BB: USAC: USA South Athletic Conference

Catfishncwc · March 29, 2013, 12:41:00 PM

Quote from: Boysofsummer21 on March 28, 2013, 10:28:58 PM
Catfish from your prospective how does the talent in the USA South look this year and any propects?

This has been a really good year for pitching and not a lot position players at that have really shined. As far as pro prospects I think Chrismon is a fringe prospect. He will probably end up being a senior undrafted signee next spring. Taylor at CNU from what I hear is the best pro prospect but still has two years. I hope to see Taylor next weekend.

Boysofsummer21 · March 29, 2013, 01:36:44 PM

Catfish - Good timing as it is lunch time

I agree the pitching has been better than I expected with the conference going to 3 game series. On a side note do wonder if a quality pitcher goes to a school and they see him being a better asset for ending a game and put him in the bullpen as setup and/or closer does that hurt him? This brings to mind CNU were it has always been said their 2 best pitchers come out of the pen or does it matter? I have been impressed this year with several of the closers in the conference but wondering if they are hurting any chance they might have.

PNeal7 · March 29, 2013, 03:52:10 PM

From what I have seen and heard, I would agree with Catfish completely on this one. If I had to rank 'potential pro prospects' I would say Taylor would be at the top of my board due to being a LHP. As you pointed out, he has 2 years left so one can only hope he continues to improve, lift weights, and doesn't suffer any major injuries. While Chrismon is absolutely talented with a big arm, RHP's in the upper 80's are a dime a dozen these days. A prime example was Kenny Moreland. Kenny's size and MPH clearly hurt him, despite the fact he is still one of the best arms I have played with or against. I could see Chrismon as a late round pick, especially including he was drafted out of high school.

I think Kevin Herget, Kean University, has a real shot to be drafted this year as he opened a lot of eyes in the Valley League last summer. He was consisently in the low 90's, and I saw 94 several times on the scouts radar guns. His breaking ball is hard and sharpe. If he would fully develop his change (last summer it was off and on) he could be a big time arm for someone in the middle/late rounds.

LTBB1971 · March 30, 2013, 03:54:49 PM

NCWC sweeps Ferrum to get within 2 games of Conference leader CNU. Next weekend series will be huge!

SO H. Brooks got beat up a bit today but hitters had the bats going again today to sneak out with a sweep this weekend. Tune up game at Hampden Sydney Thursday before facing the CNU Captains next weekend. Should be interesting...

Catfishncwc · March 30, 2013, 08:05:23 PM

Quote from: Boysofsummer21 on March 29, 2013, 01:36:44 PM
Catfish - Good timing as it is lunch time I agree the pitching has been better than I expected with the conference going to 3 game series. On a side note do wonder if a quality pitcher goes to a school and they see him being a better asset for ending a game and put him in the bullpen as setup and/or closer does that hurt him? This brings to mind CNU were it has always been said their 2 best pitchers come out of the pen or does it matter? I have been impressed this year with several of the closers in the conference but wondering if they are hurting any chance they might have.

It hurts their chances in being seen. A scout has to pick choose what games to go to. It is hard to go see a reliever at a school especially when they are the only prospect because you would hate to see a game then they don't even make it in the game so now you just wasted your time sitting on a guy and no one else in the game is a prospect. The last D3 reliever I went to see was Maxwell at Methodist but they also had Brandt throwing and I also saw Moreland the same day. Now if I had missed that game and they were playing Sunday I would not have made a trip to just to sit on Maxwell.

PNeal7 · March 30, 2013, 10:00:51 PM

What about Perry from Methodist? How is the MiLB treating him?

rolln2 · April 01, 2013, 07:21:38 PM

Well the USAS regular season is coming to an end this coming weekend. The standings look like there are still a few things to settle in the standings. The only thing that is decided at this point is that what looked like a very good team on paper (Ferrum) in the pre-season USAS poll will not even make the USAS tourney. The other unexpected to me is that NCW after a tough 2012 actually has a chance at first if they sweep CNU. The rest of the conference middle is close and all the teams but Ferrum play this weekend to decide the tourney seeds. Any thoughts on who will end up in seeds 1-8?

Boysofsummer21 · April 01, 2013, 08:26:32 PM

Well the CNU vs NCWC is for all the marbles with CNU needing just 1 win to ice it. I think CNU can take 1 of 3 from NCWC so the question is can NCW take 2 and hold on to second place?
AU vs PC this is an interesting series with the winner possibly getting to second. the loser will probably be 5th (see below) think AU will take 2 and if NCW gets sweept then 2nd goes to CNU and the rest is a toss up.
LA vs MV Think LaGrange will sweep and end with 14 wins and really be in the race for either 2 or 3rd.
Green vs MU - Think Mehtodist takes 2 here and gets rolling to the tournament (they are my tournament dark hourse)

LTBB1971 · April 02, 2013, 09:20:58 AM

Seeding has never made too much of a difference in the tournament. What I trend to look at is how are these teams playing this late in the season:

CNU: 8-3 in their last 11 games. Overall quality wins over Bridgewater, Mary Washington, Averett (2X). Pitching is off the chart.
NCWC: 9-3 in their last 12 games. Quality wins over NAIA St. Andrews, Averett (2X). Starting pitching is excellent and are hitting really well of late.
Averett: 5-6 in last 11 games. Quality wins over Lynchburg (2X), CNU. Pitching is very good.
Piedmont: 4-6 in their last 10 games. Quality win over CNU. Do not excell at any thing specific...typical .500 team.
LaGrange: 6-6 in their last 12 games. Quality wins over CNU (2x). Terrible hitting team although pitching is ok.
Maryville: 5-7 in their last 12 games. Quality wins over Averett (2X). Defense can't catch the ball.
Methodist: 6-5 in their last 11 games. Quality wins over Tufts, Averett. Pitching is bad and not enough offense.
Greensboro: 4-8 in their last 12 games. Quality wins vs CNU, Tufts, Averett (2X). Not enough offense and not playing well of late.
Ferrum: 3-7 in their last 10 games. Quality win vs Bridgewater. Bad pitching staff.

USAS tournament will and has always come down to pitching. Favorites should be CNU, NCWC and Averett who all have excellent starting pitching.

Boysofsummer21 · April 02, 2013, 12:00:54 PM

LTHS agree that pitching is critical in the tournament and that CNU, NCWC and Averett are the Favorites. Of these 3 I would position them as follows;

CNU - 3 quality starters with very good numbers no real weakness there and bullpen is best in conference - offense can be either very good or struggle so will depend on which shows up
Averett - 2 quality starters one good starter and then bullpen is my biggest concern with them really being breaking ball based - offense is good overall but struggled in conference
NCW - 1 quality starter and then a pretty big drop off and bullpen a bit shaky - solid offense like the consistency lately.

So with these 3 really looking like 123 now the strategy starts, do you pitch your number 3 on day 1 and setup to face one of these 2 with your 1 or 2 or do you just go after it?

I am also going back and reviewing my POY stuff any ideas on this?

LTBB1971 · April 02, 2013, 12:55:14 PM

I happen to disagree some...
CNU - Chrismon, Bierlein, Taylor...then they'll go to N. Santalucia (trouble) probably. 1-3, CNU is best in USAS...so as long as they don't go past Taylor, they are pretty unbeatable. Bullpen with Fleishmann, Verdillo, and Lindsay is untouchable. I would not knock the offense...they hit a very good .278 (#2), .382 OBP (#1), .346 SLUG (#2), 104 RBI (#3) in Conference play...PLUS they can catch the ball .964 fielding (#2). Best shot at beating CNU is to keep score low 2-1, 3-2 and shut down their number 7-9 batters...but CNU is battle tested and can play with ANYONE.

NCWC - Swartout and Beasley 1-2...then you'll see Brooks (50-50, inconsistent) and #4 is Pleasant (trouble). 1-2 guy can shut you down...toss up for Brooks depending on the day, so if #3 contributes they'll go real deep in tournament. Bullpen is non-existent. Only reliable arm is Ciro Norzagaray (freshman)...but he is excellent. Offensively, they hit well .280 (#1), .375 OBP (#2), .337 SLUG (#3), 110 RBI (#2), and best fielding team in Conference .966 (#1). To beat NCWC, MUST get good pitching and shut down 1-4, specially lead off batter FR J. DiSanto...but this is a very mental team and can completely go into a meltdown on their own. Lately, they have been MONEY so right now are the most dangerous team entering the tournament and have the most upside.

Averett - Moore and Kirks (excellent)...#3 Florence (if control is on) and #4 T. Davis are good pitchers. They have the most fitted starters to go deep in the tournament. Viracola, Moyer and Beaver are excellent out of the bullpen and can sit you down, much like CNU's trio without the power arms. Offensively, they do not hit well, so if you can shut down Carter, Kirks, Newcomb and Alvarez...you can beat AU. If they are to go deep and win this thing, it will be with pitching and their defense HAS TO BE SOLID. Coach Fulton I believe is the most underated Head Coach in the USAS but I think he's the most tactical. He can beat you with the long ball or bunt you to death.

Boysofsummer21 · April 02, 2013, 01:31:23 PM

LTHS - Well said! You stated the facts and figures perfectly. I was really generalizing and did not go into the detail you did so +1 Karma

CNU - Agree with all, CNU does have a good offense but I have also seen their bad offense, think this is because they are young and not consistent - Do you think they go 4 man rotation or go with a 3 man rotation?

Averett - Is/was and will be the best coached team in the tourney, they do the little things to beat you. I have only seen Florence twice and he was handled by the other team both times so he is a worry for me.

NCWC - I have really liked what they have done in the last couple of weeks, at the beginning of the season they were under the radar and playing up and down but the last 2 weeks have really done well and things are really looking solid going into this weekend. My biggest fear is they get beat bad by CNU and lose some of that confidence. Swartout is a stud and number for number (except K's which will probably lose him the Pitcher of the year) a match with Chrismoun. Also really like what I have seen from Ciro what a good pickup.

Boysofsummer21 · April 02, 2013, 02:04:16 PM

And upon further reflection about CNU's roation would not surprise me to see Emerson be the number 4 starter as they used him against Salisbury. But this should be easy to see when they start, if they are looking to only get 6 IP from each starter then they probably will go with a 3 man rotation but if they are trying to save the bullpen then look at a 4 man rotation. I love this time of year!

PNeal7 · April 02, 2013, 07:16:44 PM

I 'second' Boysofsummer21's post. Although his walk numbers are scary, I would potentially look at Emerson as the #4 for the tournaments. And although Santalucia has struggled this year, one cannot discount the experience he has pitching in big games. In 2012, he pitched well at Salisbury, beat Shenandoah in the tournament, and beat Rowan in the Regionals. Despite the numbers this year, it's nice to have a guy on the mound who has that type of experience when you get deep in the conference and regional tournaments.

Boysofsummer21 · April 03, 2013, 02:24:53 PM

Ok looking at the final weekend of the conference season and starting to watch the POY players. Below I well lay out who I am watching this weekend.

Player OY g ab r h 2b 3b hr rbi bb k sb cs avg obp slg Fielding

Weaver Overall 33 120 28 47 11 4 1 35 20 30 9 1 0.392 0.503 0.575 0.959

Weaver Conf 21 74 16 30 8 1 - 16 12 18 4 1 0.405 0.505 0.541 0.950

Dean Overall 31 132 27 50 11 1 1 28 6 8 12 2 0.379 0.400 0.500 0.884

Dean Conf 20 88 16 31 4 - 1 18 4 7 7 1 0.352 0.375 0.432 0.843

Carter Overall 34 122 24 48 4 - - 18 12 17 6 4 0.393 0.446 0.426 0.909

Carter Conf 21 73 11 26 1 - - 7 9 10 4 2 0.356 0.424 0.370 0.897

Pitcher OY g gs w l sv cg ip h r er bb k k/g hr era

Chrismon Overall 8 8 6 2 0 2 58.1 49 13 11 9 73 11.26 1 1.70

Chrismon Conf 7 7 5 2 0 2 51.1 46 12 10 7 66 11.57 1 1.75

Swartout Overall 9 8 5 3 1 3 57.2 52 13 11 15 41 6.4 1 1.72

Swartout Conf 7 7 5 2 0 3 51.2 49 12 10 12 34 5.92 1 1.74

Fleishman Overall 16 0 0 0 11 1 17 6 1 1 4 26 13.76 1 0.53

Fleishman Conf 10 0 0 0 8 - 10.2 3 0 0 4 19 16.03 - 0.00

Also looking at Rookie Pitcher

B Taylor
B Florence
C Norzagaray

And Rookie Poy

Z Blonder
M Barnes
J Houston

In the POY I think Welker should be in there but just don't see the award going to a player from a team not in the tournament. And yes I know Fleishman has no chance but being an old reliever from my days would like to see a reliever/closer get considered and he has set all sorts of records so... IMHO these are the front runners and by no means the entire list but the ones I will be watching this weekend.