In either talking about baseball portal stuff or softball portal stuff what I find amusing are players thinking they are better than what they really are. I will say this about the portal stuff. The portal stuff has certainly invite the concepts of certain groups of players all over the place all over the country who believe or who think they are the greatest thing ever even though their actual play on the field during the season does not really support it. When coaches decide after the season (baseball or softball) to evaluate you and what you need to improve upon some players and their parents either will take it and actually do something in the offseason to try to improve whatever deficiencies they have OR they get insulted by it and instead of staying put to make those improvements over JR/SR years then they decide to make the decision to run off for nowadays to a different college given this NIL money/playing time/etc. Quite frankly if you work hard then your greatness should be seen by the time you get to your JR/SR years because you will see bumps in the road your FR/SO years in the college. The concepts of what Wyatt Langford did in terms of he wanted to play at UF and was riding the bench in the beginning. He was told you need to do these things in the offseason to improve - he did those things - then he blewup his final years at UF to then get to into the MLB team. I am not saying that still does not happen but I will say the portal effects sort of allow that concept not to happen as often nowadays. The portal itself for all sports does have a purpose if used properly. But like anything most of the time any new things like the portal can get abused for various purposes thus players and their families are trying to take advantage of it. They could care less about representing UF all 4 years to speak because someone thinks there is some sort of mythical better opportunity out there. Again the portal in limited ways can serve a purpose meaning you are trying to get to a specific school academically because that college has something you want beyond the sports years in graduate school, you are trying to get closer to family for health reasons or other significant family issues, your coach gets fired, you are trying to get to a winning program your final years or you a literally getting abused in some fashion thus you just need to get out of that situation. And yes it is possible the coaching staff may tell a player your playing time may get limited with other players coming in so they are giving you an opportunity to leave on your own accord so to speak. When the portal stuff becomes about other trivial things like for example a purely money stuff grab then I just say whatever. Players for example in this specific instance like a Mia Williams who are bolting in my opinion and/or her mommy is bitching over the internet then you need to go period. I don't care. I do have issues with parents who decide to vent things over the internet because if you do that it better be for very good/specific reasons for doing stuff like that. Ranting to just rant is not a good reason particularly in her case where every single opportuntity was given to her given the various issues we have seen the last two seasons. And I get she was coming off an extremely harsh injury coming out of high school thus one of the reasons why the coaching staff was giving her more than a fair opportunity during her freshman year. Bottom line is good luck to any players wishing to go to the portal and go find somewhere you think your stuff will be tolerated. Mia had defensive issues the last two seasons which we saw. Her offensive stat wise did improve no doubt during the regular season but her post season stats were not there either during various clutch offensive situations. In other words - she is like a vast majority of college athletes who are not perfect and who need things to work on in order to get closer to that type of player you want to be in the end. The idea of immediately coming into college from high school and having immediate success for the entire season is just a rare thing to see in college baseball or college softball. I think what you are seeing in the baseball and softball programs right now for UF is just a complete retooling of the rosters based upon the end results of the seasons we saw in both programs. When you lose to the end the season, any coach worth their salt is going to evaluate every single little thing to see what needs to be done. There is good and evil to this portal thing right now. I would not get hyper over crap like this because the landscape is what it is right now. Let us hope the rosters buildup again is successful and productive for the coaches of both programs.
Good stuff. The only thing I would add is that Mia was not coming off an injury and being coddled her first year. Yes, she sustained a horrific injury a couple years before graduating and had, miraculously, shown in travel before coming to UF that she had overcome the injury. I witnessed the injury. It was horrible. But, after her amazing rehab, she never once exhibited any lasting effect via movement, speed or anything else.
On3 is showing Mia Williams is 53.3% to LSU, 46.7% to Texas Tech. LSU has already signed Kylee Edwards, a highly rated Middle Infielder from Mississippi State.
It’s college softball, and as much as I enjoy the sport and like that it’s getting more attention, it will be completely forgotten about in a few days.
LSU has to be spending money on players. They seem to get a ton of talent there and totally waste them.
LSU has, also, signed San Diego State's primary pitcher, Cece Cellura, a rising junior who was 19-9, 153.2 ip and 2.28 ERA.
Taking Mia, by anyone, is virtually a no lose situation. Other than wasting a few bucks, if she performs better than this year it is a win. If she reverts to her first year, probably not that bad but not out of the question it could be worse than this year, then you bench her. No legacy issues or long term relationships to confront.
Surprised LSU has offered Mia. They only lost one infielder to graduation and by signing edwards i assumed she would take that last infield spot.
LSU is one of my 3 most hated teams in all sports. But they recruit like crazy and always get good players in all sports. I'm always interested in reading how they sign top players. And you don't often read where a Louisiana kid goes out of state if LSU wants them.
I think we're getting a middle infielder from Florida Atlantic who's from Keystone Heights (near Gainesville) and has been very good through her first couple of year in Boca Raton.
If it's the Channell girl, seems like she has been consistent at the plate and looks to have good range on defense. Interesting to see how her bat will translate to SEC play.
Definitely sucks losing Mia. Losing Aberdeen in basketball hurt because he was our guy. Mia is most definitely our girl. The hits and the defense, all that can be replaced, but watching her improvement after struggling and having her big smile around - those can’t be replaced. I guess that’s the curse of the modern era though.
Has anyone heard the name Allison Sparkman in regards to a portal possibility? She's from Canton, GA and just finished her sophomore year as Florida Gulf Coast's most used pitcher. Her 2-year record is 30-18, 2.09 ERA, 274 innings pitched, .219 BA against, 153 K's, 120 BB. She's not a big flamethrower, high strikeout pitcher many are looking for, but entered the portal 6/4 with an On3 rating of 90. Just curious.
IP H R ER BB SO WP BK HBP IBB AB BF FO GO NP Allison Sparkman (L, 4-5) 1.0 6 6 6 1 0 0 0 1 0 9 11 1 2 46 This is what she did against us this year on 2/6.
