Houston College Classic preview

ElViento: The third weekend of baseball season is like Christmas, my birthday and Arbor Day (don’t ask) all rolled into one.

Houston, Rice, and four top college baseball programs all head to Minute Maid Park for the Houston College Classic every year. Nine games in three days. I call into work, I let my loved ones know they won’t be seeing any of me (unless they show up to the park), and I bask in the beauty of it all.

The field for 2010, besides the co-host Cougars and Owls, includes the Texas-Austin Longhorns, Missouri Tigers, Texas Tech Red Raiders, and TCU Horned Frogs. Of those, the Cougars will face Missouri, UT-Austin and Texas Tech (in that order, from March 5-7). Houston will host TCU for a weekend series later in the season.

The Cougars have competed in the event every year since its inception in 2001, and in that span, they have complied a 10-17 record at the event. Last year, Houston went 0-3 for the first time, breaking a 6-year streak of going exactly 1-2 every year. Last time UH had a winning record at the HCC was 2002, when they beat Baylor and Texas A&M.

Looking at their 2010 opponents, Houston has never faced Missouri at the HCC, the Coogs have gone 1-4 against UT-Austin (having lost the last four) and have a 3-1 record against Texas Tech at Minute Maid.

Let’s take a look at the 2010 field, starting with the hosts:

Houston Cougars (27-31 in 2009)
Strengths: Six hitters return who batted .280 or higher a year ago, led by Blake Kelso (.335) and Caleb Ramsey (.332). Michael Goodnight (4.43 ERA) is the likely Friday starter, and figures to have a big season.
Question Marks: This Cougar team has a lot of potential, but the question marks are many. Where is the rest of the starting pitching going to come from? Can Mo Wiley shake off a poor freshman campaign (in which he was recovering from injury)? Can freshman Eric Brooks (a two-time all-state selection in high school) make a smooth transition to pitching at the college level? With a much deeper lineup, will Rayner Noble have Chase Dempsay focus on pitching, and can Chase return to his 2008, Freshman All-American form as a closer? Can anyone besides Chris Wallace hit for power? (Freshman M.P. Cokinos, Ramsey, and senior William Kankel seem like the best bets.)

Rice Owls (43-18)
Strengths: Brock Holt is the only significant loss from an offense that was already scary-good (.320 team avg, 71 HR) last year. This will be a team that hits for a high average, hits a lot of home (five players return who hit 7+ last year) runs, and can steal bases (six players return who stole 7+ bases last year). Mike Ojala and Taylor Wall are a formidable 1-2 at the front of the rotation.
Question Marks: Who else can pitch besides Ojala and Wall? With Ryan Berry off to the pros, the cupboard of proven college pitchers is pretty bare. Travis Wright is the only other pitcher returning with a sub-4.00 ERA, and he only threw 14.2 innings. Mark Haynes is the only other pitcher returning with 20+ IP and a sub-5.00 ERA. As usual, there is a huge crop of young talent coming in, but the Owls will essentially have to find a Sunday starter, a couple mid-week starters, and build an entire bullpen from scratch.

Missouri Tigers (35-27)
Strengths: Outfielder Aaron Senne returns as one of the top hitters in the Big XII.
Question Marks: The entire pitching staff, and the rest of the lineup. Only one pitcher who started even semi-regularly last year returns, and that’s Nick Tepesch, who put up a 6.27 ERA in 2009. Basically every hitter besides Senne who hit for a decent average and/or any kind of power last year is gone. Losing nearly every significant contributor from last year’s team (which wasn’t exactly dominant in the first place) could spell a lot of trouble for the Tigers.

Texas-Austin Longhorns (50-16-1)
Strengths:The pitching staff is the best in the country, without a doubt. The Longhorns had a sparkling 2.95 team ERA a year ago, and lose only one significant contributor in closer Austin Wood, and Austin Dicharry figures to step right in to fill that role. Kevin Keyes, Cameron Rupp and Connor Rowe give Austin a trio of power threats in the lineup.
Question Marks:Will the Longhorns be able to consistently score runs? Three of the top four hitters are gone, and only one .300 hitter (Keyes) returns.

Texas Tech Red Raiders (25-32)
Strengths:Six of the top eight hitters from a team that hit .299 a year ago are back, including three guys who hit above .325, and slugger Jeremy Mayo (.313, 11 HR). Chad Bettis was Tech’s most effective pitcher last year, coming out of the bullpen and making a few spot starts, and he is back.
Question Marks:The rest of the pitching staff. Nobody else who pitched at least 10 innings managed to keep their ERA under 5.00 last year. None of the weekend rotation returns, but given how they performed last year, that might not be a bad thing. The Red Raiders are probably just going to have to outslug people.

Texas Christian Horned Frogs (40-18)
Strengths:If not for UT-Austin, TCU would have a legitimate claim to best pitching staff in the country. All three members of a very effective weekend rotation return, and the Horned Frogs add Matt Purke, one of the top high school pitchers in the nation a year ago, who was drafted 14th overall by the Texas Rangers, but surprisingly chose to come play for TCU. Closer Eric Marshall (1.48, 9 saves) is back, too. Slugger Bryan Holaday (.300, 10 HR) will lead the offense.
Question Marks:Only three offensive contributors return for the Horned Frogs, so there are plenty of question marks in the lineup.

There ya have it, folks. So how about it? Are you going to be camping out at Minute Maid Park with me?

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Vince Young to the Titans: Trade Me or Else

SarCoog: I’m fucking sick of hearing about an NFL backup QB… which is exactly what Tennessee Titans QB Vince Young has become. Multiple media outlets have reported that Young has asked to be traded if he is not the starting quarterback coming out of his fall’s camp.

Look, I may stridently hate the university of texas at austin and their football team, but I recognize that Young is one of the better college quarterbacks in the history of college football and arguably the best in the last couple of decades. I was sufficiently awed when I saw Young pull off a ‘one man show’ act against his opposition, while sufficiently quieting hype of whether USC was one of the best teams ever… before they’d even played in the title game. He is also the best quarterback to play for a Houston ISD team (Madison HS) and I got to watch him single-handedly tear apart defenses on a few occasions.

But the ensuing hype about Young (particularly in the Houston area) was nauseating beyond anything heard from ESPN and the national media about USC. I was aware of all his accomplishments, yet I was skeptical of people who said he would “redefine” the quarterback position on the professional level… just like Randall Cunningham and Kordell Stewart right? People vowed that the Houston Texans’ decision to pass on Young for Mario Williams would ruin the franchise forever. Anyway, Young did get the NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year despite throwing for only 2,199 yards and having more interceptions than TDs (12 TD, 13 INT). He did throw for more yards (2,546) in his second season, but only threw for 9 touchdowns and the Titans lost in the first round of the playoffs, leading to the dismissal of Titans’ OC Norm Chow. During the offseason Young blew off new OC Mike Heimerdinger‘s request that he stay in Nashville and learn the new offensive scheme and opted to go back to school at ut-austin.

Offseason workouts and film study: Vince Young Style

And if you didn’t believe it was possible, this past season got even weirder. In the Titans’ opening week win over Jacksonville, Young was booed for a 12 for 22, 2 INT performance and look visibly distressed while sitting by himself on the bench. A couple days later he went temporarily missing and his mom Felicia Young said that her son was “hurting inside”. The rest of the season was pretty uneventful as Young remained the #2 QB behind Kerry Collins for the remainder of a 13-3 regular season.

I can understand where Young is coming from as a competitor, but why would any NFL team take such a chance on a guy who not only has a shaky work ethic, but below average production as well? That sounds like a ‘lose-lose’ proposition to me and frankly I’m not too keen on those. Really I wonder if any of the bandwagon ut-austin fans from the 2006 pre-draft period want to compare Mario Williams‘ production? It’s certainly been an eye-opening first few years for the guy who was all set to “redefine the QB position”.

To all the NFL teams that end up considering Young… do your fucking homework let the buyer beware.

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At least one college baseball game lived up to the pitching duel hype today.

ElViento: Okay, so the A.J. Morris-Ryan Berry pitching duel wasn’t terrible. But both pitchers probably got left in too long, and the final score ended up being a pedestrian 7-6, with the Wildcats pulling out the W.

But here’s an impressive pitching feat that you don’t see every day:

EDIT: The Austin Wood no-no has been broken up. Wood threw 12.1 innings of hitless relief for UT-Austin against Boston College today, before a Tony Sanchez two-out single in the bottom of the 19th inning. Wood left the game after throwing 13 innings of scoreless, two-hit relief.

Texas-Austin went on to win by a score of 3-2 in 25 innings.

I swear, none of those numbers are typos.

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