TCU Baseball is pre-season #1 team in the land. My father in law (a TCU alum) would be proud.
I know pitchers and catchers just reported … but its also the kick off of the Collegiate Baseball Season. And I like following college baseball; after all, its where the Nats get all of their draft picks! 🙂
The first games of the new season start on 2/17/17. Here’s a quick post to publish some links of interest and high light some local teams as we kick off the new season.
College Season Previews:
- Baseball America’s 2017 preview
- D1Baseball’s 2017 preview index.
Pre-season top 25 lists: (I’ll back-fill those that havn’t published as of the publication of this initially)
- Baseball America: TCU, Florida, Florida State (aka FSU), LSU and South Carolina top 5. Defending champ Coastal Carolina (aka CCU) #15. Other ranked local teams or teams with local players: ECU #6, NC State #14, UVA #16, UNC #17, Maryland #24.
- D1Baseball: TCU, Florida, FSU, South Carolina, LSU. Other teams of interest: NC State #6, UNC #9, ECU #10, CCU #11, UVA #17, Maryland #22, UNC-W #24.
- College Baseball Daily: tbd
- College Baseball Central: TCU, FSU, LSU, Florida, Louisville. Other teams: South Carolina #6, NC State #8, ECU #9, UNC #10, CCU #11, UVA #18, UNC-W #24.
- Collegiate Baseball News: TCU, LSU, Florida, South Carolina, Oregon State. Others: ECU #13, UNC #15, UVA #16, CCU #19.
- NCBWA (National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association): TCU, Florida, LSU, FSU, South Carolina. ECU/NC State/CCU/UNC and Clemson ranked 9-13 consecutively, UVA 19 and UMD 25.
So, why is TCU #1 across the board? Because they return practically everyone from last year’s team, which made the CWS, and they add to it a good recruiting class that includes the highest 2016 draftee not to sign in Nick Lodolo. They have a pre-season All-American starter in Brian Howard and an early easy pick for player of the year in Luken Baker, who took the sport by storm last year as a freshman, hitting .379 and destroying pitching in the post-season.
Florida is in everyone’s top 5 thanks to their pitching depth and high-end talent (despite multiple 1st rounders drafted off of last year’s team they return another weekend starter who is in talks to go 1-1 overall in Alex Faedo. LSU, Florida State and South Carolina return their typical strong teams.
There’s a ton of teams in the Carolinas getting top 25 attention. This should make the ACC and SEC league play as interesting as always. Locally UVA and UMD getting back of the rankings recognition, though I suspect both teams may struggle to keep up with the level of play they’ve established over the last few years in the face of better competition south.
Pre-Season All-America Lists with Local players noted: (i’ll backfill those that havn’t published as of the publication of this initially)
- BaseballAmerica’s pre-season All American: tbd
- D1Baseball.com’s pre-season all American list: UVA’s Ernie Clement gets 1st team honors at 2B, J.B. Bukauskas gets 1st team for SP. Virginia-connected Pavan Smith, Brian Mimms, Nick Feight, and Adam Haseley all 2nd teamers.
- College Baseball Daily: tbd
- College Baseball Central: tbd
- Collegiate Baseball News: 1st teamers Sam Donko (rhp reliever, VCU), Feight from UNC-W. 2nd teamers: Bukauskas from UNC and UVA’s Pavin Smith and Adam Haseley.
- NCBWA: Feight and Brian Mimms from UNC-W, Andrew Beckwith from CCU, Bukaskas, Donko all 1st teamers. UVA’s Ernie Clement a 3rd teamer.
- USA Baseball pre-season Golden Spikes watch list: Bukauskas, Feight and Mimms, Beckwith, Haseley, Kevin Smith from UMD, Pavin Smith from UVA are the local interest players on the pre-season list.
I’ve highlighted mostly players with DC/MV/VA ties here but its worth noting there are several big-time names on every one of these lists. When we do the draft previews you’ll see all the big names for the 2017 draft who are also at the top of these pre-season all-american lists: Jeren Kendall, Brendan McKay, Alex Faedo, Alex Lange, Kyle Wright primarily. However there’s two sophomores who may be set to go 1-2 already in the 2018 draft: Seth Beer and Luken Baker. Both had monster freshman years at the plate and should both be in the mix for the College player of the year in 2017.
Major College Site Index/Home pages; landing/jump pages for coverage at the major sites covering the game.
- D1Baseball’s home page
- BaseballAmerica’s College Home Page is here.
Local teams of interest and who they’re playing this first week:
- UVA: at the Citadel tournament in Charleston, SC, playing Liberty, The Citadel and Kansas. A UVA-buddy of mine sent me this link where UVA set their weekend rotation: it looks to me like they’re playing match-ups because I can’t imagine a pre-season All-American like Haseley being their #3 starter.
- UMD: at the Clearwater Tournament, Clearwater, FL, playing Ball State. Louisville and Alabama State.
- UNC: hosting Kentucky, with Bukauskas likely going friday night in the opener.
- GW: At Auburn for a 4-game opening series.
- George Mason: at the Hughes Brothers Challenge in wilmington, playing UNC-W, App State and VMI.
- Georgetown: At Davidson University in North Carolina
- Coastal Carolina (aka CCU): your defending national champs are hosting the Caravelle Resort Baseball at the Beach in Conway (aka Myrtle Beach): they’ll play Richmond, W. Carolina, JMU and St. Johns.
- JMU: also at CCU’s tournament, playing NC A&T, St. Johns and CCU.
- Willam & Mary and VCU are both travelling to Florida powers (#2 Florida and #3 Florida State) respectively for challenging openers.
- NC State though has the best trip: they’re At Hawaii. That’s a heck of a travel budget they’re blowing through early.