About Eric Sorenson
After growing up in Omaha, Nebraska and skinning his knees on the concrete walkways of Rosenblatt Stadium, Eric has had college baseball in his veins for as long as he can remember. When the College World Series was going on each June, his parents would drop him and his friends off at the stadium in the morning and pick them up after the last game that night. Poor parenting? Sure. But it also fueled his fever for the sport that much more.
Eschewing the normal journalistic road to sports writing, Eric has been an advertising copywriter for years. He admits that creative background has added to his unconventional approach to sports writing and is a main contributor to his unique style.
Eric’s “addiction” to college baseball writing began back in the late 90s, when he became one of the original national writers for the sport. In the years that followed, he has covered college baseball for such media outlets as USA Today, CSTV, CBS Sportsline, CBS College Sports, College Baseball Insider and his current gig with College Baseball Today.
Living in Southern California with his wife Mandy, Eric sits in one of the hotbeds of college baseball. When he’s not covering a game or writing about the sport, he enjoys surfing, snow skiing, playing hockey and rough-housing with his black lab “T.O.” Eric was also 7th runner-up in “The Most Interesting Man In the World” competition held by Dos Equis in 2009.
The Baldcast from Alex Box Stadium
A hateful, repugnant waste of six minutes.
Just to let you guys know, you’ll notice that I recorded this Baldcast on Sunday afternoon following Sunday’s Vanderbilt-LSU game. So excuse me for not commenting on axis-tilting results like Oregon State’s sweep of Oregon, the Arkansas two-hitter at Ole Miss or TCU’s magnanimous 25-6 cascading of New Mexico. You catch my drift.
And following the jump are some interviews with LSU’s Paul Mainieri and Vanderbilt’s Tim Corbin that I did prior to this weekend series in Baton Rouge.
Recent Comments:
May 12, 2010 at 2:53 pmMark says:
Winning the regular season title is much more important that the tournament. The
May 11, 2010 at 1:28 pmBulldog says:
Good stuff as usual Eric! Been to Alex myself last year. Hope you got to enjoy
Q&A with East Carolina’s Billy Godwin
I had a chance to sit down and talk with East Carolina’s chief architect, head coach Billy Godwin. He brought his Pirate team to Southern California last week for a mid-wee game with Cal State Northridge and a weekend series at Pepperdine. I managed to catch up with him as he and his team were checking out the high-tech home where Easton baseball bats and equipment were made in Van Nuys. I asked him about his background before becoming the head cheese at ECU and how the program has grown under his guidance. And, of course, I couldn’t let him get away without asking about that rabid fan base that has been built up in Greenville in the decade of the 2000’s, clearly one of the best group of college baseball fanatics in the country.
Coach Godwin is an “Everyman” type of personality with a hard-work mentality about him. I hope you dig the interview here.
My Q&A with Nebraska’s Mike Anderson
Quick mea culpa first. Sorry that it took a few days to get this clip delivered to me and to have it edited down to a YouTubeable size and everything. But it’s worth the wait ‘coz I really like this back-and-forth I had with the Nebraska head coach. Mr. Anderson sat down with me smack-dab in the middle of Jackie Robinson Stadium during his team’s trip out to Los Angeles for the UCLA series last week.
A historic day in Connecticut sports.
Coach Penders has had a lot to smile about in his 5-2 start.
Today was a historic day for the Huskies athletic department. What’s that?… Oh, no, no, no, not for that boring girls basketball win-streak thingee either. With 71 games in a row? Or as I like to say, 71 straight dunk-free basketball games… no thank you.
Nope, today was much more important than that for Connecticut athletics. It was the baseball teams’ chance to get a four-game sweep at Cal State Northridge.
I also got the chance to talk to UConn head coach Jim Penders after his Huskies came up just short in getting that sweep. But it should be noted that they showed signs of life for a much, much, much better season in 2010.
Q&A with Indiana’s Tracy Smith
Just to let you guys know, I actually had this conversation with Indiana head coach Tracy Smith an hour before their season-opening game at San Diego on Friday. But with all that was going on with opening weekend and some traveling I was doing, I decided to wait and post this after the weekend was done.
Coach Smith knew starting off at San Diego would be tough.
And I got the feeling after catching up with Coach Smith that he knows this will be a year of growth for his program. And that growth has to start small. But just like Bill Murray says in the movie Stripes, it is the little acorn that grows into the mighty oak.
(Right before he slumps to the floor and says, “… and then, depression set in.”)
I get D-2 Baseball explained to me.
Minnesota State, the 2009 Northern Sun champs
What if Division II ruled the world?
If D-2 baseball ruled the world, we’d have to get used to three indelible truths…
1- There would never be more than one team per conference in the College World Series.
2- The term “student-athlete” would actually be revered by the NCAA. And…
3- The Minnesota Twins would still be idiots for building a stadium without at least a retractable roof.
Q&A with Jim Schlossnagle
Word of warning: when it comes to TCU for 2010… all hell can’t stop ‘em now.
Yes, quoting the Rage Against The Machine song, these guys are going to be an even stronger force in college baseball this season than they were last year when they finished a game away from Omaha. And Coach Jim Schlossnagle knows it.
Umps be damned, 2010 will be a good year for Jim Schlossnagle.
While in the Dallas-Fort Worth area to cover the Big 12 title game at Cowboys Stadium this past weekend, I took a quick side trek to the home of the school that should be playing for the national championship in football and talked with the man that hopes to emulate the pigskin success on the baseball diamond this coming spring.
‘Table For Four’ With Paul Mainieri
I don’t know if you remember the IFC show “Table For Five” that actor/director Jon Favreau hosted for a couple of years. It was the free-form interview/conversation show where he would go to a restaurant with four of his favorite actors, directors or musicians and just sit down at a table to talk about movies, influences and life in general with the cameras rolling, the waiters serving and the beer flowing.
The table for four, grueling down at The Chimes.
I had Favreau-style deja vu on Monday after the Florida-LSU football game as I sat at my favorite hangout in the entire world, The Chimes, near the gates of LSU. There was myself, the doctor of college baseball, Lady Stitch-head and our guest of honor, national championship coach Paul Mainieri, who was able to make room in his hyper-busy schedule.
The hostess sat us down at a table in the middle of the same room I once saw the Meat Puppets play (The Chimes used to have bands play there in the evenings). Then, we tucked our napkins inside our shirts and we got underway.
Q&A With UC Irvine’s Mike Gillespie
Mike Gillespie is as close to an institution in college baseball as we get in our sport. And I don’t mean that in a stuffy, boring, museum-like way. He’s old school cool with a new school rule.
You have to excuse the guy for having a laissez faire attitude to his UC Irvine team being given its No. 1 ranking in just about every poll out there. Because this guy really has been there, done that. He’s seen fame be fleeting, rankings meaning nothing and teams being snowed under by their own press clippings.
From winning the 1961 College World Series championship game for USC to taking the reigns of a program that was built by a legend to winning a national title of his own to taking a team with a nickname of “Anteaters” to a No. 1 position in the land, Mike Gillespie could be the one person we all agree has lived a college baseball dream.
Best part is, he doesn’t seem to be even remotely close to being done.
Q&A with North Carolina’s Mike Fox
I don’t think people appreciate North Carolina coach Mike Fox enough. I really don’t.
To bring his team to Omaha three years in a row and get THISCLOSE to winning a national championship each time – that’s a pretty incredible run he’s on.
In fact, I said after returning from Omaha last June that, even though I respect the hell out of what Mike Batesole and Fresno State accomplished last season, I still thought Mike Fox deserved the national coach of the year for keeping his team at a high level all season long and just making the field of eight in the promised land once again.
So while on this trip to Tarheel country this past weekend, I couldn’t wait to get a chance to talk with Coach Fox about what he’s accomplished and the state of his program.
Husker Chico says:
I guess you will need set up a facebook page to get Kyle Peterson in the booth,