Cowboys Face Sketchy Future
Frank Anderson and the Cowboys will be pressed for a rebound in 2013
By John Helsley
Follow on Twitter @jjhelsley
Before lunch on the second day of the Big 12 Tournament, OSU’s baseball season ended Thursday with a quick ushering from the event.
Two and Q, as they say, with the Q standing for BBQ.
And this team was cooked in so many ways.
An offense that never fully adjusted to the tamer bats.
A core of veterans who stumbled trying to show the way for the club’s young and promising players.
Bad luck robbed the Cowboys of two-thirds of their outfield and one-third of the rotation down the stretch, just as the team seemed to be finding some traction with a long winning streak and a Bedlam series win.
OSU ended the season without No. 2 pitcher Kyle Ottoson, who flashed his potential with a dominant win overOklahomain their non-conference clash, but was eventually shut down due to arm soreness. Also missing were center fielder Jarrett Higgins and left fielder Gabe Wiedenaar, the first injured and the latter wrecking his career by getting involved in drugs.
Already a thin squad, the Cowboys could hardly afford to play shorthanded.
And now their season is over, without a postseason for the second time in three years.
Next year looms critical for the program, as coach Frank Anderson and his staff will be feeling heat to produce.Andersonis finally free from the shackles of reduced scholarships brought by self-reported scholarship allotment mistakes made by the school’s previous administrative support staffs. And there are promising young players in place, including pitcher Jason Hursh, a potential ace who missed this season following Tommy John surgery.
Realistically, however, rising up won’t be easy.
Texasand Baylor are always going to be the favorites in the league, due to locale and premium facilities. And newcomer TCU, already stout, will benefit from its fresh appeal as a Big 12 school.
OSU works with the league’s worst facilities – by far – and that stuff matters to recruits, whether it should or not.
Can the Cowboys climb, restoring the program’s proud history and tradition and establishing themselves as a team that simply waits for its postseason assignment come Memorial Day weekend Monday?
OSU won’t ever return to the glory days of the Ward era. Cowboys fans longing for that should recall them wonderfully and recognize that it was a magical time that just doesn’t exist with any regularity – and can’t be duplicated, not with theTexasteams in the league and Reynolds Stadium in the same disrepair that once plagued Lewis Field.
Still, Cowboys fans have a right to expect success.
And it’ll be on the Cowboys to produce more in 2013.
Cowboys Nearing Desperation Point
OSU must find a way to win its biggest series without a win from ace Andrew Heaney.
By John Helsley
Follow on Twitter @jjhelsley
The Cowboys found themselves scrambling for footing following Thursday night’s loss to Texas A&M in extra innings.
This one hurt.
A 2-0 lead in the ninth. Andrew Heaney dealing on the mound.
Even Aggies coach Rob Childress had trouble envisioning a happy ending.
“I thought we’d all be out of here before the sun went down, the way it was going,” Childress said.
Then all of a sudden, the Aggies tied it. And the teams played into the night, before A&M won it 5-2 with a three-run homer in the 13th.
The Cowboys simply don’t lose with Heaney holding a lead in the ninth.
“He pitched great,” said OSU third baseman Mark Ginther. “It’s his job to keep us in the game and give us a chance. And he did that. He did a great job.
“It’s a tough one to lose.”
Tougher still considering OSU’s precarious position in making the postseason. The sense is, even inside the program, that the Pokes needed to win some games this weekend and get the push that beating a top-10 team like the Aggies provides. And their best shot seemed to come with Heaney dealing like he did for 8 1/3 innings Thursday, before the pitching edge in the series shifted to A&M.
Quickly, the Cowboys talked about flipping the switch to Friday.
“We’ve just to come back,” Ginther said. “We’ve got to get a win tomorrow. There’s no other way to put it. If we pitch and play good defense and hit, we’ll be just fine.”
The Pokes even found a reference point, going back to last season’s difficult 15-inning, 1-0 loss toTexason a Friday night early in conference play after they’d already dropped their league-opening series. Those Cowboys bounced back to win Saturday and Sunday, showing their resolve.
“We lost a game pretty similar to this last year toTexas, came back and won the next two,” said Heaney. “That’s what we’re going to look to do.”
Cowboys Baseball: Doing The Little Things
Robbie Rea slides in for the winning run in Game 3 of Bedlam, but an earlier at-bat was maybe just as big.
By John Helsley
follow on Twitter @jjhelsley
OSU gets a weekend off from Big 12 play – and what should be a weekend off from major competition – with a three-game series against Alcorn State.
So there’s still time to reflect back on Bedlam.
Sunday’s Bedlam finale provided some fascinating inside-the-game moments, the kind of little stuff that true baseball fans acknowledge and enjoy.
And the kind of little stuff that can define a season, as both the Cowboys and Sooners know.
OSU is riding one of the nation’s hottest stretches, because in tight games – which the Cowboys seem to constantly find themselves in – they’re making plays that seemed to avoid them in the season’s first two months.
The little things.
Take this moment from the Sunday game: scoreless, bottom of the third, one out, runner at third for the Cowboys.
Robbie Rea is batting – and battling. He missed a safety squeeze sign early in the count, resulting in Hunter Bailey getting caught stealing second, so he better be battling. Well, Rea keeps fouling off 3-2 pitches from OU’s Dillon Overton, finally drawing a walk on the 10th pitch, leading to a high-pitch, high-stress inning for the Sooner pitcher.
Following the walk, Mark Ginther drove in a run with a double and later scored on Jared Womack’s single.
Overton didn’t get out of the inning, lifted after Womack’s hit.
“I think those are huge,” Cowboys coach Frank Anderson said of Rea’s extended at-bat. “Even if you strike out there, that’s tough on the guy. Especially today. It was very humid. We probably knew (pitchers) weren’t going to finish the game. So one at-bat like that, where you battle and fight and claw and get to double digits, it’s huge.”
Cowboys Right Themselves In Time For Bedlam
Frank Anderson's Cowboys have won eight straight.
By John Helsley
follow on Twitter @jjhelsley
For Cowboys coach Frank Anderson, surviving the early stages of the Big 12 schedule was always the goal.
Anderson wouldn’t limit expectations for success, preparing his club to go win during that first month of conference play. And “go win” are the operative words, as OSU found itself on the short end of an opening league schedule, facing three road series among the first four weekends.
And yet, it’s tough to win on the road in the Big 12, especially in places like Waco and Austin and even Columbia, which presented the early road challenges for the Cowboys. So when the Pokes went 1-5 the first two Big 12 weekends at Missouri and Baylor and 2-7 in the three road series overall, Anderson kept his team playing hard and pushing.
Now they’re 11-7 in the league and tied for third in the conference standings with Texas A&M, following a weekend sweep of Kansas State in Manhattan.
And just in time for Bedlam.
Oklahoma climbed back over .500 with a weather-shortened, two-game road sweep of Kansas, moving to 9-8 in the league, alone in fourth place.
The Cowboys already own a win over the Sooners, after taking last week’s non-conference clash in Stillwater. But this weekend’s Bedlam series counts in the standings and carries heavy intrigue into each team’s postseason hopes.
A month ago, Anderson and the Cowboys couldn’t count on that.
Now they’ve won a season-best eight straight games and have swept back-to-back Big 12 series for the first time since 2008.
Cowboy Baseball: Safe or Out?
OSU's Davis Duren (38) has his hand stepped on by Phil McCormick (27) of Missouri as he touches first base in the top of the ninth inning during the Big 12 baseball tournament game between Oklahoma State University and the University of Missouri at RedHawks Field at Brickown in Oklahoma City, Thursday, May 26, 2011. Duren was called out on the play. Missouri won, 6-5. Photo by Nate Billings, The Oklahoman
By John Helsley
follow on twitter @jjhelsley
Appears we owe an apology to umpire Mark Winters, it wasn’t him who botched the call at first base on Davis Duren in OSU’s Thursday night loss to Missouri. Both the pregame lineup sheet and the postgame box score listed Winters as working first base, yet it was Mike Morris on the call.
The reference to a botched call above, however, remains. Duren was safe. Here’s proof from photographer Nate Billings of The Oklahoman. In this excellent photo, you can see Mizzou pitcher Phil McCormick stepping on Duren’s hand on first base, meaning Duren was there first.
It was a huge play in the game, as the Cowboys were getting to the Tigers closer. And even with two outs, they would have at least had the bases loaded, and Devin Shines may have scored all the way from second on the slow-developing play.
As it was, the call sucked momentum from the Pokes, and immediately transferred it to the Tigers, even though they’d just blown a 5-3 lead and found themselves tied 5-5 going to the bottom of the ninth.
Of course, Mizzou won it in the bottom of the ninth. And now the Cowboys must attempt the difficult path through the loser’s bracket to make Sunday’s title game. More on that in a bit.
Now, a case for the umpire, Morris.
On close plays at first base — bang-bang plays they call them — umpires depend on both their eyes and their ears. They can’t watch both the glove and the base, so they fix their eyes on one and listen for the sound of the other, most likely the foot on the bag.
By sliding head first — a move that’s never a good idea — Duren removed one of the bangs from the equation.
So let’s cut Morris some slack.
On to today’s game, an elimination contest agaisnt Texas — who wants it more?
Longhorns coach Augie Garrido is on record as saying he’s not interested in taxing his pitching staff at the Big 12 Tournament, not with UT’s status as a national seed and host role in the NCAA Tournament all but assured.
So what about the Cowboys? While not in the lofty position of the Horns, the Cowboys are in the NCAA Tournament and likely can’t do much to change their place, which is a low 2 or high 3 seed in a regional. But as one of the “local” teams, there may be more pressure on OSU to do well in Bricktown, and not just fade out to prepare for next week’s more important games.
We’ll see.
Who will Anderson pitch today? In a text message this morning, he said he’d been “up since 5:30 (a.m.) trying to figure that out.” Another indication of how he views the tournament.
Andrew Heaney, Jason Hursh and Randy McCurry are the pitchers with the most starting experience. But Anderson also said he liked the way Blake Barnes threw in relief against Missouri, indicating that he could be in play if the Cowboys stay alive in the bracket.
Stay tuned. And follow me on twitter @jjhelsley for in-game updates.
And Now, For Something Completely Different… OSU Baseball
By John Helsley
follow me on twitter @jjhelsley
Cowboys baseball coach Frank Anderson likes to keep a quiet approach to who he’s recruiting, with news on signings or offers limited to what flows from the players and their local media outlets.
It’s an effort to keep from providing too much information to scouts, who may look at a player differently, or more closely, if they know he’s going to a school the caliber of OSU.
Anderson isn’t alone in his approach. Some coaches prefer the silent treatment, until the players are securely enrolled and attending school. Some coaches freely and openly talk about their recruits well in advance, even using it as a means to enhance their recruiting of other players.
Well, Anderson’s latest class has finally been revealed, with the addition of 13 newcomers: nine from the Juco ranks, three high schoolers and one Division I transfer who will be eligible immediately. Five were taken in the June MLB Draft.
This stands to be a critical class for the Cowboys, who have failed to make the Big 12 Tournament the past two seasons.
Anderson will be looking to mesh the new faces with a solid core of returning players led by Davis Duren, Mark Ginther, Luis Uribe, Andrew Heaney and Mike Strong.
“This has a chance to be a really special class,” Anderson said. “We were fortunate with how with came out of the draft, both with the new guys and our existing team. There are a bunch of pitchers in the group, and that should really help us.
“Along with the scholarship guys, we brought in a lot of walk-ons, and the competition level in practice is really high. We’ve been doing a lot of evaluation, and we’ve been really pleased with how things have been going.”
The plum of the class is right-handed pitcher Jason Hursh of Carrollton, Texas, a power arm who was taken in the sixth round of the draft by the Pittsburgh Pirates. Andrew Heck should offer an instant upgrade on offense, after transferring from Duquesne, which dropped its program, making him eligible right away. Heck was a first-team Atlantic 10 All-Conference Team after leading the Dukes in nine offensive categories.
The recruits:
Joel Atkinson, SS, San Clemente, Calif. (San Clemente HS) – As a senior at San Clemente High School, Atkinson hit .310 with two home runs and 12 stolen bases. That came on the heels of a junior campaign that saw him hit .391 with 14 doubles and 10 stolen bases to earn first-team all-league, all-county and team MVP honors.
Hunter Bailey, INF, Cedar Park, Texas (McLennan CC) – As a sophomore in the JUCO ranks last season, Bailey hit .384 with 34 RBIs, 16 doubles and 15 stolen bases and was named a North Texas Junior College Athletic Association All-Conference first-team second baseman.
Blake Barnes, RHP, Prosper, Texas (Howard College) – In 17 appearances as a freshman at Howard, Barnes was 9-1 with three saves and a 3.27 ERA and helped the team to a national championship. As a sophomore, he was 2-3 with a team-high three saves and was drafted in the 48th round by the Tampa Bay Rays in June.
Andrew Heck, RHP/OF, Pittsburgh, Pa. (Duquesne) – Heck played his first three seasons at Duquesne, but the school dropped the baseball program after the 2010 season. As a result, Heck transferred to OSU and will be eligible to play in 2011. As a junior last season, Heck earned Atlantic 10 First-Team All-Conference honors after leading the Dukes in nine offensive and four pitching categories. He hit .408 with 10 homers, 15 stolen bases and 49 RBIs and set school records with 91 hits and 25 doubles. On the mound, Heck picked up three wins and tossed three complete games in nine starts. He was named a Top 10 pro prospect in the Jayhawk League by Baseball America following the summer of 2010.
Hunter Herrera, RHP, San Diego, Calif. (San Diego City College) – As a sophomore at San Diego CC last season, Herrera was 9-2 with a 2.54 ERA in 15 appearances, including 13 starts. He tossed two complete games, recorded two saves and racked up 104 strikeouts in 92 innings, and opponents hit just .199 against him. He earned All-America and all-conference honors and was named the Pacific Coast Conference Player of the Year.
Jason Hursh, RHP, Carrollton, Texas (Trinity Christian Academy) – After a standout prep career, Hursh was drafted in the sixth round of the 2010 MLB Draft by the Pittsburgh Pirates with the 177th overall pick. He has a fastball that reaches the mid 90s to go along with a very good curveball. He was a three-year letterman in baseball and football at Trinity Christian. A two-year starter in baseball, Hursh was 11-2 with a 2.47 ERA and 123 strikeouts in 70 innings as a senior and earned district MVP and first-team all-state honors. He was a first-team all-district selection and honorable mention all-state performer as a junior after a season in which he recorded 48 strikeouts in 28 innings and had a 1.45 ERA. He was invited to the Perfect Game National Showcase and Area Code Baseball Games. Hursh was an all-state kicker and punter during his senior season on the gridiron.
Zach Johnson, INF, San Ramon, Calif. (Ohlone College) – Johnson was drafted by the Oakland Athletics in the 48th round of the 2010 MLB Draft after earning First-Team All-Coast Conference honors at Ohlone College last season. In 74 regular season games with the Renegades, Johnson hit .375 with 18 homers and 66 RBIs. He led Ohlone in hitting with a .405 batting average and 12 home runs in 2010.
Chris Marlowe, RHP, Spring, Texas (Navarro College) – Marlowe spent time as a pitcher and shortstop at Navarro and was drafted in the 21st round of this year’s MLB Draft by the Toronto Blue Jays. As a sophomore, he led all JUCO pitchers by averaging 17.3 strikeouts per nine innings through mid-May, and he finished the season with 61 strikeouts in just 32 innings of work en route to a 4-2 record and a 2.84 ERA. Marlowe pitched in the Prospect League over the summer and was named the fourth-best pro prospect in that league by Baseball America.
Josh Neilson, RHP, Lawton, Okla. (Vernon College) – An Oklahoma native, Neilson starred at Lawton High School before spending the last two seasons at Vernon College, where he earned all-conference accolades.
Gabe Weidenaar, INF/OF, Bozeman, Mont. (College of Southern Nevada) – As a sophomore last season, Weidenaar hit .371 with seven homers and 39 RBIs in a wooden bat league. He also had 13 stolen bases and was named to the All-SWAC second team after leading his team to the 2010 JUCO World Series.
Vincent Wheeland, RHP, Turlock, Calif. (Turlock HS) – Wheeland capped a stellar prep career at Turlock High School by going 13-0 with a 0.74 ERA as a senior. In 85 innings of work, he racked up 147 strikeouts and issued just 18 walks. He earned all-state honors and was named district, league and team MVP.
Jared Womack, C/OF, Tampa, Fla. (Ranger College) – Womack spent his freshman season at Oklahoma State in 2009, where he appeared in 12 games and hit .258 with a homer and six RBIs. Following that season, he transferred to Ranger for his sophomore year and hit .404 with 21 home runs and 54 RBIs and turned in a .918 slugging percentage before returning to the Cowboy program.
Vance Woodruff, RHP, Forney, Texas (Grayson County College) – As a freshman at Grayson, Woodruff pitched in 12 games and was 2-2 with three saves in 23.1 innings. Following a sophomore season in which he made 16 appearances and was 3-3 with 56 strikeouts in 55.1 innings, Woodruff was drafted in the 40th round of the ’10 MLB Draft by the Minnesota Twins.
Seeking Receivers
Hubert Anyiam led the Cowboys in receptions in 2010.
By John Helsley
twitter @jjhelsley
New OSU offensive coordinator Dana Holgorsen is searching for capable wideouts, saying the Cowboys need at least eight receivers he can count on.
And he’s not overstating the need.
Now, before you go pointing out that nobody has eight great receivers — and accurately so — keep in mind that Holgorsen’s offense is a different monster. It’s a passing offense, operating with four wide on nearly every snap. The Cowboys are about to chunk it 50-plus times per game, which is a lot of running around for the receivers.
They’ll need a break. And they’ll need guys who can come in and keep the offense going and command respect from the defense.
So the emphasis isn’t on eight great receivers, although a few great or at least really good ones would be nice. It’s about waves of receivers who can do the job and keep moving the chains when the top targets are on the sideline catching their breath.
In Holgorsen’s attack at Houston last year, 19 different Cougars caught passes and 12 of those finished with double-digit receptions. And of those, seven caught a minimum of 22 passes and four grabbed 70 or more.
Now, contrast that with OSU’s version of the spread in 2009. The leading receiver, Hubert Anyiam, totaled 42 catches. Running back Keith Toston was next with 25.
Holgorsen utilized his backs as receivers, too, as well all saw in Houston’s upset win over the Cowboys in Stillwater. And he’ll flip the ball to Kendall Hunter a bunch this fall.
But the passing attack is built around the quarterback and those guys out wide.
And right now, Holgorsen claims faith in four: Justin Blackmon, Tracy Moore, Josh Cooper and Anyiam.
More are needed. And that’s one of the pressing issues of this preseason camp.
——-
Going, Going….
Cowboys baseball coach Frank Anderson anxiously watches the clock tonight, with the Major League deadline for signing draft picks arrives at 11 p.m CT.
Anderson’s recruiting class featured 13 players who were drafted. Already, two of the elite prospects, shortstop J.T. Realmuto and pitcher Zach Cates, have signed.
Anderson always thought he’d get Realmuto, who went much higher than anyone projected as a third-round pick of the Florida Marlins. And the Marlins didn’t go get him that high to let him return to school.
Still, plenty of OSU’s signees — and some potential returning players — are still in play to report to school. And Anderson hopes it remains that way as the Cowboys try to shake two straight seasons of missing the Big 12 Tournament.
Bedlam Baseball: Kicking Up Memories
By John Helsley
Bonus Bedlam proved to be a hit, with an interesting, intriguing and entertaining game delivered in the first on-campus Bedlam baseball game since 1996.
Beautiful night. Big flies. Big plays. Big blunders. Big crowd.
Left me wanting more. (More on that in Friday’s paper).
And I’m talking more Bedlam on-campus baseball, not more of the other stuff that has at times in this series, shall we say, livened up the action.
The brawl. The beer. The bickering.
In researching the advance story for this game, I came across some classic Tom Holliday quotes concerning Bedlam. And, hey, Holliday was a classic quote, after any game.
I remember going back to the press box after games and reviewing all that Holliday said and fretting over the fact that I couldn’t get it all in the paper. That, of course, was in the days before blogs, where overflow can live a prosperous life.
Anyway, check out this stuff from Holliday, obviously in reference to the old days of the Bedlam series, probably at All-Sports Stadium:
“It was always fun. And there was always tension. And there were players wanting to fight with each other. And there was stupid stuff going on, people wanting to fight with each other in the stands.
“I can still picture people throwing beer at each other, people fighting in the stands, somebody smacking somebody and being arrested. You could see that just in between innings.”
The action on the field was pretty good, too.
And so it was Tuesday night.
And so it will be May 7-9, when Bedlam resumes in the bigger ballparks in Tulsa and Oklahoma City.
Thanks to Bonus Bedlam, I’m looking forward to it.
