FAYETTEVILLE — As Arkansas continues to pile up wins, it is only natural for fans to compare this year’s team to last year’s national runner-up squad.
While the 2018 team spent pretty much the entire season ranked in the top 10 and had expectations to not only make it to the College World Series, but win the program’s first championship, the 2019 season was thought to be a slight rebuilding year.
The Razorbacks had to replace nine players lost to the MLB Draft (two draftees returned to school) and two other starters who graduated. Head coach Dave Van Horn mentioned multiple times during the offseason that he didn’t think his team would appear in preseason polls.
That was somewhat of a naive thought by the veteran coach because of the respect he’s built for his program over the previous 16 seasons and sure enough, Arkansas checked in at No. 16 in HawgBeat’s Preseason Composite Poll.
No one could have predicted the Razorbacks would be where they are with two weeks remaining in the regular season: ranked No. 4 in the country with a two-game lead in the SEC West and only one game behind Vanderbilt in the conference title race.
Arkansas is 37-12 overall and 17-7 in SEC play, which is better than its 33-15 (14-10) mark at this point last year. Despite having a much softer non-conference schedule, the Razorbacks are also two spots higher in the RPI, sitting at No. 4.
Before the Razorbacks left town for last weekend’s series at Kentucky, Van Horn was specifically asked if he thought this year’s team was better than last year, but he wasn’t ready to make that call.
“I think time will tell,” Van Horn said. “We’re still a work-in-progress. If we stay healthy, we have a chance to have a pretty good year. Right now it’s going pretty good, but I don’t get all carried away with it.”
The biggest difference between the two teams is that the 2018 Razorbacks featured more juniors and seniors, while the 2019 version is mostly freshmen and sophomores.
“I haven’t laid two stat sheets out there because I really don’t care, to be honest with you,” Van Horn said. “This team is fun to coach; they show up everyday and play.”
Van Horn has bigger and more important things to worry about than those comparisons, such as trying to reverse his fortunes against LSU this weekend, but that is right in HawgBeat’s wheelhouse.
Here is a look at a position-by-position breakdown of the two teams, complete with their stats through 49 games…
Catcher
2018: Grant Koch
.273/.386/.448, 4 2B, 7 HR, 29 RBI, 27 R, 27 BB/29 K, 3-4 SB, .997 FLD%, 16-22 opp. SB
2019: Casey Opitz
.246/.382/.294, 3 2B, 1 HR, 23 RBI, 23 R, 27 BB/31 K, 5-5 SB, .995 FLD%, 19-37 opp. SB
Starting virtually every game behind the plate likely wore him down and led to his batting average dipping over the second half of the year, but Koch was still an excellent catcher for the Razorbacks. He rarely made a mistake in the field and opponents were hesitant to run on him because of his arm, plus he had power as a hitter - as evidence by his seven home runs.
That led to Koch being a fifth-round pick by the Pirates in the MLB Draft, leaving pretty big shoes to fill for Opitz. The sophomore has stepped in nicely. Although he doesn’t have as high of a batting average or hit for as much power, Opitz has been tremendous defensively. He’s throwing out potential base stealers at a higher rate than any other catcher during Van Horn’s tenure and rarely lets a pitch get by him.
Despite the low batting average, Opitz has also had a knack for delivering in the clutch. He has two walk-off hits and another game-winner, leading to three of Arkansas’ SEC wins. With runners in scoring position, Opitz is hitting .311, compared to Koch’s team-worst .188 average in those situations in 2018.
Verdict: Opitz
First base
2018: Jordan McFarland
.307/.388/.412, 3 2B, 3 HR, 15 RBI, 33 R, 13 BB/22 K, 0-2 SB, .986 FLD%
2019: Trevor Ezell
.330/.454/.544, 17 2B, 2 3B, 6 HR, 36 RBI, 57 R, 42 BB/37 K, 15-16 SB, .995 FLD%
The biggest hole on last year’s team was at first base. At this point of the season, McFarland was still the primary starter. However, Van Horn was not happy about his lack of RBI production - 11 of them came in a four-game span just before the start of SEC play - and his batting average plummeted 100 points from the end of non-conference play to this point of the year.
