BB: LL: Liberty League

[shoeless]

Get out the broome, 2 down.  RPI sweeped Skidmore today.

[shoeless]

Team Defense in playoffs is 100X more important than regualar season

What gives heightened importance to strength in the middle during postseason is the paring down of pitching staffs to  team's  top starters. With teams not having the opportunity to face their opponents' fourth and fifth starters, runs will be harder to come by, defense will be emphasized.  Now is the time to put your best defense on the field.

Here are stats for Liberty league middle infielders and league rank.  Was hard to tell who unions regulars were.  but for argument sake.


Castilla (Vassar) - 16
Glantz (Vassar) – 8
Brown (Union) - 15
Carroll (Union) -  7
Kahovec (Roch) – 16
Stein (Roch) –  15
Muscateillo (RPI) -14
Stroud (RPI)  - 10
Currty (Clarkson) –  11
Bresset (Clarkson) -  9
Brown (skidmore) –  6
Ferri (Skidmore) – 12
Ford (St Law) - 14
Harris (St Law) – 10

Team Rankings worst to first up the middle:
1. Rochester with 31 Errors
2 Vassar with 24 Errors
2. St Lawrence with 24 Errors
2 RPI with 24 errors
5 Uniont with 22 Errors
7 CLarksonw ith 20 Errors
8. Skidmore with 18 Errors

So in a tight it could bee Clarkson or RPI in the liberty league tournament.  Rochester will only win slugfests. 

[anonymous234]

Look at the overall team stats for defense in the liberty league:
TEAM FIELDING          G    PO     A     E    Pct    DP    PB SBA-ATT
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Clarkson.............        35   800   363    56   .954    21    11  49-64
Skidmore............       37   867   410    62   .954    25    14  47-61
Rochester...........       38   892   364    65   .951    33     6  26-43
St. Lawrence.......      35   794   332    61   .949    28    16  45-59
Rensselaer..........       40   968   412    78   .947    17    12  44-60
Union...............         27   613   292    65   .933    13     8  48-69
Vassar..............         30   690   296    71   .933    21     9  67-83

Looks like in reality RPI is the one that will have to win slugfests because there defense is full of nonchalant players that only care about how many hits they get.  Pitching is good, offense is good, but their defense leaves a lot to be desired, and I believe that was their downfall last year as well.  Hopefully for your sake shoeless, they pick things up for the tournament.  I think the tournament is wide open just like it was last year.

[ocho]

Ouch Shoeless! BURNED!

[shoeless]

Nice stats.  Don't disagree with them.  But up the middle matters 10 times more.  my put stands.  I appreciate the put from anunymous as well.

[D3xprt]

Shoeless, no disrespect.

You have been harping this all year.

I hate to admit but ia agree that up the middle defense matters more than anything.

But i like rochesters chances. 

Should be a great weekend in cny for baseball.

I also think in a short series don't count clarkson out.  They are streaky.

[anonymous234]

Ok Shoeless, let's look at this point: 
DP's turned.  33 for Rochester, 17 for RPI.  Now I know DP's aren't solely SS/2B, but you definitely need a strong middle infield to turn it fast enough and get them started.  I think that should count towards Rochester and against RPI as well.

[John McGraw]

Found this interesting...

Pete McEneaney has been drafted by the Traverse City Beach Bums of the Frontier League. He was taken in the first round of the Frontier League draft on Monday.

The season starts around Memorial Day.

[AlleyCat]

Pete is well deserved!! Congratulations. He has had a great season to this point and has developed very nicely over his years at Rochester. Hopefully it won't be the only time he gets drafted this year.

[shoeless]

Pete undoubtedly has the best velocity in the Liberty league.  Congratulations Pete.

[BaseB13]

Predictions?  Who do we think is starting for each team came 1?  Do the top teams throw their aces or their #2 in hopes of saving their ace for later on?  Does UR break their Liberty League conference tournament jinx of losing every conference tournament game that they've played in?  Let's hope for good weather so that we don't have a repeat of what happened in 2003 when it rained during game two of the last day with Clarkson winning and RPI got to automatically move on.

[John McGraw]

Player of the Year - Jay Jay Vanderstyne, Rochester
Pitcher of the Year - Joe Zongol, RPI
Rookie of the Year - Nick Laracuente, Skidmore
Coach of the Year (Coaching Staff of the Year) - Joe Reina, Rochester

2008 Liberty League First Team
1B    Ken Carroll       Rensselaer    SR    Shelton, CT
2B    Jay Jay Vanderstyne       Rochester    SR    Victor, NY
3B    Blayne Fuke       Rochester    SO    Kailua, HI
SS    Adam Brown       Skidmore    SR    Morrisonville, NY
OF    Cale Giroux       Clarkson    JR    Cortland, NY
OF    Camden Mamigonian       Rensselaer    SO    Dover, NH
OF    Dan Valentine       Rensselaer    SR    Goshen, CT
OF    Sean Wilkes       Rensselaer    JR    Troy, NY
C    Ryan Sullivan       Rochester    SR    Hilton, NY
P    Pete McEneaney       Rochester    SR    New York, NY
P    Joe Zongol       Rensselaer    SR    Flower Mound, TX
RP    Andrew Novick       Rensselaer    JR    Hopewell Junction, NY
DH    Patrick Reardon       Rensselaer    SO    Troy, NY
DH    Nate Stein       Rochester    SO    Greece, NY

2008 Liberty League Second Team
1B    Matt Holiday       Clarkson    JR    Syracuse, NY
2B    Anthony Ferri       Skidmore    SO    Jersey City, NJ
3B    Ryan Duff       St. Lawrence    SO    Concord, MA
SS    Ed Kahovec       Rochester    SR    Victor, NY
OF    Andy Cannon       Rochester    SO    LaGrange, IL
OF    Greg Carlow       Skidmore    SR    Mystic, CT
OF    Matt Francis       Rochester    FR    Amherst, NY
OF    Christian Spicer       St. Lawrence    SR    Watertown, NY
C    Matt Pisani       Skidmore    SO    Winchester, MA
P    Greg Chojecki       Clarkson    JR    West Seneca, NY
P    Blair Veenema       Rochester    JR    Fairport, NY
RP    Chris Cook       St. Lawrence    FR    Sunderland, MA
DH    Brett Peplowski       Clarkson    SO    Albany, NY

Honorable Mention: Mike Bresett 2B (Clarkson), Dan Brien 1B (Rochester), Scott Carroll 3B (Union), Jim Devine 3B (Rensselaer), Andrew Ford SS (St. Lawrence), Matt Giordano OF (Clarkson), Ari Glantz 2B (Vassar), Jake Groszewski RP (Clarkson), Tim Klein P (Rensselaer), Joel Kocan C (St. Lawrence), Nick Laracuente P (Skidmore), Stevan Slusher C (Rensselaer), Dan Stroud 2B (Rensselaer)

[BaseB13]

Would have thought Ken Carroll of RPI should have been player of the year.

Player                 AVG  GP-GS    AB   R   H  2B  3B  HR RBI   TB  SLG%  BB HBP  SO GDP   OB%  SF  SH  SB-ATT   PO   A   E  FLD%

Ken Carroll.........  .485  29-26    97  27  47  11   1   4  37   72  .742   6   4  14   1  .528   1   0   4-4    178  16   4  .980

13 J.J. Vanderstyne.  .437  37-36   126  32  55  17   0   2  43   78  .619  14  10  10   0  .516   3   4   5-7     65  34   5  .952

Dan Valentine.......  .437  40-40   151  44  66  21   1   3  47   98  .649   8   8   9   0  .474   6   2   6-8     76   2   2  .975
Player                 ERA   W-L   APP  GS  CG SHO/CBO SV    IP   H   R  ER  BB  SO  2B  3B  HR   AB B/Avg   WP HBP  BK  SFA SHA

Ken Carroll.........  2.53   5-1     8   5   1   0/0    1  32.0  29  13   9  11  22   4   0   1  122  .238    3   2   0    1   1


Pretty tough to take a position player over someone who hits and pitches with those types of numbers

Not to mention the second best hitter for RPI (Valentine) hit for the same average with 11 more hits and 4 more doubles. 

Pitching very well could have been Co-Pitchers of the year with Zongol and McEneaney.  Perhaps RPI and UR had to each make a sacrifice to get one of their guys the top award.  Coulda done Co Player and Co Pitcher..

Not a single award for a Union or Vassar player besides honorable mention.  Can't believe how bad the bottom of the conference has gotten.

[Bob Maxwell]

Is this John's predictions?  Or has the team been announced?  I didn't see anything on the Liberty League page about it...

[Bob Maxwell]

Guess I just looked at the wrong time... the teams are up now.