Looking to the future...

[cajunhawk]

We are seeing the future Sun Belt Conference champs playing at Tigue Moore Field. The young talent on this team is amazing.

Looking at just true freshmen we have playing and contributing this year:

Dylan Butler
Logan Preston
Jace Conrad
Almann Snowden
Cord Cockrell
Austin "Don't call me T-Robe" Robicheaux


Then you look at the Redshirt Freshmen we have playing and contributing this year:

Tyler Girouard
Thomas Simoneaux

Then you look at the Sophomores we have playing and contributing this year:

Dominick Francia
Ryan Leonards
Micheal Strentz
Matt Hicks
Caleb Kellog
Chase Compton

All of these players have 2+ years left in Tony's system, barring any insanity or injury. That is scary.

Robicheaux, Kellog, & Cockrell as the future three man rotation and Hicks coming in as the closer. Strentz at Catcher, Compton at first, Conrad at second, Leonards at short, Girouard at third, and Francia, Butler, & Snowden in the outfield.

That is an entire team with oodles of eligibility left. I think Tony has set himself up for a fantastic run with this group of kids.

[RaginDave]

I don't disagree with you on anything you said, but this team has to learn to hit better. Pitching and defense is not going to be a problem. The other thing, I think personally is that Robe needs to bring in some pop in the bat. We seem to have quite a few singles/doubles hitters, but no real long ball threats with the exception of Butler the only other HR this season was from SR Chris Sinclair. We need someone to protech Butler, I believe he is going to end up being our cleanup hitter of the future, but we only have 6 hitters on the team batting above .273 and then a huge drop off to .238 and below. I agree with our pitching we don't need to hit .325, but we better hit closer to .300 than the current .263 if we plan to ever win a championship. I don't think this team is built to win a championship this year, I hope I am wrong. But I do think that in the next year or two we should be the favorite with a little strong recruiting and some power hitters.

I agree the youthful talent is awesome, but we have to hit better than .263 and 4 HR's in 12 games.

[CajunRage]

The hitting will come with experience. Pitching and defense doesn't change much from level to level. Hitting does. These guys are going from seeing 2 or 3 pitches an at bat to put a good swing on to 1.

Also, the tigue isn't what you would call a launching pad.

[RaginDave]

Rage, I agree with you that it will come and that the Tigue is not a launching pad, but currently we have 4 HR's on the season and we have played 7 games on the road. The problem is right now our only power threat on the season is Butler, we need to have some pop in the bats. Like I said we don't have to hit .325 with our pitching and the same goes for HR's. We don't need 50, but man we better find a way to hit more then the pace of 18 that we are on for the season. We will play what I believe is 56 games and we are averaging .33 per game. That means we will at this pace hit 18 this year.

It will improve as the hitters see more pitches.

[MetryCajun]

I don't disagree with you on anything you said, but this team has to learn to hit better. Pitching and defense is not going to be a problem. The other thing, I think personally is that Robe needs to bring in some pop in the bat. We seem to have quite a few singles/doubles hitters, but no real long ball threats with the exception of Butler the only other HR this season was from SR Chris Sinclair. We need someone to protech Butler, I believe he is going to end up being our cleanup hitter of the future, but we only have 6 hitters on the team batting above .273 and then a huge drop off to .238 and below. I agree with our pitching we don't need to hit .325, but we better hit closer to .300 than the current .263 if we plan to ever win a championship. I don't think this team is built to win a championship this year, I hope I am wrong. But I do think that in the next year or two we should be the favorite with a little strong recruiting and some power hitters.

I agree the youthful talent is awesome, but we have to hit better than .263 and 4 HR's in 12 games.

Dave, I think the hitting will come around. These young guys look well put together and take aggressive cuts. It looks like we are recruiting higher caliber hitters than in previous years. Can't believe I am saying this, but I agree with CajunHawk.

[SlappyCajun]

Can't believe I am saying this, but I agree with CajunHawk.

[jumboragncajun]

We are seeing the future Sun Belt Conference champs playing at Tigue Moore Field. The young talent on this team is amazing.

Looking at just true freshmen we have playing and contributing this year:

Dylan Butler
Logan Preston
Jace Conrad
Almann Snowden
Cord Cockrell
Austin "Don't call me T-Robe" Robicheaux


Then you look at the Redshirt Freshmen we have playing and contributing this year:

Tyler Girouard
Thomas Simoneaux

Then you look at the Sophomores we have playing and contributing this year:

Dominick Francia
Ryan Leonards
Micheal Strentz
Matt Hicks
Caleb Kellog
Chase Compton

All of these players have 2+ years left in Tony's system, barring any insanity or injury. That is scary.

Robicheaux, Kellog, & Cockrell as the future three man rotation and Hicks coming in as the closer. Strentz at Catcher, Compton at first, Conrad at second, Leonards at short, Girouard at third, and Francia, Butler, & Snowden in the outfield.

That is an entire team with oodles of eligibility left. I think Tony has set himself up for a fantastic run with this group of kids.

I don't wanna rain on anybody's parade. I like these young guys. I don't think Tony can accuse them of being 'soft'.
But I had the same excitement in 08 when we had some really good looking freshman playing. Goulas, Fontenot, Whipple, Guillory, Bowman, Cook, Benzel, Thad....Poirrier, Willie Long and Justin were sophomores.

Hey, they did share the Belt in 2010, but I would say under acheived as a team, throughout their tenure. Four didn't even make to their senior year. And I still to this day think that Willie was better than he ever showed. I will hope more from the current group develops as we assume they will.

[CajunAmos]

Rage, I agree with you that it will come and that the Tigue is not a launching pad, but currently we have 4 HR's on the season and we have played 7 games on the road. The problem is right now our only power threat on the season is Butler, we need to have some pop in the bats. Like I said we don't have to hit .325 with our pitching and the same goes for HR's. We don't need 50, but man we better find a way to hit more then the pace of 18 that we are on for the season. We will play what I believe is 56 games and we are averaging .33 per game. That means we will at this pace hit 18 this year.

It will improve as the hitters see more pitches.

I'm all for the improved averages, but I wouldn't judge teams now by HR's. The new BBCore bats will limit HR's to only those who have true HR power, not #8 lineup weak hitters. I've been to all the Cajun games except for the San Antonio trip, and I don't think I've seen but one HR by our opponents in all the games you mentioned. I think a great HR hitter in todays climate will be 10-15 HR's.

[BirdofParadise]

Let's also remember only one team in the Sun Belt hit .300 last year and that was FIU. With the new bats, if you can get into the .280-285 range, you're doing awfully well.

This team has good gap power and will have a pretty decent slogging percentage. And, any coach will tell you that's more important than how many taters you hit.

[cajunhawk]

I don't wanna rain on anybody's parade. I like these young guys. I don't think Tony can accuse them of being 'soft'.
But I had the same excitement in 08 when we had some really good looking freshman playing. Goulas, Fontenot, Whipple, Guillory, Bowman, Cook, Benzel, Thad....Poirrier, Willie Long and Justin were sophomores.

Hey, they did share the Belt in 2010, but I would say under acheived as a team, throughout their tenure. Four didn't even make to their senior year. And I still to this day think that Willie was better than he ever showed. I will hope more from the current group develops as we assume they will.

Yeah but we had some serious duds in that group. Poor Thad Griffen. Goulas had the rib problem that I think killed his senior year. Bowman has a chance to redeem himself this year...and all he wants to do is mash. Dillon Guillory...no comment. Micheal Cook...no comment. Did Whipple and Benzel ever do anything? With that group we had the great run in 2010. If we can anything better than that with this group that wouldn't be terrible. Let's just hope for better luck with this group. Hopefully we have less duds, more studs.

[BirdofParadise]

Yeah but we had some serious duds in that group. Poor Thad Griffen. Goulas had the rib problem that I think killed his senior year. Bowman has a chance to redeem himself this year...and all he wants to do is mash. Dillon Guillory...no comment. Micheal Cook...no comment. Did Whipple and Benzel ever do anything? With that group we had the great run in 2010. If we can anything better than that with this group that wouldn't be terrible. Let's just hope for better luck with this group. Hopefully we have less duds, more studs.

Whipple was actually leading the team in hitting when he had his off the field issue which resulted in his suspension.

[cajunhawk]

Let's also remember only one team in the Sun Belt hit .300 last year and that was FIU. With the new bats, if you can get into the .280-285 range, you're doing awfully well.

This team has good gap power and will have a pretty decent slogging percentage. And, any coach will tell you that's more important than how many taters you hit.

No kidding, that Butler kid has a serious bat. And he isn't a feast or famine hitter either. That's a rare combo in this day and age.

[cajunhawk]

Whipple was actually leading the team in hitting when he had his off the field issue which resulted in his suspension.

Yeah now I remember, he loved Mary Jane a bit too much. Didn't we also have a kid with the first name Les that left for personal reasons?

[BirdofParadise]

Yeah now I remember, he loved Mary Jane a bit too much. Didn't we also have a kid with the first name Les that left for personal reasons?

Les Smith. Left after his freshman season so he could get drafted earlier.

And, just for accuracy, it wasn't Mary Jane that did Whipple in. It was too much of a legal substance.

[wcd35]

Les ended up getting drafted by the Tigers and signed. Spent a year at a Juco after his freshman year here.