It’s been a pretty good couple of weeks for the Oregon baseball team.
On April 16, the Ducks took two of three games from No. 1 UCLA for their second straight conference series win. That was followed by a complete pasting of Gonzaga in Spokane, Wash., where the team scored 26 runs in two games.
This last weekend, Oregon beat last-place USC two games out of three, putting up 15 hits in Sunday’s game. Add in a 9-4 win over the Oregon State Beavers on Tuesday night, and you get a 28-13 baseball team that is tied for fourth in the conference and has a No. 17 ranking.
With four conference series left and with 19 games to go in the last month of the season, head coach George Horton knows that it can all go sour in one weekend, so now is not the time for his team to rest on its laurels. Washington State is in town with game start times of 7 p.m. Friday, 5 p.m. Saturday and 1 p.m. on Sunday. Oregon must take care of business against the 20-15 Cougars to stay afloat in the postseason race.
“Their numbers are about like us,” Horton said of the Cougars, who lost two of three games to Oregon State last week. “We watched them on tape, they play the game awful hard. They swept us last year, it’s supposed to be good weather. Just another weekend of Pac-10 baseball, ho-hum.”
Washington State made it to a regional last year in the NCAA tournament, and after Tuesday night’s game against the Beavers, Horton said the win gave Oregon another notch in its belt that should impress the selection committee.
“We have a long way to be conference champions,” Horton said. “So when it comes right down to it, our head-to-head against a team like Oregon State might mean the difference … that’s probably the significance of it.”
One big part of the team’s success, especially against ranked opponents, has been the pitching. As of April 25, Oregon was No. 4 in the nation in ERA at 3.14, behind Texas, UCLA and Coastal Carolina. Leading the way is reliever Joey Housey, a sophomore from Hollywood, Fla. In pitchers with over three appearances, Housey has an ERA of 0.96 in 15 appearances, and he is 2-0. Batters are hitting .185 off of him, but because of surgery on his elbow over the offseason, he won’t throw more than 40 pitches during an outing, pitching coach Andrew Checketts said.
“That’s probably going to be his pitch count for a while,” Checketts said. “(Housey) has such a special upside. We think he has a chance to be a frontline starter at some point in his career. We don’t want to risk injuring him at all. He’s way ahead of schedule on recovery for what he did, so he’s going to stay there.”
The pitching staff has evolved throughout the year, but the rotation in recent weeks has been Tyler Anderson (6-3, 2.64 ERA), Justin LaTempa (3-2, 3.12 ERA), and either Alex Keudell (4-4, 3.70 ERA) or Zack Thornton (6-0, 3.02 ERA) on Sundays. A pitcher like Madison Boer (2-1, 3.54) will get a spot start, and both Horton and Checketts have been working with Boer to pitch more consistently.
“We had a talk about him moving up to his potential,” Checketts said. “He seems to pitch a little bit better when he’s upset at me. It seems like the longer we wait to pitch him the harder he throws because he’s upset. We’re trying to get him to have that same mentality no matter who we’re playing and if he’s starting.”
Boer did exactly that on Tuesday in his four innings of work. He was supposed to start, but Checketts and Horton gave the start to Housey, who pitched the first three innings. Boer came in for the next four innings, giving up four hits, one run and striking out four batters.
“Angry is when he’s most successful,” Horton said. “He came out and he was very, very aggressive.”
And with the offense giving the pitchers enough runs the past few weeks to pitch comfortably, the Ducks are in a good position.
Promotions
Friday night’s promotion is a trading card give away for the first 750 through the gates, and is also ’80s Night. Then on Saturday, in honor of the Spring Game festivities, Ahmad Rashad and Dan Fouts will be at the game to throw out the first pitch. It is also George Horton Mustache Night, and military personnel with their IDs can buy reserved tickets for $5. Additionally, standing room only tickets are available at the Spring Game for $5 at the gate while supplies last.
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