The Book 2007 Ragin' Cajun Baseball

[BirdofParadise]

_ Who is Mark Etheridge? I imagine he has some type of position on the selection committee. What is the Daily Dose? Do you believe your email will have some impact on the decision making process? _

Mark Ethridge is the man who runs sebaseball.com. He isn't on the selection committee, but any publicity we can get about our road travels this year is a good thing.

[GoneGolfin]

Who is Mark Etheridge? I imagine he has some type of position on the selection committee. What is the Daily Dose? Do you believe your email will have some impact on the decision making process?

Mark is the founder of SEBaseball.com and the person to which I submit my article content when I find time to write. Paul Kislanko is the stats workhorse behind the scene and provides the core numbers behind Mark's work. SEBaseball.com is well read in the college baseball community. Let's just leave it at that.

Anyhow, he provided the quote in today's Daily Dose, which is just a recap of the previous day in college baseball and what is on tap for the current day.


From the Mailbag:

I used to get a lot of hate-mail. That has slowed a bit fortunately and here recently have had some nice exchanges with players, coaches, and ardent bracketologists. This week I got a nice message - a Louisiana Ragin' Cajun fan pointing out an interesting note.

"I suspect that the Cajuns' record against the Top 50 (3-6) and potentially the Top 75 (10-9) Base RPI may give them problems if their Adjusted RPI slips down into the mid to late 20's. By trouble, I mean possibly losing out on a #2 seed, despite winning a conference championship.

"An interesting thing to note is that all nine Top 50 games have been on the road. Additionally, sixteen of the nineteen Top 75 games have been on the road. When the regular season is complete, the Cajuns will have played 32 road games and only 24 home games. I venture to say that no team in the Top 20 will have played such a home/road differential. And many teams will be far from such a differential."

In this era of home-loaded schedules for the top thirty teams, it seems very odd that a warm-weather program would have such an road-heavy schedule. In contrast, Florida State has just 18 road games and a neutral site game in Jacksonville against Florida. That leaves the other 37 at home. Just thought that was interesting.

[NewsCopy]

He's the most feared .232 hitter in the Sun Belt Conference. Of the league's 11 baseball teams, no nine-hole hitter makes an impact on games like UL's Devon Bourque, just because he's seemingly always on base. "That's my job," Bourque said. "Play defense and get on base. I'm not a guy that's going to drive in 50 runs, so I have to get on and score runs." The senior from Gonzales and East Ascension does that on a regular basis. His batting average through the Cajuns' first 44 games may be nearer the Mendoza line than the team leader, but his on-base percentage is an astonishing 166 points higher at .398. That's mostly because he's tied for the team lead in walks (33), a huge number for someone hitting at the bottom of the lineup. He's also struck out the fewest times among Cajun starters (17). The rest of the story Dan McDonald dmcdonald@theadvertiser.com

[NewsCopy]

MONROE - No one expected this weekend's UL-ULMonroe intrastate series to have such an impact on the Sun Belt Conference baseball race - except, maybe, the folks in the Warhawk camp. ULM was picked last in the Sun Belt in the preseason coaches' poll in February. Now, three months later, there's a chance that the Warhawks could be atop the league standings by Sunday night. The visiting Ragin' Cajuns are, of course, hoping that's not the case, since UL (32-13, 15-6 Sun Belt) enters tonight's 6 p.m. game at the ULM Baseball Complex leading the Sun Belt race by two full games. But the Cajuns admittedly didn't play well last weekend even though taking two of three at home against Arkansas State. "Our biggest goal is not just winning another conference weekend, but getting back to playing quality baseball like we were earlier in the year," said Cajun coach Tony Robichaux. "It's a long season and everybody gets in a rut. You hope to stay away from that late in the season. Every team hits a wall, and we've got to be able to scale that wall." The rest of the story Dan McDonald dmcdonald@theadvertiser.com

[NewsCopy]

For the first time since ULM moved into the Sun Belt Conference for all sports, the Warhawks will face rival Louisiana-Lafayette with the chance for a conference championship on the line for both schools. The ULL baseball team comes to Warhawk Field for a three-game series this weekend, starting with a game at 6 p.m. today. The Ragin' Cajuns (32-13, 15-6 Sun Belt) are currently in first place in the standings. They are 2½ games ahead of the Warhawks (27-20, 14-9), who are behind Troy by mere percentage points for second place. Neither team can clinch the regular-season title this weekend. However, both could effectively eliminate the other from the race. Trailing with just two conference series left, ULM needs to win at least two of three games this weekend to stay in the race. The rest of the story By Michael Kern mkern@thenewsstar.com

[Dad04]

Is ULM reverse pitching? What happened to Bucky Chandler?
EDIT: Just read BB's scouting report

[cajun1300]

_ Is ULM reverse pitching? What happened to Bucky Chandler? _

By the way, Dad, how's your son feeling?

[Dad04]

He's good.

[NewsCopy]

MONROE - UL's baseball team won two of three games last weekend playing what head coach Tony Robichaux called "ugly baseball," but his squad turned that around in Friday's 5-2 win over UL Monroe. The Cajuns didn't commit an error, although two defensive mishaps led to ULM's two seventh-inning runs, UL outhit the hosts 9-6 and Cajun pitchers Danny Farquhar and Greg Harmon combined for 17 strikeouts with only two walks. "We won playing better baseball tonight," Robichaux said. "We're still a tired bunch, but we also played a lot closer together tonight." TODAY: The Cajuns are scheduled to start junior lefthander Hunter Moody (5-3, 4.20) against ULM junior lefthander Keith Christensen (3-3, 4.50) in today's 6 p.m. middle game of the series. The rest of the story Dan McDonald dmcdonald@theadvertiser.com

[El Sidonio]

I guess I'll ask about both baseball and softball this weekend.

From the little bit I caught by radio on Friday, it sounds like there were at least as many UL as ULM fans. Were there more UL than ULM fans? What was attendance? (I'm asking these questions as well for Saturday and Sunday games too)

God Bless

[Turbine]

Baseball: Dan McDonald said

A CROWD, A CROWD: ULM's announced crowd was 2,362, more than twice the Warhawks' previous season-high attendance. ULM's largest home crowd this season before Friday was 985 in a Saturday game against South Alabama.

The crowd was also the seventh-largest in Warhawk Field's 29-year history and the largest ever against a non-Southeastern Conference opponent. ULM's top five crowds all came against LSU and the number six crowd came against Mississippi State.

On the Radio broadcast it sounded like half were Ragin' Cajun fans. That might be from us being use to making noise.

[Zeebart21]

Baseball: Dan McDonald said On the Radio broadcast it sounded like half were Ragin' Cajun fans. That might be from us being use to making noise.

BOP said about 300 strong...

We all know 300 Cajuns can overpower 2000 warhoax any day.

Z.