CWS Final

I was traveling back home yesterday and did not post a final College World Series entry. In case you missed it, South Carolina won in extra innings. Yes, the SEC is the greatest conference in the entire history of mankind. Blah Blah Blah.

16 games in 11 days - and it comes down to a single moment.

Whit Merrifield drives a pitch into right field.

Scott Wingo scores the winning run

Gamecock dogpile (I was up high, my son shot this one)

Trophy celebration

Jackie Bradley Jr = MVP

We now return to our regularly scheduled blogging.

CWS Day Eight - IF game x2

It was an incredibly oppressive hot day made worse by what seemed like a thousand mound visits and batter delays In the end UCLA took out TCU, ending the Horned Frogs magical season. Bruin starter Trevor Bauer was once again very impressive, with 8 strong innings. If he gets a win in the championship series, he has a great chance to be the tournament MVP.

TCU's Bryan Holaday connected on this pitch for his second HR of the day, but...

UCLA Trevor Bauer was too much.

In the much cooler night cap, South Carolina completed their march through the losers bracket on Saturday night, beating Clemson again, this time 4-3. The Gamecocks also came through the Omaha losers bracket and beat Clemson twice in 2002. After having lost to Ohio State in football for the last decade or so, I feel for the fans of the Tigers.

Christian Walker HR

Double play attempt

Winner Winner Chicken Dinner

CWS wallpapers

I have missed a couple of Wallpaper Wednesdays. Here are a couple of cool wallpapers while I have been in Omaha.

CWS Day Seven - Arms Race

It was a day dominated by pitching. TCU and South Carolina both avoided elimination forcing the "if necessary" game in both brackets. Another double-headed on Saturday.


TCU's freshman phenom Matt Purke improved his record to 16-0 on the season.

USC's Michael Roth, who normally comes out of the bullpen pitched a complete game gem against Clemson.

CWS Day Six - Gamecocks win

Another day, another very exciting baseball game. This is a perfect example on why I love this event. Last night we got to watch one of the most exciting games ever... and tonight we get an extra inning walk off win. South Carolina was one strike away from elimination before Jackie Bradley Jr. drove in a run to tie the game in the bottom of the 12th inning. A few minutes later he scores the winning run and chaos resumes once again.

OU's leadoff hitter Ellison tried to steal to open the game, and was out by a mile.

It was a very close game. This guy was called out.

It looked like Oklahoma was going to win the game after Ogle's 12th inning HR.

But USC scored two in the bottom of the 12th.

Gamecocks continue on to play Clemson tomorrow night.

CWS Day Five - Fear the Frog

Awesome college baseball game last night in Omaha. Florida State jumped out to a 7-2 lead and it looked as if they would eliminate the TCU Horned Frogs. However, TCU came storming back with eight runs in the eighth inning, highlighted by a dramatic grand slam by 1B Matt Curry. The Seminoles go home.

Florida State scored early and often

Because the game looked like a blow out, I decided to attempt to shoot some sunset pictures.

Thank goodness my son stayed focused on the game and captured this great series of the Matt Curry grand slam reaction. The kid has talent.

CWS Day Four - Adios Arizona State

Thanks to the state of South Carolina, Top seeded Arizona State did not really enjoy themselves in Omaha this year. Many expected them to mash their way thru the bracket, instead the Sun Devils join the "Two and Bar-B-Que" crowd with the Florida Gators. Final score South Carolina 11 Arizona State 4.

USC starter Sam Dyson

USC's Jackie Bradley Jr. is going to be a rich man next year after he is drafted in the first round.

Arizona State = Two & Bar-B-Que

The night game between Clemson and Oklahoma was suspended in the 6th inning because of a huge rain/thunder/lightning storm, or as I like to call it, night time in Nebraska. Clemson is leading 6-1. The game will re-start at 3:30PM CST.

Clemson's RF is also their starting QB, Kyle Parker.

Check out the sweet mullet on Garrett Buechele.

OU 1B Cameron Seitzer.

CWS Day three - Let's play 3

Thanks to the rain yesterday, for the first time since 1980, there was a triple header in the College World Series. If you love baseball like I do, it was a great day. I am pretty tired right now, but looking forward to two more games tomorrow.

Erin Andrews wore her rain boots this morning.

#1 ranked Arizona State scored here, but they lost to Clemson

Florida State bounced back and eliminated Florida

UCLA starting pitcher Gerritt Cole looked like a future all star in the win over TCU.

CWS Day Two

9 hours from when it was supposed to start, the Oklahoma - South Carolina game finally ends. 6 hours of rain delays and countless looks at the weather radar. You have to really love baseball to put up with a day like this. We are going to have three games tomorrow, starting at 10AM local time.

OU's Chris Ellison scores the 1st run of the game.

USC's shortstop Bobby Haney could not tag out this OU base thief.

CWS Day Two - Rain rain go away

We are in the middle of a 4 hour rain delay. Nothing to do but play around with photoshop. I just saw Oklahoma football coach Bob Stoops in the press box.

CWS Day 1

2 blow out games today. Both TCU and UCLA each won their first College World Series games ever. Florida and Florida State both looked pretty ragged. One of them is going home on Monday.

TCU freshman pitcher Matt Purke.

TCU tried to score two runs on a suicide squeeze play. The second runner was out.

UCLA starter Trevor Bauer.

Incredible catch by Florida center fielder Matt den Dekker. It was ESPN SportsCenter's #1 play of the day.

Erin Andrews was bored with the UCLA blow out and was tweeting from the dugout.

College World Series 2010

I am going to be in Omaha for the next 12 days taking picture at the College World Series. Unless we can coax T9 to put down the margarita and reach for her keyboard -- my posts are going to be limited to college baseball until we get into July. I will try to send tweets and share a couple of unique images at the end of each day. Look for me on ESPN, I will be the incredibly good looking photographer with the Michigan hat on.

2010 is the last year of Johnny Rosenblatt Stadium, the CWS moves next year to new digs in downtown Omaha. I took this image during Fresno State's improbable run to the championship in 2008.

2010: The year of the pitcher

After years decades of offensive dominance, it appears as if major league baseball has dramatically swung the opposite direction. Welcome to the era of pitching dominance. Last night a previously unknown Detroit Tiger named Armando Galarraga pitched a perfect game. 27 Indians came up to the plate over 9 innings, and 27 Indians made outs over those 9 innings. It was the third perfect game in the majors this season. Prior to the start of this season, there had only ever been 18 perfect games. Ever.

Pay no attention to what you saw. Pay no attention to what you read following the game. There should be no questions. If an official scorer can rule on an error made in the field by a player, it is perfectly logical for everyone to rule on an error made by an umpire. The kid pitched a no-hitter. The kid pitched a perfect game. That is all there is to it. Everyone was so happy they decided to allow one more Indian hit, just for the fun of it.

Nothing like this has been seen since the 1968 season. That was the year Bob Gibson and Denny McClain launched the game into the offensive rocket ship we have experienced most of my lifetime. Gibson had a microscopic ERA of 1.12 for the entire season. McClain won 31 games leading the Tigers to the world championship.

In response to the 1968 season, MLB lowered the mound and shrunk the strike zone to give the hitters more of a chance. A few years later, the American League added the DH, eliminating the easy out previously delivered by a pitcher at bat. The game was never the same, until now.

Maybe in response to the 2010 season, MLB will officially recognize the perfect game we all clearly watched last night and institute some expanded version of instant replay to ensure the human beings they employ to arbitrate the game get it right.

Happy Memorial Day

For most people, it is just another day off from work and the official start of summer. The original Memorial Day was in 1868, it was called Decoration Day. The purpose was to honoring the dead of the Union Army in the Civil War. Over time, the Decoration Day holiday was expanded to salute the fallen soldiers from both North and South. Eventually it was renamed Memorial Day and chosen to encompass all of this country's fallen in subsequent wars.

Like the old english "D" on the Tigers cap, I believe the United States Flag is a thing of beauty. I just wish the marketing scientists at Major League Baseball could prevent themselves from grafting these two masterpieces together into a hideous mess.

So PERFECT

Story

God Bless Ernie Harwell

"In baseball, democracy shines its clearest. The only race that matters is the race to the bag. The creed is the rule book. And color, merely something to distinguish one team's uniform from another's."
~ Ernie Harwell's Hall of fame induction speech. 1981.



Thanks for the memories Mr. Harwell.

Tasered

Last night in Philadelphia's Citizens Bank Park a drunk (and stupid) fan ran out onto the field, waved a rally towel around, and got tasered for his efforts. He falls flat on his face at about the 17 second mark. I love the reaction of Ryan Howard (Phillies firstbaseman), he is covering his mouth with his glove because he is laughing. There is no truth to the matter that the guy is Boubacar Cissoko.



The 17-year-old was charged with defiant trespass, disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. According to a report in the Philadelphia Inquirer, he called his father to ask permission to run on the field prior to doing so. The father says he did not grant permission. The MLB site has a better video of the event, but it will not embed.

Wallpaper Wednesday: Barry Larkin

On Saturday the Michigan Baseball program will retire Barry Larkin's number 16 jersey in a ceremony before the game against Ohio State.

During his time in Ann Arbor, Barry played with future Reds teammates Chris Sabo ('83) and Hal Morris ('85). These three Wolverines formed the core of the Cincinnati Reds team that won the 1990 World Series.

MGoBlog has a nice Barry Larkin diary entry here.

Edit: Today is Barry Larkin's birthday. Happy Birthday big fella.

Collision at home

Ouch. If you have ever attended a minor league baseball game, you know it was just a matter of time before this was going to happen...

Bat Trick

I have been sent this video link by a couple of people now, so I thought that I would share it with all of you. The fat part of my thumb hurts every time I watch it.

The ballplayer in the video is named Josh Womack. He was a 2nd round draft pick of the Seattle Mariners in 2002. He played 6 years in their minor league system and never made it up to the majors. He is currently playing for an independent team named the Long Beach Armada in the Golden Baseball League.