All Hail the Smart Boys

There’s something special about baseball programs like Stanford and Rice…. and also Vanderbilt, Duke, Notre Dame, the military academies and the Ivy League. Yes, we all should cheer for them. Because they can do what we can’t: be highly intelligent AND play baseball really well. In fact, the charm for Rice and Stanford is that [...]

A perfect day… according to the Aztec Calendar.

Contrary to popular belief, the Aztec calendar does NOT say the world is going to end in 2012. But unfortunately it DID say that the excitement of the Aztec Invitational would end today after two straight days of riveting finishes. Aw great, just in time for me to get there. Damn.

SEC football is officially jealous: The Toreros of San Diego upended Cal State Northridge with little problem.

Titans clash… and tie weekend series.

As I’ve alluded to many times before, the sport of college baseball used to have many more high-profile non-conference series during the course of February and March than you might care to remember. But as money, high-dollar on-campus facilities and conference expansion have taken over our sport the last few years, the need/want/desire to play non-conference teams in a competitive home-and-home fashion became more and more rare.

After getting the final double-play to end the game, outfielder-turned-reliever Michael Lorenzen yells skyward as Fullerton evens the series with TCU tonight.

But we can always take solace in the fact that Fullerton and TCU are all for playing the best in order to eventually beating the best. Now, if only the rest of college baseball would adhere to their strict policy of playing the best around, year-in, year-out. In the words of the great Satchmo, “What a wonderful world” this would be.

Now THIS is an opening day.

Okay people, it’s now four down, 294 to go.

In my pursuit to see all 298 Division 1 baseball teams (wait… it IS 298 now right?), it’s good that I got over my sickness from yesterday and finally got out of the driveway to catch a glimpse of a few teams on the California coast today. What did I see? One black-and-orange OSU goes up, one black-and-orange OSU goes down.

There is a reason why I've labeled Cal Poly's Baggett Stadium one of the most picturesque settings in the country for baseball.

ESPN Super Regional Wrap – Day 2

One day we’ll look upon this and have a good laugh.

How pathetic is this? It’s 5:30am and I’m sitting in my car outside a Starbucks Coffee joint in San Jose, because my friend who I’m staying with is having ill-timed wireless issues. This is in addition to my computer seemingly being the only one in the Santa Clara press box that can’t get an internet signal. WTF, right?

Well enough of my bitchin’, here’s the link to my wrap-up of Day 2 of the Supers on ESPN.com.
I hope you dig it. And sorry for the delay in posting.

Regionals: Day Two

Wow. Just… wow. Who would’ve figured Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Fresno State and FIU would be gone, and Texas, TCU, Rice, UCLA, Fullerton and Georgia Tech would have the stack decked against them after losses in the first two days? I mean, to quote Freddy, is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?

The heroic Stanford Cardinal took down Cal State Fullerton to advance to the Regional finals.

If you wanna give my daily wrap-up a once-over on ESPN.com, click here and check out the ESPN college baseball blog.

I got to see a couple of games today, the crowning moment being Stanford’s 1-0 stress-fest win over Cal State Fullerton. An unreal contest. I’ll be sure to share some pics I took from that game and the Illinois win over K-State. The first lady of Stitch-Head Nation was at the UC Irvine win over San Francisco as well and the Doctor of College Baseball chipped in from the Carolinas too. Bitchin’.

I Get a Case of Vertigo Over Today’s Action.

This was a long day full of amazing cliffhangers. My nerves can barely take it.

It was a cliffhanger Saturday on the diamond in college baseball today, even a wide-eyed Jimmy Stweart can attest to that.

Harmlessly, it started in my own bed this morning. My dog jumped up, scaled the mattress and licked my nose to wake me up at 8:05am Pacific time. Two minutes later, I picked up my servant bell off the silver salver on my nightstand and rang it. I then asked Jeeves to bring me my laptop. At 8:09 I turned on my computer. At 8:11 I read a “thank you” Email from Maine’s baseball coach. At 8:13am I opened up the scoreboard page on Jeremy Mills’ site and saw that Florida State was beating Georgia Tech 4-0 in the 7th inning.

I scanned down Jeremy’s scoreboard a bit more to find that Samford and Appalachian State were already in the 9th inning of their elimination game, with the Bulldogs up 2-1. Man, a lot happens while I’m sleeping. WTF? Guess I better stop sleeping so much, right?

But that’s the dichotomy of good and bad of college baseball during tournament time.

The Good: it’s wall-to-wall ball from early in the morning to late late at night.

The Bad: Jesus Christ people, we’re deciding conference champions at 6am?! (Pacific). These poor boys.

The World Didn’t End. But Some 2011 Seasons Did.

It was a weird last day of the world people. Believe me.

Lots of upheaval and bizarre season-ending games went into today’s collection of action. It sure points to a wild and unpredictable post-season ahead of us. It also makes me glad we’ll see another tomorrow in our college baseball season.

I would make another “End of Days” joke here, but to be honest, I’m sure you’ve heard more than your share of them today. People, just quit being so stupid about these whack-jobs. It gets in the way of our enjoying college baseball, which is way more important.

Solid Proof That I Have No Freakin’ Life.

I didn’t go to a game today. Instead, I spent nearly the entire day in front of the boob tube to watch games from around the country. Thank you DIRECTV. Yes, thank you for keeping me cooped up inside all day, denying my body of the Vitamin D I need that is supplied by the sun.

Eight of Florida State's nine seniors got an on-field graduating ceremony before the game started this afternoon. They were talked into doing the "N-O-L-E-S" count-out on the field after ward. Well, that is, all except for Taiwan Easterling (#1) who apparently couldn't be bothered to do the actual spell out.

A few notes from the Saturday in college baseball.

Yea Though I Drive Through The Valley of Death, I Fear No Evil.

Bravely, I ventured. Devil may care.

Like Hawaii and UC Irvine, I made my way deep into the San Joaquin Valley. Where ranked teams had met their slow, painful, searing death on Friday. Well today, the only evil I encountered was the specter of missing out on Josh Osich’s no-hitter that I could’ve gone to see as Oregon State beat UCLA 2-0. Yep, evil is totally a man-made farce. But cruel irony?… that’s something the baseball gods vex me with from time to time. And this was one of those times.