Fall Ball - 10/07/12

[Gatorgal04]

We were originally told practice started today at noon. I walk up and hear the batting cages in use. Great sound! However now we find out practice is at 1:30 so I think I'll mosey over to the Copper Monkey for lunch. Be back later.

[Gatorgal04]

Pitchers are doing infield practice. Working on fielding grounders to 1B, picking up grounds to SS, throwing to 2B & 3B.

[Gatorgal04]

Outfields getting practice catching high balls over their shoulder, and then running up for grounders.

[Gatorgal04]

Couldn't stay any longer. No rosters available, but we might get them at Tuesday's practice.

[gatorbogey]

very 1st practice, i assume?

should be interesting to see who emerges and starts this season. have alot of very big shoes to fill. kind of a 'no pressure' - in a way - type season. low expectations. sometimes, this type of year can have alot of pleasant surprises. this year i feel we'll see a continuous improvement curve for the team. might have alot of bumps in the road along the way.

[Gatorgal04]

Quick update. Yes, that was the very first practice. I stopped by one night last week and caught a lot of BP. It was situational, like "hit an infield line drive" and hit and run practice, so nothing went yard. No scrimmage that night. Still no roster, but I recorded their numbers.

I'm out of town this week, but will stop by when I get back the middle of next week and see what's going on.

[TheBoss]

I spent a couple of very pleasant, very sunny hours at practice yesterday afternoon- 10/14. I have no deep analysis to offer beyond feeling that the team will be built on returning players. Five falls ago, I had no trouble spotting freshman Preston Tucker in the batting cage and none of the frosh performed at that level with their bats or gloves. BP went smoothly, but there were no boomers mixed in with the line drive guys.

There was a six-inning scrimage with decent defense and pitching that limited the batting performance. It appeared that the lineups were blue first string/ orange second string, other than TThompson as DH for the orange. After Zack Powers hit a soft single into LF off Johnny Magliozzi, Thompson popped a nice dinger to right. The blue scratched out a run and there was a smattering of other hits.

The blue lineup had Gushue C, frosh #29 1b, Turgeon 2b, Tobias 3b, Richie Martin SS, Shafer LF, Harrison Bader CF, Ramjit RF. Martin wore 12 Tobias 11, Bader 8. Martin was smooth at SS, especially on flyballs down the LF line. Dent and Powers clearly were the strongest orange position players for the day. Gushue's 2-3 throws to second had no chance to get runners, but it's likely the pitchers were to blame for the SBs.

The 2013 team likely will be dominated by vets, but its substance still is to be determined.