FAYETTEVILLE — After tinkering with various orders in nine preseason intrasquad scrimmages, Dave Van Horn is close to settling on his Opening Day lineup.
Following the Swatter’s Club meeting Monday, the veteran coach revealed that Arkansas’ three preseason All-Americans will hit in the top four spots and a pair of newcomers will also in the top half of the order.
Shortstop Casey Martin will bat leadoff, followed by right fielder Heston Kjerstad in the two-hole. The cleanup spot will go to center fielder Dominic Fletcher, with graduate transfer Trevor Ezell batting third to break up the highly touted trio.
In an effort to protect Fletcher with another left-handed bat, Matt Goodheart will likely hit fifth. Unlike the four players ahead of him, who have more than 1,700 combined career at bats, Goodheart is a junior college transfer who has yet to appear in a Division I game. However, Van Horn likes the sophomore as a hitter.
“He has a little power, some bat speed,” Van Horn said. “He’s not a big, tall, strong kid, but he’s got some quick twitch in that bat and it’s fun to watch him hit, especially when he’s swinging it good.”
Whereas last year’s lineup was deep with effective and powerful hitters one through nine, the bottom of this season’s lineup will be more of a mix-and-match situation.
Several players have been inconsistent in Arkansas’ preseason scrimmages, with the team batting average hovering around the Mendoza Line.
“They need to produce a little bit and it’s been really up and down,” Van Horn said. “Our pitchers are pretty good, but they’re SEC guys and they’ve gotten us out pretty good for the most part.”
The bottom of the lineup will likely be led by the Razorbacks’ catchers. Sophomore Casey Opitz has the edge over fifth-year senior Zack Plunkett for the starting job, but both will probably play this season.
Plunkett is more of a power hitter, while Opitz will hit for average and is an excellent base runner who Van Horn describes as a “baseball rat.” The determining factor in the battle is defense, which gives Opitz a the advantage.
“What he’s ahead of him at is his receiving,” Van Horn said. “They both throw well and they both throw people out in practice and pick people off and they both block well, but Opitz is a really, really polished receiver, probably one of the better guys in the country.”
A player Van Horn hoped would emerge in the lineup is first baseman Jordan McFarland. The junior has worked hard to improve his defense and shown offensive flashes at times as one of the strongest guys on the team, but he’s currently in the midst of a miserable slump.
In the 6.5 scrimmages open to the public, McFarland unofficially went 1 for 21 with 14 strikeouts. Although there is always a chance he could have a Chad Spanberger-like turnaround, those struggles will probably limit his playing time early on.
“Maybe he’s putting too much pressure on himself,” Van Horn said. “I don’t know what’s going on with him. We’ve had talks with him (and) we’ve left him alone. I think he’s going to snap out of it.”
Luckily for the Razorbacks, they might not need McFarland for the first few weeks of the season.
Because of offseason shoulder surgery, Ezell is still struggling to make the throws required of a second baseman. His bat will keep him in the lineup, though, and Van Horn suggested he may start opening day at first base.
He has been scrimmaging solely at second to test his shoulder, but Ezell has also taken some ground balls at first in practice to get a feel for the position and he already owns a first baseman’s glove.
“Ezell can play anywhere,” Van Horn said. “What I mean by that is he’s a baseball player. … I really like him on the field somewhere because of his presence and his baseball knowledge.”
Being strong up the middle defensively is a point of emphasis for Van Horn, a former middle infielder himself, so Jack Kenley will move to second base.
That leaves a hole at third base, which will be filled by utility infielder Jacob Nesbit, a redshirt freshman.
If he opts to use Ezell at first base and Goodheart as the designated hitter, or vice versa, that opens the door for true freshman Christian Franklin to get the start in left field. He has struggled at the plate, but brings a unique skillset to the lineup.
“He hasn’t had some great days, but boy, when he gets on base, he can steal a base with anybody,” Van Horn said. “He’s an outstanding defender and I want to play some defense the first game.”
With no midweek games before next week’s road trip to USC, Van Horn said he probably won’t substitute much against Eastern Illinois.
“I think what you’ll see is most of our starters are going to stay in the game because…it’d be nice to get the starters 12, 13 at bats against somebody else and just to play the game together, no matter if we’re down or up,” Van Horn said. “You’re going to see those guys stay in the game.”
Once he sees how that particular lineup performs in live action, he could decide to mix things up. He’s mentioned the possibility of platooning based on pitching matchups more than he has in the past.
The only thing for certain is that Van Horn plans to experiment with various pieces and orders in non-conference play so he knows what does and doesn’t work before the SEC opener against Missouri on March 15.
“Every now and then, it might cost you a game,” Van Horn said. “Midweek game, trying to figure some things out, sometimes a loss now will get you two (wins) down the road. That’s the way we look at it.”
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