• The KillerFrogs

FWST: Sooners get much-needed relief against Frogs

TopFrog

Lifelong Frog
http://www.star-telegram.com/2010/04/06/20...ded-relief.html

[SIZE=14pt]Sooners get much-needed relief against Frogs[/SIZE]

By STEFAN STEVENSON
sstevenson@star-telegram.com

TCU and Oklahoma entered Tuesday's nonconference game at Lupton Stadium each smarting from conference losses over the weekend.

The Horned Frogs lost Game 3 to San Diego State on Saturday, and the Sooners were limping into Fort Worth after suffering a three-game sweep at home to No. 7 Texas.

A crowd of 3,924, the second-largest in Lupton Stadium's eight-year history, saw the Sooners stop their slide and the Frogs' struggles continue with OU's 4-2 victory.

Oklahoma, ranked No. 16 in the USA Today/ESPN coaches' poll, scored two runs in the first after starting a three-hit rally with two outs and no one on off TCU starter Paul Gerrish.

TCU (20-7), ranked No. 12 in the coaches' poll, had a chance to put some runs on the board in the bottom of the inning, after the first three batters reached on a single and two walks. Oklahoma coach Sunny Golloway wasted no time pulling starter Drew Verhagen and called on reliever Jeremy Erben, who entered with a 0.61 ERA, but no more than 42/3 innings of work. The Sooners got much more from him Tuesday.

"When you're facing a good team and they roll out maybe the best relief pitcher in the Big 12 in the first inning, you know it means something to both sides," TCU coach Jim Schlossnagle said.

Erben got Frogs' cleanup hitter Matt Curry to swing at his first pitch, a slider down, which Curry tapped back to Erben for a 1-2-3 double play. Jimmie Pharr grounded out to second to end the inning.

Erben continued to stifle the Frogs' hitters for the next 72/3 innings. The only hiccup came in the second inning when Taylor Featherston reached second on a single and error by the shortstop, and then made it to third on a wild pitch. Featherston scored on Erben's errant throw to first on a pick-off play. Featherston scored again in the sixth after a triple with two outs. Josh Elander singled him home to pull TCU within 3-2.

Gerrish settled down and pitched 61/3 innings, allowing three runs on nine hits. Trent Appleby pitched the final 22/3, allowing a ninth-inning run to score after two quick outs.

"We give up three runs with two outs and nobody on base," Schlossnagle said. "That was big. We had poor at-bats in the first inning with the bases loaded. We didn't get a sacrifice bunt down. [Jerome] Pena missed a hit-and-run."

Brance Rivera and Pena reached on Texas leaguers to give the Frogs runners at first and second with one out in the bottom of the ninth, but Bryan Holaday's sharply hit ball to short started a game-ending double play for the Sooners.

Each team threw a runner out at home. Rivera threw out Cody Reine as Holaday made a great stab up the third-base line to apply the tag in the fourth inning. In the fifth, Holaday was thrown out at home on Jason Coats' double down the right-field line on a great relay throw from first baseman Cameron Seitzer.

"That was a really good college baseball game," Golloway said. "There were quality defensive plays tonight along with some great at-bats and quality pitches. Our guys really played well and I'm proud of the way they responded after last weekend."

Stefan Stevenson, 817-390-7760

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http://www.star-telegram.com/2010/04/06/20...-tcus-loss.html

[SIZE=12pt]First inning crucial in TCU's loss to Oklahoma[/SIZE]

Why Oklahoma won: The first inning turned out to be crucial as the Sooners rallied with two outs, scoring twice on three consecutive hits. The Frogs let a golden scoring opportunity slip by with the bases loaded and no outs in the bottom of the first.

Notable
Oklahoma has won five in a row over TCU. The Frogs travel to Norman on April 20.

TCU didn't walk a batter for the first time since Matt Purke pitched a complete game March 13.

Up next: TCU at Houston, 6:30 p.m. Friday, Cougar Field
 

TopFrog

Lifelong Frog
Wasted another great starting pitching effort with bats that can't string together hits, execute, get some timely hits. Just gone almost dead. We are getting base runners, then leaving them, or running into outs trying to force things.

In the last wo games, TCU has scored three runs and stranded 23 runners.
 

Burner1

Tier 1
Baseball is a game of streaks and slumps. We can hope the team gets over these doldrums and gets hot by tournament time.
 
Five straight losses to the Sooners seems somewhat ridiculous.

Unfortunately, the Frogs blew an opportunity to make a real

statement last night. sheesh...
 

NativeFrog

New Member
I think this season officially has become a rebuilding year instead of a World Series year. Frogs always seem to have trouble with good pitching. Wonder if Schloss has thought about a new hitting coach?
 

South Texas Frog

Active Member
The Frogs remind me of the Texas basketball team this year...start out hot and surprise everybody and then absolutely crash. Hope they wake up and right this ship.
 

Houston Frog

New Member
In my opinion, everyone is overreacting just a little. I feel like a lot of Frog fans didn't grow up watching college baseball or something, so they're looking at it like a college football season. Every game is not the end of the world like it is in football, teams go through peaks and valleys.

If y'all notice, all of our losses have been by very low run totals. We're not getting blown out, we're losing some squeakers to some pretty good teams. My guess would be that we have lost our 7 games by a total of like 16 runs.

Our team ERA is like 3.50, our bullpen ERA is 3.33, we can hit the ball, and we're 20-7. We've had a couple bad games where we left a bunch of runners on base, now we just got to hope we get that turned around. I don't think we can say we don't have any clutch hitters on our team (Holaday and Coats might have something to say about that), we just haven't had many clutch hitters the last couple weeks.
 

TopFrog

Lifelong Frog
QUOTE(Houston Frog @ Apr 7 2010, 09:12 AM) [snapback]541608[/snapback]
In my opinion, everyone is overreacting just a little. I feel like a lot of Frog fans didn't grow up watching college baseball or something, so they're looking at it like a college football season. Every game is not the end of the world like it is in football, teams go through peaks and valleys.

If y'all notice, all of our losses have been by very low run totals. We're not getting blown out, we're losing some squeakers to some pretty good teams. My guess would be that we have lost our 7 games by a total of like 16 runs.

Our team ERA is like 3.50, our bullpen ERA is 3.33, we can hit the ball, and we're 20-7. We've had a couple bad games where we left a bunch of runners on base, now we just got to hope we get that turned around. I don't think we can say we don't have any clutch hitters on our team (Holaday and Coats might have something to say about that), we just haven't had many clutch hitters the last couple weeks.


A little slump on offense as far as getting timely hits with runners on. We're getting runners on.

One thing that bothered me last night was having Pena bunt with two strikes, an 0-2 count after failing twice to get the bunt down. He has been swinging a good bat. Schloss trying to avoid a DP ball I suppose, but do a run-and-hit and try to put some pressure on the D.

In the game we lost against SDSU, we smoked some balls, but they were atom hits ... we hit it right at 'em. Unlucky, but still unable to get timely hits with runners on.

Problem is dropping some midweek games against teams ranked our with good RPIs. It matters when looking down the road, way far, probably too far.

It is baseball and there is a lot of it still to play.
 

satis1103

DAOTONPYH EHT LIAH LLA
QUOTE(Houston Frog @ Apr 7 2010, 09:12 AM) [snapback]541608[/snapback]
In my opinion, everyone is overreacting just a little. I feel like a lot of Frog fans didn't grow up watching college baseball or something, so they're looking at it like a college football season. Every game is not the end of the world like it is in football, teams go through peaks and valleys.

If y'all notice, all of our losses have been by very low run totals. We're not getting blown out, we're losing some squeakers to some pretty good teams. My guess would be that we have lost our 7 games by a total of like 16 runs.

Our team ERA is like 3.50, our bullpen ERA is 3.33, we can hit the ball, and we're 20-7. We've had a couple bad games where we left a bunch of runners on base, now we just got to hope we get that turned around. I don't think we can say we don't have any clutch hitters on our team (Holaday and Coats might have something to say about that), we just haven't had many clutch hitters the last couple weeks.

Games like OU and Rice, certainly - no panic button there above and beyond the simple mistakes we make (2-strike bunt, stealing when catcher is clearly a sniper) that cost us an opportunity to squeak out a win.

I don't however consider teams like AFA, BYU and SDSU to be pretty good teams. Squeakers or not we should win those. And even if I'm wrong, the RPI thinks like I do...
 

gdu

Active Member
QUOTE(South Texas Frog @ Apr 7 2010, 02:01 PM) [snapback]541598[/snapback]
The Frogs remind me of the Texas basketball team this year...start out hot and surprise everybody and then absolutely crash. Hope they wake up and right this ship.

They aren't crashing near as bad as Texas basketball but it would be nice if we could win a big one. We shouldn't lose 5 in a row to OU.
 

PurpleBlood87

Active Member
You can't lose midweek games to national powers and hope to host a regional. TCU needed to build on the momentum build by hosting a regional last season, but it is not happening. Not many chances remain for RPI building games.
 

Houston Frog

New Member
QUOTE(PurpleBlood87 @ Apr 7 2010, 09:49 AM) [snapback]541634[/snapback]
You can't lose midweek games to national powers and hope to host a regional.


We did last year
 

TopFrog

Lifelong Frog
QUOTE(PurpleBlood87 @ Apr 7 2010, 09:49 AM) [snapback]541634[/snapback]
You can't lose midweek games to national powers and hope to host a regional.


I was thinking more super regional. I think that's where it will hurt IF we are able to host and/or win a regional.
 

satis1103

DAOTONPYH EHT LIAH LLA
QUOTE(TopFrog @ Apr 7 2010, 10:27 AM) [snapback]541660[/snapback]
I was thinking more super regional. I think that's where it will hurt IF we are able to host and/or win a regional.

You can forget a super regional now unless some major upsets happen in the regional rounds, or some small schools with wimpy venues make it through. At this point, I'll take righting the ship, geting hot and taking our chances on the road. After all, we were a couple plays/clutch hits here and there away from taking a S.R. at the eventual runners-up.
 

TopFrog

Lifelong Frog
QUOTE(satis1103 @ Apr 7 2010, 10:30 AM) [snapback]541663[/snapback]
You can forget a super regional now unless some major upsets happen in the regional rounds

Afraid you are right ... and agree we just need to get everything working together and in synch.
 

leofrog

Active Member
QUOTE(PurpleBlood87 @ Apr 7 2010, 09:49 AM) [snapback]541634[/snapback]
You can't lose midweek games to national powers and hope to host a regional. TCU needed to build on the momentum build by hosting a regional last season, but it is not happening. Not many chances remain for RPI building games.

We were 1-6 against the Big 12 last year, with the only win against Texas Tech. I guess the committe screwed that up.

The problem this year is that the teams we need to be highly ranked have been down. Fullerton looks like they are righting the ship.
 

OldSchoolFrog

Full Member
ROAD TRIP! OU and payback!! I'll still take our boys in the playoffs against these guys. Mid season blues have happened to a lot of championship teams....
 
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