Pitching Status Today.
Stanford is in a curious spot with respect to pitching today. On the one hand, Stanford has used 9 separate pitchers in the past two days. On the other hand, there is nobody who is necessarily 100% out today.
Neither Dixon nor Dowd have pitched yet in the Supers, and I suspect they are 1 and 2 today in some order.
Dixon has been ahead of Dowd over the second half of the season, but Dowd pitched better in the regional (was quite good).
The only other regular who hasn't pitched yet is Braden Montgomery. Using him from the pen is tricky as it takes away the DH.
However, nobody on the staff has thrown more than 47 pitches this weekend. Brandt Pancer, Alex Williams and Quinn Matthews are the only guys who have thrown over 40. Now I would be shocked to see Alex Williams, but not really anybody else.
Coaching strategy was interesting. Esquer seemed to start playing for Sunday/Monday by the end of the second inning on Saturday as he used the lower end of the bullpen to get through the game. At the time I thought it was for the best - at least up until the ninth inning heroics. Yesterday he went with the best of the pen. I thought with a big lead he might try to get by without using Matthews, but nobody pitched a lot.
Now we'll see, but I think essentially the whole staff is available at least for a short outing.
[Two back of the bullpen cases interest me a lot.
Max Meier only pitched 7 innings all season long. Then he had an appearance in the conference tournament, and now has pitched four times for 6.2 innings in the NCAA tournament. He seems to have suddenly won the coaches' trust.
Cody Jensen had a promising frosh year in 2019 and was perhaps our best pitcher in the tough super regional series at Mississippi State. He struggled (along with the whole team) in the aborted 2020 season. Got injured and red shirted in 2021. This year he has had quite a few appearances, but hadn't appeared in almost a month and hadn't appeared in a weekend game since mid-April until Saturday. He pitched well on Saturday, with only a HBP marring an otherwise perfect two innings. If he were to return, I could see him as a major contributor next year. ]
Stanford is in a curious spot with respect to pitching today. On the one hand, Stanford has used 9 separate pitchers in the past two days. On the other hand, there is nobody who is necessarily 100% out today.
Neither Dixon nor Dowd have pitched yet in the Supers, and I suspect they are 1 and 2 today in some order.
Dixon has been ahead of Dowd over the second half of the season, but Dowd pitched better in the regional (was quite good).
The only other regular who hasn't pitched yet is Braden Montgomery. Using him from the pen is tricky as it takes away the DH.
However, nobody on the staff has thrown more than 47 pitches this weekend. Brandt Pancer, Alex Williams and Quinn Matthews are the only guys who have thrown over 40. Now I would be shocked to see Alex Williams, but not really anybody else.
Coaching strategy was interesting. Esquer seemed to start playing for Sunday/Monday by the end of the second inning on Saturday as he used the lower end of the bullpen to get through the game. At the time I thought it was for the best - at least up until the ninth inning heroics. Yesterday he went with the best of the pen. I thought with a big lead he might try to get by without using Matthews, but nobody pitched a lot.
Now we'll see, but I think essentially the whole staff is available at least for a short outing.
[Two back of the bullpen cases interest me a lot.
Max Meier only pitched 7 innings all season long. Then he had an appearance in the conference tournament, and now has pitched four times for 6.2 innings in the NCAA tournament. He seems to have suddenly won the coaches' trust.
Cody Jensen had a promising frosh year in 2019 and was perhaps our best pitcher in the tough super regional series at Mississippi State. He struggled (along with the whole team) in the aborted 2020 season. Got injured and red shirted in 2021. This year he has had quite a few appearances, but hadn't appeared in almost a month and hadn't appeared in a weekend game since mid-April until Saturday. He pitched well on Saturday, with only a HBP marring an otherwise perfect two innings. If he were to return, I could see him as a major contributor next year. ]