[Husker] And we're off! (Long)

[Skylar Dodds]

Hello Husker Fans,

  Husker baseball is FINALLY back! Today NU won their first game
  against the New Mexico Lobos today, 6-2. This is a long post, but
  it's meant to be an intro to the baseball season and a summary of
  today's game!

  NU started out slow with Watson loading the bases in the first (a
  few hits with some control problems), but fortunately escaping with
  just 1 run.

  It took NU until the 3rd inning to get a hit, when Jeff Lanning
  ripped a 1-0 pitch into right for a 1 out double.  After Belfonte
  hit an 'excuse me' infield single and a Nimmo flyout, Corriston (who
  had a monster game) doubled them both home for a 2-1 NU lead.

  About this time Watson REALLY started to get his rhythm and when he
  does...look out. Watson retired 12 batters in a row during this
  stretch (ending with 2 walks and a strikeout). A lot of which were
  'awkward defensive swing' groundouts.

  ** Note ** When Watson gets into that groove, he REALLY works
  quickly, not much time between pitches.  I wonder if teams might try
  to slow him down with timeouts later in the year.

  The Huskers scored the very next inning (4th).  Opitz hit a 1 out
  single (batting cleanup of all things, more on that later) and Gerch
  followed up with a double for runners at 2nd and 3rd with 1 out.
  Opitz scored on a pass ball and Gerch moved up to third only to be
  squeezed home by Tezak.

  The Huskers added another run when Nimmo stretched a 2-out single
  to 2nd on a fielding error.  Corriston followed up with a RBI double
  to make it 5-1 Huskers.

  After Watson's final inning (groundout, popout, walk, walk
  stikeout), NU went to work again with a 3-2 double with 1 out by
  Tezak and a 1-2 Thad Weber single to drive him in making it 6-1
  Huskers in the bottom of the 6th.

  In the 7th Hammerlink looked good.  He hit 1 guy and another guy
  reached on an error, but got the final out to ground out for the end
  of the inning.

  In the bottom frame, the Huskers were unable to capitalize on a
  2-out double from Opitz and were held scoreless for the first time
  since the 2nd inning.

  In the 8th, newcomer Drew Bowman took the hill and was VERY
  impressive (see below) with a K, E4, and a 6-4-3 DP!

  Weber and Belfonte both drew walks but Nimmo struck out looking to
  end the bottom frame.

  In the 9th, Steve Edlefsen started out sharp, but then lost control
  and had to bring in Bird to finish them off.  Oh well!

  ********
  Pitching
  ********

  Tony only gave up 4 hits and 1 run, all in the first 10 batters.
  After that, he was absolutely dominant.  He's the real deal and
  probably one of the top pitchers in the country.  My hunch is we'll
  see some teams do to him what they did with Joba, and that is
  pitch their #2 on Friday and almost 'forfeit in the hopes of getting
  a sure win on Saturday.

  Hammerlink was decent, but the impressive newcomer was Drew Bowman.
  I see why some people are excited about this guy. Control wasn't
  perfect, but MAN does he have some pop on that fastball with a nasty
  breaking ball. He threw the top of the 8th with a K, E-4, 6-4-3 DP!
  And really both ground balls were little league level. My only gripe
  was he got behind on the 2nd hitter 3-0, but he did battle back
  well. You got a tall lefty that throws easily into the 90s and a
  killer off-speed pitch, that's a great combination.

  Edlefsen came in to finish in the ninth (he decided to stop playing
  3B to focus on pitching, probably since there's a logjam there
  anyway).  He looked sharp with flyout and a strikeout early, but
  loss control with and gave up a run with 2 BBs, 1 HBP and 1 hit.
  Bird came in and struck out the last guy to end the game.


  **************
  Strange Lineup
  **************

  Anderson started out with a strange lineup for the afternoon game.
  Mort and Andrew Brown sat, while Corriston, Thad Weber, DJ Belfonte
  (for an injured Sullivan who broke his thumb skiing) and Tezak all
  started.

  1) Nimmo CF - 1/5,R - So so day, lots of popups with 1 good hit
  2) Corriston 3B - 2/3 3RBI, 1 2B - Great day 3 RBI and on base 4 of 5 times
  3) Wehrle SS - 0/3, K, BB - Really rough day at the plate
  4) Opitz 2B - 2/4 R, K - Good day except 2 errors in the field
  5) Gerch LF - 1/4 R, K - Not bad
  6) Tezak DH - 1/3 R, RBI, 2K
  7) Weber 1B - 1/3 RBI, BB - Good day, had 1 error but also had a nice play on a high throw
  8) Lanning C - 1/3 R, BB - 1 throwing error on a steal, but otherwise good (nice double)
  9) Belfonte RF - 1/2 R, 2 BB

  I don't think it means anything, they have a lot of games this
  weekend (including two today) and probably just wanted to run 2
  different lineups for the games today.

  

  

-- 
Go Skers,
 Skylar                            mailto:Sklarbodds at cox.net