cam weston
The good news from the weekend is that Michigan Baseball managed to captivate the entire UofM fanbase in a way that they haven't since late June 2019. The bad news is that it ended like the 2016 Ohio State game, with a controversial (non)use of replay sending the Maize & Blue faithful to scour LinkedIn pages to find out the past of the official who hurt us so we could add it to the grand conspiracy folder. It was a busy weekend down in Louisville, KY, and the events of yesterday afternoon ended the 2022 season for Michigan Baseball, which means it's time for the post-season column. I'm going to give you all what you want and will talk plenty about The Review, but we'll also then turn attention to the 2023 season and the future of the program later on:
Recapping Louisville
Michigan faced Oregon in the first game of the regional on Friday night and they got off to a good start, taking a 3-0 lead through three innings thanks to a Jimmy Obertop HR. Connor O'Halloran had a decent start, but let the Ducks tie it at 3, before Michigan surged back ahead 6-3 on another Obertop longball. Yet again the Ducks answered, this time off Michigan's Chase Allen in the seventh, but a Matt Frey HR in the eighth put Michigan back up. This time, it was for good. Cam Weston finished it off with a two inning save, and the Wolverines won 8-6.
On Saturday, Michigan played their first of what would be three games against Louisville. They went to Walker Cleveland as the opener, and he got only four outs and ceded a run. Noah Rennard was admirable in mop-up duty, and he would give way to Jacob Denner. The Wolverine bats faced Cardinal ace Jared Poland and after looking silly through eight batters, they broke through in style, battering Poland for seven runs (six earned) in 4.2 IP. Clark Elliott and Joe Stewart both went deep, and then Joey Velazquez and Riley Bertram RBI singles helped spike the Michigan lead. It was 7-2 after five, and the combination of Denner, Allen, and Weston got the game to the finish line, pitching through jams most of the afternoon, but the Wolverines hung on to win 7-3.
That put Michigan into the Regional Final on Sunday, where they awaited their opponent. Louisville beat Oregon in a high-scoring affair, and that set up a rematch. With many of their best arms taxed after throwing plenty of pitches the preceding couple of days, the Wolverines had to rely on the reserve options. If you have read any of my preceding baseball columns, you had a pretty good feeling of how this one was gonna go from the jump. Michigan does not have the pitching depth to keep an offense like Louisville's in check without their best guys, and the bats mailed it in as well. The result was NSFW, a 20-1 final score, to push the regional to a winner-take-all Game 7 yesterday.
[Paul Sherman]
The two teams met again and it got off to a good start, with Michigan notching two in the top of the first off hits from Elliott, Stewart, and Frey. Things went south pretty quickly, though, as O'Halloran took the bump for the bottom of the first. It was a decision that was a bit confusing to me, given that O'Halloran had thrown 93 pitches on Friday and had just two days of rest in between. He didn't look as sharp, allowing the first two baserunners to reach, but then did a good job to get the next two outs. With two on and two out and a 3-2 count, Levi Usher laced a double to right to plate a pair. That began a disastrous series of events, as the next seven hitters would reach(!). A single, HBP, single HBP, single, walk, and error. That debacle led to O'Halloran being yanked, and Allen entering to finish the frame. It was 7-2 L'Ville after one.
Michigan would get one run back on a Frey HR, but inclement weather would roll in, putting the game into a protracted weather delay. When it resumed, things continued on the same path until the top of the fifth, when an Elliott solo HR and a massive Obertop 3-run bomb tied the game at 7. An inning later, a Ted Burton HR and a Joe Stewart single made it 9-7 Wolverines. Those who had given up hope started to believe, and Cam Weston was cruising. He got two out in the eighth, but as his pitch count rose, he didn't look quite as sharp. The second out in that inning was hit hard but right at Frey, and then Weston surrendered a walk (squeezed by the home plate umpire, but still).
Jack Payton came up to the plate and on a 1-0 pitch, he scorched a ball to left field that missed clearing the fence by only a couple feet. Jordon Rogers played it quickly, threw it in to Riley Bertram, who made the relay to Ted Burton at second. The swipe came across on a bang-bang play. It was ruled safe but a review was quickly triggered. The angle shown seemed pretty definitive:
Ruled safe even after review... pic.twitter.com/X1tZImFI81
— Mr Matthew CFB 🇺🇦 (@MrMatthewCFB) June 6, 2022
The glove hits the fingers, we see the fingers bend back a bit and the glove move upwards, indicating contact, and then the hand touches the bag. Clear cut, the definition of indisputable video evidence. But the review dragged on and reached its mind numbing conclusion: safe. And this time, the ball in fact did lie. Levi Usher struck again, with a 2RBI single that tied the game. Despite Cam Weston now getting tagged repeatedly, Erik Bakich left him in. A seeming strike was called a ball, and right after that, Cameron Masterman teed off for a two-run blast:
B8 | 😤😤😤😤😤😤😤
— Louisville Baseball (@LouisvilleBSB) June 6, 2022
💻 https://t.co/wY15497eSz#GoCards | @Cam_Masterman pic.twitter.com/4Sojh9ql6n
Michigan did get the leadoff runner on in the ninth, but couldn't get to the Cardinals' closer Michael Prosecky. 11-9 loss, season over. No Super Regionals.
[AFTER THE JUMP: Season takeaways and 2023]
Yesterday I supplied an update for softball, and today we will circle back on Michigan Baseball, which I haven't written about much since the season preview back in mid-February. The team is currently 20-15 overall and 6-3 in the Big Ten and outside the fringes of the NCAA Tournament bubble. Just like yesterday, we're going to follow the format of doing a recap of the season up to this point, talk about developments in the season from a personnel standpoint, and then what to watch for the rest of the way:
A Short Season Recap
Michigan started their season down in Arlington, TX, in the College Baseball Showdown against three Big 12 opponents. In the first game against a ranked Texas Tech team, Michigan held leads of 4-0, 5-1, and 6-3 throughout the game before heading into the ninth with a 6-5 lead. Willie Weiss was tasked with shutting the game down and proved unable to close it out, allowing the Red Raiders to walk it off. Michigan rebounded to hammer Kansas State the next night before dropping the final game of that weekend 6-1 to Oklahoma. It was a bit of an empty feeling only taking one of three, but Michigan showed they could battle.
From there, the Wolverines handled UT-Arlington, Seton Hall, and FIU before heading to Boca Raton to take on FAU. In the first game against the Owls, pitching faltered yet again to blow a late lead. Michigan led 8-6 in the eighth, but the late inning arms couldn't get it done. They salvaged the series split with a 20-13 (yes, that was the real score) win the next night and then Michigan was off to the Keith LeClair Classic in Greenville, NC. They beat a ranked Maryland team 7-4, but dropped tight games to ECU and Indiana State after falling behind early in both.
Tito Flores [JD Scott]
Michigan played a couple more P5 opponents on the road before heading home to Ann Arbor. They went to the Bluegrass State to take on Louisville, which included a memorable blizzard mid-game leading to the suspension of the contest. Michigan won the blizzard game 16-7 after it resumed, but dropped the other two. The last stop on the early season tour was Nashville, for a battle with #4 Vanderbilt. That was Michigan's best chance for a marquee victory and once again, they had it in their jaws before pitching fumbled it away. The Maize & Blue led 4-2 entering the bottom of the ninth, but Willie Weiss allowed a two-out double to tie it, and then Vandy won on a walk-off passed ball, 5-4. Not great!
Back in Ann Arbor a few days later, the Wolverines played host to Dayton in a three-game series and swept them rather easily. A mid-week trip to Xavier ended in an 8-2 loss and after that, B1G play got going. Michigan is 6-3 in the B1G at the moment, losing 2 of 3 to Iowa, but taking 2 of 3 from Nebraska and sweeping MSU in lopsided fashion this past weekend. Those results are mostly fine, but there have been disappointments in the mid-week games. Against two seemingly easy opponents, Oakland and Purdue-Fort Wayne, Michigan dropped both at home, and both by multiple runs. They were also unable to be competitive down in South Bend against #10 Notre Dame.
[AFTER THE JUMP: Positional Takeaways and the Stretch Run]
As is customary, one week after the NCAA softball season got underway, baseball is about to do the same. Indeed, Michigan Baseball is set to begin its season tonight against #14 Texas Tech in Arlington as part of the College Baseball Showdown. The Wolverines finished last season's COVID-modified season with a 27-19 record, good for 3rd in the B1G (27-17 in conference), but they were quickly broomed out of the South Bend Regional by UCONN and Central Michigan. Obviously there is a hunger for redemption inside the program as Erik Bakich chases his first regular season conference title, and the 2022 squad figures to be an intriguing group, with some legitimate stars but also a ton of question marks.
Your author is not a Michigan Baseball aficionado the way he is with softball, so I can't say that this will be as detailed of a preview as last week's softball one was, but my goal will be to cover all the bases (pun intended) and be a bare bones guide. After all, for a program as unfortunately under-covered as Michigan Baseball, any coverage at a major outlet such as this one is an upgrade, so I'm doing my best to chip that in at a basic level and bring a little more awareness to this less-talked about team. For the narrative of the preview, I'm pooling the statistics with my own knowledge, as well as the knowledge of that of my one-time colleague Austin Falco, perhaps the biggest Michigan Baseball fan and knowledge bank on the program out there.
Returning Hitters in the Lineup
Michigan rolls over a good collection of top talent who should provide thump in the middle of the order thanks to a stellar junior class. Ted Burton is one of the B1G's best hitters after slashing .342/.434/.667/1.101 in 2021, with all of those values ranking in the top ten in the league last season. His 7 HR weren't overwhelming, but he didn't break into the everyday lineup until a bit later in the year, so they (+ his 12 doubles) represented a high percentage of his total hits and hence the monstrous SLG clip. Burton gets on base and he hits for power, and will give the Michigan order a huge amount of punch. He's set to be Michigan's everyday third baseman.
The other two big boppers who give Burton protection are his fellow juniors Tito Flores and Jimmy Obertop. Flores can play the outfield or 1B and he got on base at a nearly identical .429 clip with an also identical 7 HRs, plus five steals. Obertop is your traditional slugger with monstrous power, not quite the doubles hitter of Burton, but his 11 HRs were tied for fifth in the conference last season. One of those 11 was a walk-off two run HR to cap in an improbable comeback against MSU in March that your author got to be on the broadcast for (and thus it is my voice in the below video):
MICHIGAN WINS!!!!!!
— Michigan Baseball (@umichbaseball) March 21, 2021
OBERTOP GOES OPPO 2-RUN BLAST & WE WIN 8-7 with 8 runs in the 9th! LFG #NCAABaseball #GoBlue! pic.twitter.com/vQC3laFjli
The downside for Obertop as a HR-focused hitter is he does struggle with the strikeout, an ugly 59 K in 153 ABs. Michigan would like to see that ratio come down in 2022, but you're not going to complain about having a .900 OPS guy in your lineup. The question with Obertop is where he fits in defensively, as it sounds like Michigan is going to try him behind the plate, but his experience there at the NCAA level is limited. If he can't fit behind the dish, DH or 1B is a logical place for him.
Those three will likely be joined by Clark Elliott, who isn't the same caliber of hitter (yet) but should be a consistent everyday hitter. Elliott is an outfielder who got on at over .400 last season and though he doesn't have a Burton or Overtop level of power, he did have 8 steals on 10 attempts, adding that speed dimension. Riley Bertram is a returning starter, but the kind where you are half-hoping that someone else steps up and takes his job, because Bertram was brutal in 2021 offensively. The Wolverines' starting 2B posted an OPS of .605 thanks to a very low batting average and being a soft hitter, zero HRs and only 6 XBHs total. There was a lot of hope for Bertram earlier in his career, and perhaps he can make a leap at the dish still, but right now he's merely a blackhole in the order, one where you're looking for an upgrade.
Jordon Rogers got nearly the same number of at bats as Bertram despite appearing in seven fewer games (and starts), being able to play both the OF and catcher. Rogers was a decently entertaining player last year, stroking some clutch hits against Rutgers, Minnesota, and PSU, but he still was a .682 OPS hitter. His experience in the lineup means Rogers will get his shot to stick for Michigan, but perhaps he's not sharpie'd into the lineup yet.
Elliott, Obertop, Burton, and Flores are four players who should anchor the top/middle of the lineup as known quantities. Bertram and Rogers would seem to have better than 50% odds to be consistent faces somewhere in the lineup as well. It is the remainder of the order that is more in flux.
[AFTER THE JUMP: hitters, pitchers, and opponents!]
24