith
"We are entering the end of our first week of practice, and we've had good weather for the most part, and that is such an important factor this time of the year.
"We enter the season fairly optimistic, I think mainly because we have so much pitching coming back. We've probably never had this many wins or this many innings pitched returning from a previous year's staff. That's the good news.
"The challenge is obviously replacing some very good offensive players. We lost two All-American type players in Chris Durbin and David Murphy in the outfield, so we have to replace those bats, which I think it will probably be impossible to match the numbers they gave us last year. We're replacing a shortstop in Trey Webb who signed and moved on in professional baseball. And we had Mark Saccomanno and Ross Bennett, who just had great seasons as fifth-year seniors.
"That's what we knew going into the year that we would have to replace. We've been working to do some of those things, but we didn't plan on having to deal with some of the injuries we've had. We had Josh Ford go down in the fall with a shoulder injury that will limit greatly his opportunity to catch this year; it won't affect him swinging the bat, but we probably will not have him available to get behind the plate until April. That is a big chunk of your presence on the field because Josh was such a good player, an everyday player on the field for us last year behind the plate. That's our biggest unknown right now.
"The guy that was right there with him last year - Zack Dillon - is very capable, but he also had arm surgery right there at the end of November. He's still rehabbing that, but he looks good so far and I think we'll be able to piece it together back there."
On new look of Baylor's offense without Durbin and Murphy ...
"It puts us in a situation where we're going to have to learn on the run a little bit. All of us have fall practice, and we see our guys in those intrasquad situations, but it's a different world when you start teeing it up against somebody else, particularly in our league.
"So, things like the batting order right now are pretty up in the air for me. I think I know where I like Michael Griffin and Ford - there are a couple returners right there. Kyle Reynolds has put on about 15 pounds and really improved himself as you'd hope a sophomore would do after his freshman year.
"The biggest question for us offensively is going to be how we stack them up. Last year it was a pretty simple thing, not a difficult decision to put Durbin leading off and Murphy in the two-hole. That made everyone have to face them a bunch of times during the course of the game. Right now I'm still searching for who's going to be in those spots."
On fifth-year senior RHP Zane Carlson ...
"Zane is going to get the most out of what the NCAA will allow a college player to get. He pitched two seasons and then got a medical redshirt, but he pitched right up until that drop-dead date of when you could apply for it. And he's pitched the last two seasons. So, he's going to get the full four-and-a-half years. He's had one summer of Team USA and three summers in the Cape, and I don't think that's ever been done before.
"We certainly don't have a question mark in him. Zane goes into the season as the active saves leader around the country, and he's 16 away from setting a new NCAA record for saves. That's a comforting thing. I thought last year, particularly down the stretch, he really carried us and really threw well. He threw a lot of innings in the conference tournament and in the first round of the Regionals, and obviously we lost him for the Super Regionals. That in and of itself tells you how important he is to the staff."
On strength of schedule and having a lot of non-conference games at home ...
"We have to go back to Long Beach State, but we have the other four weekends before conference play at home, which I hope will be beneficial to us because obviously we're going through some turnover in our lineup. This may be a year where it is beneficial to us early to be able to play at home.
"The flip side of that is that all those teams we're playing are going to be better than they were last year when we played them. We've got Arizona here this year; last year when we went there to play them, they started five or six freshmen against us that weekend. Those guys are much better now. That will be a better Arizona team that comes to Waco than the one we played there last year.
"UC-Irvine was in much the same situation last year when we went out there. They had lost to injury the whole middle of their lineup, and they struggled the whole year with that issue. They'll be a much better team that comes to Waco.
"And anyone that's done their homework on Vanderbilt will realize they're going to bring a bunch of talent, including at least one first-rounder on the mound that we'll have to face.
"I really believe the schedule, although we get to face them at home, the teams and the quality of the teams are probably going to be a little better than last year."
On Mark Pankratz's adjustment to Division I baseball during the fall ...
"I saw a very, very good athlete, just a hard worker. He's got some bat speed. It's going to be a little bit of an adjustment for him. He went off last summer to the Northwood League where they swing wood; the quality of pitching he saw up there day in and day out is not going to match what he's going to see in our league. But he performed very well. I've been very pleased with him. He's the one newcomer that we are depending on. Everybody else, despite the losses we have, we're not going to be putting a body out there that's brand new to our program. It's going to be someone who's lettered, someone who's been in the lineup before, maybe not quite in the role that they're in right now, but they're not inexperienced. Mike's the one guy coming in that's going to be baptized by fire. But I think we'll have a good enough supporting cast around him and he's a good enough athlete with good enough tools. Give him a little bit of time and he'll be just fine.
On the pitching rotation ...
"I think if we were going to tee it up today our rotation, maybe not in this order, would be Mark McCormmick, Sean Walker and Trey Taylor. Jared (Theodorakos) is not ready to be in a rotation to start yet. He's throwing pain free, but I think he's a little short on stuff, on velocity right now. We'll have our first round of intrasquads probably Tuesday or Wednesday of next week, so we'll see how he starts to shape up once he faces some hitters again for the first time.
"We've got some options on the mound. Ryan LaMotta also was outstanding starting and relieving for us last year, particularly at the end of the season. Cory VanAllen is not ready for it right away, but he's got a great arm and as time goes along I think he'll certainly develop into somebody that can be in that role.
"Then Andy Pape went off last summer and got a lot of starts and comes back to us a much stronger bodied kid. Andy's a 6-5, 250-pound kid, and I'm not sure he couldn't play football for us. He's a big strong kid, and I think he's really improved himself as well."
