I'll start by saying I'm just a dude. I mean that. This is for entertainment purposes only and any negative perception towards anyone should be accompanied by the reality that these guys know more baseball than I ever will.
Nevertheless, here is my opinion on where we are.
First, I'll start with my reaction in July to the hire
ASU (Willie Bloomquist): C-
I love the people and inside the lines this is an A hire. But, I'm nervous about the resumes. Bloomquist, Goff, and Mueller are amazing baseball guys. But, so much of winning at the college level happens outside the lines and is about being locked in on scholarship allocation, recruiting relationships, knowing the club circuit, and having connections for the transfer market. Before we switched JK with the SDSU pitching coach this grade would have been higher but without JK on staff we are looking at a "learn as we go" situation. All of my concerns have to do with the lack of college experience, so if this staff can ride the success in year 1 to a solid year 2 then all of the sudden this coaching staff has experience and we are ready to rock and roll.
Coming off of 2 pretty bad eras in ASU Baseball I wanted us to swing for the fences here and instead it feels like Ray Anderson went cheap.
Who I would have hired: Former OSU baseball coach Pat Casey
What is a little bit concerning is this coaching staff's strength was supposed to be elevating players on the field and the learning curve was supposed to be outside the lines (as defined above). The outside the lines part is TBD (with lower than expected early returns but still TBD), but, the player progression has been substandard. Again, that's concerning for me.
With this season over (barring a miraculous turnaround or run in the P12T) I look to this off season and what the next step looks like. McClain, La Flam, Lampe, Davis, Higgins, Baez, Meyer, BVK, Levine, Long, Tulloch, Luckham, and Walker are either potentially or likely names that aren't here next season for various reasons. Not to mention potential transfers out that I didn't list.
Many of the current players that will be returning next year might be described as "serviceable" this season. Probably not a guy there that you would build a line up or a rotation around with confidence. Not to say they can't develop into that.
So, where does that leave us?
In my opinion, we need to hit the transfer portal and the JC ranks hard this off season.
That begs the question, "Do we have the coaching staff to do that" and my answer is no. Our staff as constructed does not have the relationships with club coaches. We don't have the rolodex that is so vital for transfers. Our recruiting coordinator Sam Peraza has a private twitter account with only 2k followers and the country can't even see his posts lol. Compare that to Jason Kelly who posts multiple times per week on twitter promoting LSU and has 11.5k followers. Which one do you think recruits better? At least Peraza has a twitter, even if it is locked, Mike Goff doesn't even have social media. I'm sorry, but, if we are counting on these guys to fix this roster through the transfer portal or by connecting with 17 year olds then a no instagram means I'm praying that Sparky in heaven helps us.
FWIW, Travis Buck "gets it". Don't get me wrong, he has a huge learning curve as well. But, he needs help. But, even our coach that "gets it" has recently compared kids in 2022 to kids 15 years ago which is a comment that screams "I'm figuring this out as I go". Although he seems to be getting it from my view on the outside.
I still love Bloomquist and think he can be an All Timer here. But, it's got to be with a staff that understands THE COLLEGE GAME outside the lines better than what we are seeing because this year has made it obvious that we aren't going to "out baseball" some pretty damn good coaches in the Pac-12 and beyond.
My #1 target this off season would be to bring in the GCU pitching coach. He played with Willie at ASU in 1998! He was the HC of CAC which is a traditional ASU pipeline loaded with talent and he knows the valley. Not to mention GCU is pretty dang good.
My #2 target would be to bring in a monster recruiter to be the third base coach and the infield coach. Willie can do a lot of the technical part of baseball infield and base running. Get a guy that crushes it in living rooms.
Pair those 2 coaches with Buck and Willie and let's freaking do this. Supposedly one of Willie's strengths was he would have great booster relations. Smith raised the money for facilities now Willie needs to go raise the money for an improved coaching staff. Sell them on the vision. Will he? It was something Murphy was unwilling to do. I bring that up because Willie is a Murphy disciple and Esmay (another guy with Murphy connections) didn't do it either from what I understand. Let's go Willie get it done! Sell your program to the deep donor pockets and get you some help.
My worry is that if he waits another season to do this the roster will be in such a hole that he won't recover.
What are your thoughts?
Nevertheless, here is my opinion on where we are.
First, I'll start with my reaction in July to the hire
ASU (Willie Bloomquist): C-
I love the people and inside the lines this is an A hire. But, I'm nervous about the resumes. Bloomquist, Goff, and Mueller are amazing baseball guys. But, so much of winning at the college level happens outside the lines and is about being locked in on scholarship allocation, recruiting relationships, knowing the club circuit, and having connections for the transfer market. Before we switched JK with the SDSU pitching coach this grade would have been higher but without JK on staff we are looking at a "learn as we go" situation. All of my concerns have to do with the lack of college experience, so if this staff can ride the success in year 1 to a solid year 2 then all of the sudden this coaching staff has experience and we are ready to rock and roll.
Coming off of 2 pretty bad eras in ASU Baseball I wanted us to swing for the fences here and instead it feels like Ray Anderson went cheap.
Who I would have hired: Former OSU baseball coach Pat Casey
What is a little bit concerning is this coaching staff's strength was supposed to be elevating players on the field and the learning curve was supposed to be outside the lines (as defined above). The outside the lines part is TBD (with lower than expected early returns but still TBD), but, the player progression has been substandard. Again, that's concerning for me.
With this season over (barring a miraculous turnaround or run in the P12T) I look to this off season and what the next step looks like. McClain, La Flam, Lampe, Davis, Higgins, Baez, Meyer, BVK, Levine, Long, Tulloch, Luckham, and Walker are either potentially or likely names that aren't here next season for various reasons. Not to mention potential transfers out that I didn't list.
Many of the current players that will be returning next year might be described as "serviceable" this season. Probably not a guy there that you would build a line up or a rotation around with confidence. Not to say they can't develop into that.
So, where does that leave us?
In my opinion, we need to hit the transfer portal and the JC ranks hard this off season.
That begs the question, "Do we have the coaching staff to do that" and my answer is no. Our staff as constructed does not have the relationships with club coaches. We don't have the rolodex that is so vital for transfers. Our recruiting coordinator Sam Peraza has a private twitter account with only 2k followers and the country can't even see his posts lol. Compare that to Jason Kelly who posts multiple times per week on twitter promoting LSU and has 11.5k followers. Which one do you think recruits better? At least Peraza has a twitter, even if it is locked, Mike Goff doesn't even have social media. I'm sorry, but, if we are counting on these guys to fix this roster through the transfer portal or by connecting with 17 year olds then a no instagram means I'm praying that Sparky in heaven helps us.
FWIW, Travis Buck "gets it". Don't get me wrong, he has a huge learning curve as well. But, he needs help. But, even our coach that "gets it" has recently compared kids in 2022 to kids 15 years ago which is a comment that screams "I'm figuring this out as I go". Although he seems to be getting it from my view on the outside.
I still love Bloomquist and think he can be an All Timer here. But, it's got to be with a staff that understands THE COLLEGE GAME outside the lines better than what we are seeing because this year has made it obvious that we aren't going to "out baseball" some pretty damn good coaches in the Pac-12 and beyond.
My #1 target this off season would be to bring in the GCU pitching coach. He played with Willie at ASU in 1998! He was the HC of CAC which is a traditional ASU pipeline loaded with talent and he knows the valley. Not to mention GCU is pretty dang good.
My #2 target would be to bring in a monster recruiter to be the third base coach and the infield coach. Willie can do a lot of the technical part of baseball infield and base running. Get a guy that crushes it in living rooms.
Pair those 2 coaches with Buck and Willie and let's freaking do this. Supposedly one of Willie's strengths was he would have great booster relations. Smith raised the money for facilities now Willie needs to go raise the money for an improved coaching staff. Sell them on the vision. Will he? It was something Murphy was unwilling to do. I bring that up because Willie is a Murphy disciple and Esmay (another guy with Murphy connections) didn't do it either from what I understand. Let's go Willie get it done! Sell your program to the deep donor pockets and get you some help.
My worry is that if he waits another season to do this the roster will be in such a hole that he won't recover.
What are your thoughts?
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