HawgBeat preview: Hogs host Aggies for final home series
The regular season is coming to a close, with this weekend marking the final home series of 2018 before the postseason. Arkansas welcomes Texas A&M to Baum Stadium for the occasion.
Here is a preview of the three-game set…
Schedule (TV)
Friday, May 11 – 6 p.m. (SEC Network)
Saturday, May 12 – 1 p.m. (ESPN2)
Sunday, May 13 – Noon (ESPN2)
For the first time this year, all three of Arkansas’ games will be nationally televised. The Razorbacks are 2-4 in games that aired on ESPN channels – including the SEC Network – this season.
Projected Starting Rotation (season stats)
Friday – Jr. RHP Blaine Knight (12 games/12 starts, 7-0, 2.77 ERA, 66 K/17 BB, 68 1/3 IP)
Saturday – Jr. LHP Kacey Murphy (11 games/10 starts, 5-4, 2.57 ERA, 58 K/10 BB, 63 IP)
Sunday – R-Soph. RHP Isaiah Campbell (11 games/11 starts, 3-5, 4.76 ERA, 43 K/23 BB, 45 1/3 IP)
There is nothing new in Arkansas’ starting rotation, except that Campbell has already been named the Game 3 starter. Head coach Dave Van Horn had left that game as “TBA” last week.
His final stat line might not look too impressive, but the redshirt sophomore right-hander looked good for four innings before unraveling in the fifth inning against LSU.
With that in mind, Van Horn said the bullpen will be ready to go Sunday to avoid something like that happening again.
“It’ll be a situation depending on where we’re at with our pitching, a lot of things,” Van Horn said. “We might have a little shorter leash on Campbell if we have pitching available.”
In the Polls
After dropping two of three games at LSU, Arkansas fell two spots into a tie with Clemson for No. 7 in the HawgBeat composite poll, which includes top-25 rankings by Baseball America, D1Baseball, NCBWA, Perfect Game and the USA Today Coaches Poll.
Texas A&M has been ranked most of the year and is barely hanging on to a spot in the top 25 after losing a home series against No. 1 Florida. The Aggies fell six spots to No. 25.
In the RPI, the Razorbacks are still in good shape at No. 5, while Texas A&M checks in at No. 13.
Weather Report
Mother Nature hasn’t been too kind to the Razorbacks this season, but it looks like they’ll get great weather for Mother’s Day weekend.
According to the Weather Channel, temperatures are expected to get into the mid- to upper-80s with no chance of rain. It might be a little windy – especially Friday, with gusts expected to be about 17 miles per hour – but other than that, it should be great baseball weather.
Scouting the Opponent
Texas A&M’s projected starting rotation (season stats)
Friday – Jr. RHP Mitchell Kilkenny (12 games/12 starts, 8-2, 2.20 ERA, 71 K/19 BB, 77 2/3 IP)
Saturday – Soph. LHP John Doxakis (13 games/10 starts, 6-3, 3.04 ERA, 57 K/20 BB, 68 IP)
Sunday – Jr. RHP Stephen Kolek (13 games/12 starts, 5-4, 3.78 ERA, 52 K/31 BB, 69 IP)
The backbone of Texas A&M’s top-25 team is its pitching staff, which leads the SEC with a 3.15 ERA.
All three of the Aggies’ weekend starters are solid pitchers and when they run out of gas, they turn it over to a bullpen that has a 3.38 ERA and strands 60.9 percent of inherited runners on base.
“Just watching them on TV, watching them on video, they have a really strong pitching staff and it’s very deep,” Van Horn said. “Everybody thinks Florida is so deep, but I think A&M has the deepest pitching staff.”
Junior Nolan Hoffman has emerged as Texas A&M’s closer. He has a miniscule 0.89 ERA and 10 saves in 40 1/3 innings spread across 25 appearances.
At the plate, the Aggies are led by junior college transfer Michael Helman, who reached based in the first 27 games of the season and is still hitting .378 with 13 doubles, six home runs and 32 RBIs.
Sophomore Braden Shewmake, who was a first-team All-American as a freshman last year, is right behind Helman with a .338 average and team-high 40 RBIs. They have combined for 22 of the Aggies’ 39 stolen bases, as well. As a team, they are 39 for 42.
“They’ve been very successful when they’ve run, stealing bases,” Van Horn said. “They’ve only been thrown out three times all year…which is pretty amazing.”
Texas A&M’s top power hitter is also its only other player hitting above .300, as Logan Foster has eight homers to complement his .316 batting average.
Injury Updates
Van Horn confirmed Thursday what he said at the Swatter’s Club on Monday that closer Matt Cronin would be available to pitch Sunday. The sophomore left-hander has missed the last couple of weeks because he has mono.
Before he got sick, Cronin had nine saves with a 2.76 ERA and was named to the NCBWA’s midseason watch list for the Stopper of the Year award. How much he is able to pitch will be decided during the game, Van Horn said.
“If he’s in the game on Sunday, then we’ll just kind of watch the way he throws,” Van Horn said. “Everybody should be able to tell if he’s either got it or if he’s fading. It could be three hitters, it could be six hitters, it could be one hitter. We’ll just see what happens.”
Another player who had been out of the lineup for an extended period of time was second baseman Carson Shaddy. He suffered a hand contusion when hit by a pitch at Mississippi State.
The Razorbacks’ top hitter with a .361 average and nine home runs, Shaddy returned to action Sunday against LSU. He went 2 for 4 with a double and said Thursday that he should be ready to go against Texas A&M.
“It’s still a little bit sore and tender, but there’s so much adrenaline that goes on during the game that I don’t think it’s really going to bother me,” Shaddy said. “Right now, just trying to get as much treatment as I can.”
Who’s On First?
Also after the Swatter’s Club meeting Monday, Van Horn gave three possibilities for who would start at first base this weekend: Hunter Wilson, Jack Kenley or Heston Kjerstad.
He revealed Thursday that he will “probably” start Wilson in Friday’s game. He was the only new addition working at the spot during the Razorbacks’ practice, rotating with Jordan McFarland and Jared Gates. Those two players lost their spot after poor showing at the plate, in the field and on the base paths.
Van Horn also said he would have senior Luke Bonfield back in the starting lineup at designated hitter over sophomore Evan Lee.
“I’m going to start leaning on the older guys,” Van Horn said. “It’s the end of the season and it’s time for the older guys to kind of take the team and run with it.”
Senior Day
The Razorbacks are still trying to secure a top-eight national seed so they can host a regional and super regional, but this weekend is their final regular-season series at Baum Stadium.
That means Arkansas will honor its seniors, with the “senior day” festivities scheduled before Saturday’s game. There aren’t typically many seniors in college baseball, but the Razorbacks have three this season: Carson Shaddy, Luke Bonfield and Jared Gates.
They were asked about their careers Thursday afternoon and here is what they said:
“It's gratifying more than anything because these kids are graduating. Whether they play another day of baseball after the season's over, they got what they came here to do. Even though when some of these guys first get here, they're thinking, 'Oh, I'll play three years and sign a pro contract’ – and we want them all to be able to play pro ball and hopefully in the big leagues – realistically the percentages aren't with them there. They need to get that degree. We're always talking about it and how it opens up a lot of doors. I'm proud of them and looking forward to the next batch graduating. There's a couple that'll graduate in the summer. There's many more that are going to graduate next year.” – Dave Van Horn
“It’s going to be really emotional. You guys know how much I love Arkansas. It’s my last regular-season SEC series here. My dream as a kid wasn’t really to be a professional baseball player. It was to follow my dad’s footsteps and play for the Razorbacks. So getting to have that opportunity as a freshman to walk on and kind of earn my spot was huge. It’s going to be really emotional. I’m looking forward to it, but I’m not at the same time, just because it means so much to me. … I great up coming to all the games here while I was in high school and idolizing guys like Clay Goodwin, Scott Hode and everybody. It’s pretty cool getting to put my name on the same list as those guys, for sure. It means a lot to me. I’m not sure you guys can really understand how much it means to me. It warms the heart a lot, for sure.” – Carson Shaddy
“Four years here and it’s been a great experience. I’m looking forward to Senior Weekend. … I feel like I’ve had a pretty good career to this point. I haven’t been able to do the one thing I’ve wanted to do, which is win a national championship. So that’s the one thing left to do here. … I hope we get to play at Baum as long as possible. I sure hope this isn’t the last series here, but we can’t think about that. We’ve got to think about Friday night’s game.” – Luke Bonfield
“It’s been kind of a rough year for myself, but I’ve always been a team guy, so as long as the Hogs are doing good, I’m happy. Obviously, I’d like to produce and help the team out, but whoever’s over there, if they’re helping the team then that’s good for me. … It’ll definitely be emotional for me and my parents. It’ll be exciting and sad at the same time, but I’m looking forward to it.” – Jared Gates
Van Horn, Childress Relationship
When deciding where to continue his career after McLennan (Texas) C.C. back in the early 1980s, Van Horn had his options narrowed down two schools: Arkansas and Texas A&M.
He ended up choosing the Razorbacks and played for them in 1982 before becoming a 10th-round pick of the Atlanta Braves. However, that aspect of the Texas A&M-Arkansas series isn’t what Van Horn always talks about.
Instead, it is the series that put him against one of his best friends and long-time assistant coach Rob Childress, who is in his 13th season as the Aggies’ head coach. Also, Texas A&M’s assistant coaches are Justin Seely and Will Bolt, who played for Van Horn at Nebraska.
“I say it every year, I really don’t like coaching against Rob and Will and Justin,” Van Horn said. “It’s business when we play them. We just play, so I don’t get any more fired up really about any team. I just want to hopefully win a series and move on, to be honest with you.”
Van Horn holds a 10-7 edge over Childress, with all but one of those games coming after the Aggies’ joined the SEC in 2013.
All of those matchups have led to an extra element of chess play when they meet on the diamond.
“You’ll see them pitch out at certain times because maybe there’s a tendency to hit and run on those counts over the years, so usually I won’t just to see if they will,” Van Horn said. “There’s a lot of that going on.
“Bottom line, we just know each other pretty good. It’s like anybody else; the more you’re around them, you kind of learn how they do things.”
Home Run Tracker
With five home runs against LSU last weekend, Arkansas now has 74 for the season. That is still ahead of the record-breaking pace in 2010, when the Razorbacks had 70 long balls at this point of the year.
That season, Arkansas finished with 92 home runs. Here is a chart that illustrates the Razorbacks’ game-by-game progression compared to 2010 and 2017, when it hit the third-most home runs in school history (83).
(The Razorbacks hit 84 home runs in 1999, the second most in UA history, but game-by-game data for that year is not yet available.)
Stat of the Week
A lot of attention – rightfully so – has been spent discussing Arkansas’ failures on the road. However, on the flip side of that, the Razorbacks have been nearly unbeatable at Baum Stadium.
Not including the Grambling State game in North Little Rock, they are 26-3 at home this year. That is a winning percentage of .897, which would break the record for Baum Stadium set back in 1999. That season, Arkansas went 25-5 (.833) at its home park.
However, the season isn’t quite over. Arkansas still has three games left against Texas A&M. It needs to win just one of the three to clinch the best single-season winning percentage at Baum Stadium since it opened in 1996.
Stat Comparison – Arkansas | Texas A&M (national rank, out of 297 teams)
Batting average: .306 (10th) | .288 (49th)
Slugging percentage: .498 (4th) | .433 (53rd)
On-base percentage: .401 (11th) | .369 (107th)
Home runs: 74 (3rd) | 44 (t-48th)
Runs/game: 7.1 (21st) | 6.5 (63rd)
ERA: 3.50 (38th) | 3.15 (13th)
WHIP: 1.28 (34th) | 1.22 (20th)
Strikeouts/9 innings: 9.4 (24th) | 8.2 (118th)
Strikeout-to-walk ratio: 2.71 (20th) | 2.67 (24th)
Fielding percentage: .973 (75th) | .973 (81st)