BB: ASC: American Southwest Conference

[Ralph Turner]

Chris, you are about "this close" to calling out the ASC rep to the committee.

As I understand the conduct on the committee, the involved representatives recuse him/herself when their institution is under discussion.

You can confirm that locally with locally with those members of the MC athletic department who have sat on those committees.

If there is administrative malfeasance on the West Region committee, then the ASC can handle that, but those are serious allegations that you are implying.

[golden_dome]

Chris, you are about "this close" to calling out the ASC rep to the committee.

As I understand the conduct on the committee, the involved representatives recuse him/herself when their institution is under discussion.

You can confirm that locally with locally with those members of the MC athletic department who have sat on those committees.

If there is administrative malfeasance on the West Region committee, then the ASC can handle that, but those are serious allegations that you are implying.

Ralph,
   I think you are going overboard on that one and missed the entire intent of my post. I want to be sure that I am looking at the correct numbers, maybe I'm not. If those numbers are right then I think the committee has the wrong team from the ASC in the rankings, not just Coach Shewmake. I am not implying that he has somehow personally kept UTD ahead of MC, Coach Shewmake is very respected in the league and should be, he has always been professional.

You are right that Coach Shewmake would be taken out of the conversation, I already am aware of that, so there is no reason for me to try and blame this on him. I know he's not part of that conversation. If anything, my thinking was directed more at the other members of the committee. But I do think the committee as a whole got this one wrong if I am looking at the numbers correctly, which was the intent of my post. 

The fact is most of our numbers are very similiar according to primary criteria, but we were 3-1 against them and had a much stronger record against West regionall ranked oppponents (MC 7-5 / UTD 2-7). I would think those are tiebreakers. Actually, the season records of the top three ASC East teams against one another this year would shake out like this:
UT-Tyler 7-4
MS College 6-4
UTD 2-7

I don't see it.

[d3baseballnut]

UTD should not be above Miss College....period

The committee emphasizes different criterion for different situations. Miss college played a MUCH MUCH harder schedule, and in the more difficult division. So, in this case, regional record is most important, which is close, but goes to UTD

In the north, if Illinois Wesleyan gets a Pool C over Concordia Chicago (which will happen), it will only happen bc of strength of schedule.

IN the mid atlantice, Montclair is where they are purely for SOS reasons.

PICK ONE

[Ralph Turner]

Miss College was 30-16 on the season.

These are not in-region games

Belhaven (NAIA) 1-2
Spalding (only Provisional year #1)  2-1
Blackburn IL (Administrative Region #4, not #3/Central Region)  1-0
Touglaoo (NAIA)   1-0

That makes MC 25-13, (.6578) which is close to the same winning percentage as UTD  (27-14,  .6585)  both one win shy of 2/3rds.

Mississippi College played HPU (3-0) and TLU (0-3)  in the crossover series

TLU played CTX (1-2) and TLU (3-0) in the crossover series, plus CTX (1-1) in the UTT Easton Tourney).

As for the criterion of common in-region opponents, I get MissColl:

TLU                       0-3
ASC East              14-4
Tourney Finals       3-2
Total                     17-9  (8 games over .500)

For UTD:

TLU                     3-0
ASC East           12-6
Tourney Finals   1-2
Total                   16-8    (8 games over .500)

I think that it is too close to call between MC and UTD, especially since we don't have the OWP/OOWP.

In any case we knock ourselves out.

[Ralph Turner]

We don't know the OWP's of the 12 in-region teams that Mississippi College played.

However, let's assume that the 11 teams' winning percentages, excluding Rust, were all .500.

Add those Winning percentages together and we get 5.500 divided by 11 to get .500 as an OWP.

Let's assume that Rust was 0-25 (.000) versus in-region opponents.  (I cannot find Rust's baseball scores on Rust's website.  Anyone have the NCAA web page for Rust?)

Add .000 to 5.500 and we get 5.500.  Divide that by 12 and we get the OWP for Mississippi College of .4583.  That is a drop of .042 as a possible maximum hit that Rust made on Mississippi College's OWP.

Is that the difference that the West Region committee was required to acknowledge?

[hatbaseball]

Had anyone checked out the All-Conference teams that have released?

I am all for player recognition and acknowledging players for their accomplishments, but I think there is a point where you need to draw a line. Not to take anything away from Schreiner, but having 13 all conference recognitions in one of the bottom teams in the division definitely raises some eyebrows. There are definitely some deserving players that made the honorable mention list, and I think their accomplishments are overshaddowed by the fact that they are recognized alongside pitchers with 10+ERA's and hitters with sub .230 batting averages.

Not to mention a player like Kyle Martiin with a 3.61 ERA didnt even make Honorable Mention while other players on the list had terrible numbers.

While I agree with alot of the list, and where some players are put can be arguable, the bottom of the list really bothers me.

This is all of course my humble opinion, and I am curious to hear other's thoughts.

   

I agree completely with your assessment.  I just looked at the numbers for the Schreiner players and it's not good.  I guess each coach nominates their own players and the Schreiner coach decided to nominate his whole team.    McMurry has 8-9 guys that aren't on the list that have MUCH better numbers than most of the Schreiner players listed.  (and I'm sure most of the other teams in the conference do as well!)  I'm not meaning for this to sound disparging toward the Schreiner kids and some of them certainly deserve to be there, but the coach should certainly be more respective of what the All Conference awards are really for.

[Ralph Turner]

Welcome hatbaseball.

Have we met before?

Contact me offline if we have.

Thanks and welcome to the boards.

[dp643]

Hatbaseball,

Up and down the west division there are a ton of deserving players that didnt make honorable mention while the Schreiner guys did.

To the best of my knowledge, a coach nominates his players (which Schreiner obviously nominated their whole team), and then the nominations go out to all 8 coaches. To be Honorable mention, you must get at least one vote to be on a team by another teams coach. You can't vote for your own players.

So this means that someone (other than Schreiner) voted for the Schreiner players over players like Drew Farr, Kyle Martin, Gaona, both Satlzbagers, Beasley (just to name a few). I dont know and I am probably beating a dead horse, but something doesnt seem right here.

[golden_dome]

Miss College was 30-16 on the season.

These are not in-region games

Belhaven (NAIA) 1-2
Spalding (only Provisional year #1)  2-1
Blackburn IL (Administrative Region #4, not #3/Central Region)  1-0
Touglaoo (NAIA)   1-0

That makes MC 25-13, (.6578) which is close to the same winning percentage as UTD  (27-14,  .6585)  both one win shy of 2/3rds.

Mississippi College played HPU (3-0) and TLU (0-3)  in the crossover series

TLU played CTX (1-2) and TLU (3-0) in the crossover series, plus CTX (1-1) in the UTT Easton Tourney).

As for the criterion of common in-region opponents, I get MissColl:

TLU                       0-3
ASC East              14-4
Tourney Finals       3-2
Total                     17-9  (8 games over .500)

For UTD:

TLU                     3-0
ASC East           12-6
Tourney Finals   1-2
Total                   16-8    (8 games over .500)

I think that it is too close to call between MC and UTD, especially since we don't have the OWP/OOWP.

In any case we knock ourselves out.

Ralph,
  This would be my best guess. If TLU, UTD and MC all were up for the ASC's #2 spot, then that could cloud things and I could see arguments. MC should definitely get in over UTD, TLU over MC, and UTD over TLU. I still think MC should be the team chosen if all three were in a hat, based on a better record vs regionally ranked opponents (MC is 7-5, UTD is 2-7, TLU is 0-4). All would have similiar records and probably similiar strength of schedule numbers.

   But I'm not sure TLU was in that discussion due to no ranking last week, and an 0-2 performance in the tourney didn't get them any closer.
 
   If it's down to MC or UTD and the records and schedule strength were smiliar, I would think MC would be the team based on our 3-1 record against them, our much better record against West region ranked teams, and the fact that UTD was the clear #3 in the ASC East Division should win out.

   Oh well. I think MC and UTD would both have shots at this based on very good strength of schedule numbers, but neither would be close to locks. I think both teams could win games in a regional. But whoever is in that #6 spot has a leg up to getting in.

   You won't see TLU fans complaining because they unfortunately had a poor showing in the ASC Tournament. But from listening to MC people, it's hard for them to undertand how UTD would get in ahead of them considering we went 3-1 against them including a 10-0 pounding in the ASC tourney, and they were clearly a step or two behind MC and UT-Tyler all season.

[d3baseballnut]

HERE IS YOUR TIEBREAKER....they played each other GUYS!!!

Miss won 3 out of 4!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And made it to the championship.......how is this close. If they are this close, how is head to head not coming into play.

[Ralph Turner]

HERE IS YOUR TIEBREAKER....they played each other GUYS!!!

Miss won 3 out of 4!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And made it to the championship.......how is this close. If they are this close, how is head to head not coming into play.

Yes, I see that.

I am trying to understand what the committee had that put UTD ahead of MissColl.

In either case, I think that they both stay home.

[hsusid]

It is something the ASC I guess just has to accept. The West teams in softball, baseball, tennis and golf are all underrepresented on the committees. We have almost half the teams in our region from the ASC and have one person on the committee.

In softball, HSU was 31-12. Of their 12 losses, eight were to teams with 29 or more wins.

LaVerne was 28-15 and Claremont Mudd Scripps was 28-14. The CMS was one of four members of the committee. Three of the four members were from the West coast and three teams from the very weak SCIAC gets three teams flown to Texas for the tournament.

In the past, we have always seen when it is close that geographic proximity is a real issue. HSU had a better record, better region record and probably as good of a strength of schedule.

BTW, HSU lost to ETBU 5-1 in 10 innings in the ASC Tournament last Friday in a great game that you could not tell which team was better until the last inning when ETBU got a 3-run home run. In the first round of the softball regional ETBU run ruled CMS in five innings.

Ralph, I disagree about the coaches stepping out when their team is talked about. That may supposed to be the rule, but human nature says that is not the case.

If you are on those conference calls every week you get to know the people on the committee. It is human nature to take care of your own. I have seen this on voting for all-region and all-American committees. Maybe I am not supposed to, but if I see two players from say *UMHB and *Christopher Newport and their stats are close I almost always will pick the player I am more familiar with.

Same thing works here if I am from say *Linfield and I don't know much about Mississippi College or UT-Dallas and their numbers are close who are you going to vote for. Someone you don't know or someone you do know.

*All of the schools listed above are examples.

[Dawgsdad]

I don't know what is driving UTD to be ranked above MC. I also don't believe that the ASC will get a second bid either. If we were to get one I'd say it should go to the runner up of the ASC championship, which was MC in this case. I would like to think that TLU is worthly but frankly we fell on our own sword in the tourney. Head to head, we were 0-4 against UTD and 3-0 against MC and 0-1 against UTT. So, somewhat of a mixed bag if you aske me... I believe we are a better team than what the stats show (to be honest)...

On a side note, I want to thank everyone on these boards for a fun and exciting year. I wish we could have spend more years within this environment but one year is all we had... If you'll allow me to stick my nose in from time to time I'd welcome the opportunity. Best of luck to those still playing and I will certainly be following these discussions for perhaps years to come - I'm sure at somepoint I will have grandchildren coming through the system at some point. Now the focus is getting the kid ready for the draft and keeping fingers crossed we get a call this year...

[TexasBB]

Dawgsdad,

I think both TLU and MC are deserving teams and with a broader 64 team field may have made it. But once again the ASC will only get one team so the so called 6.5/1 ratio is out the window. I truely feel for the seniors like your son that played on a division champion and is penalized for 2 close losses in the conference tournament. It happend to UTT last year and they ended up ranked in the top 25 but got left home.

If your son is not drafted but still has the itch I would suggest he attends the tryouts that are being held and he may have a chance to get picked up by one of the independent minor league teams. That happened to my son a few years back.

I have said several times that I thought that MC was as good as any team in the ASC the last 2 months of the season. However, their slow start, I believe at one point they were 6-7 ended up killing their Playoff chances. They had to get a Pool A bid and came one strike short of doing it. UTT was the only team in the ASC that had a chance and probably would have got it even if they lost the last game IMO. TLU's extra inining loss to UTD is really what killed them. Had they won that game they would have of perhaps made it. But once again they were only so so in the early season and came on strong in the middle to second half. As Ralph has said if there was one or two games during the season that you lost to a team you should have beat those are the games that probably killed your chances. I do not like the system since I believe the ASC is a very strong DIII conference and the teams will beat up each other. I don't think there is any team in the country that could run the gauntlet of UTT, UTD, MC, TLU, McM, HSU, UMHB and Ozarks without suffering more than a couple of losses. The conference IMHO is that tough and we are getting penalized for it. By beating each other up the win loss records are not steller and thus the regional rankings are lower than the true strenth of these teams. That is just how I see it but I am sure that others feel the same way. 

[LA Mike]

I made a comment on the Western Region Tournament that the ASC should be split to the ASWC* and the ASEC* and request Pool A bids from each conference to the west region.  If we went to the 8 team format across the board                  *American South West Conf. and Amer. South East Conf.

SCAC  - A   (this multi-region conf. needs to be fixed & more than 4 teams)
SCIAC - A
SCIAC or NWC or ASWC/ASEC - C bid
ASWC - A
ASEC  - A
NWC  - A
Non-Region D --as I proposed on a previous post, a Pool D would be the
                               records of RANKED teams against RANKED teams.  It
   { probably from   seems that these are the teams that get left out but
   SCIAC, NWC        might give them a path to the playoffs.  It allows the teams
   ASWC or             unlucky to be in a conference with 3 or 4 ranked teams
    ASEC }               to see how they compare to other teams nationally and
                               slide into the dugout of the committees choice !!!
Pool B Team Selection --  Although I believe that the Pool B teams should
                               have a structured tournament of their own 4 regions, 4
                               teams, take the 4 winners and runners up and seed them
                               into the 8 regions -- one Pool B in each region -- In this
                               way the independents have a method of sorting them
                               selves out and presenting a case to the committee that
                               these 8 teams are the best of the indepent group.  (Sort
                               of like their own National Region !!!)

The arm is tired and needs ice...........
LA Mike has gone to the trainers table!