Gopher Softball 2019

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Watching the game. Really rough start again. However, another error allowing a ball to drop does not help when playing the #2 Florida State Seminoles. I have been watching MANY COLLEGE SPORTS over the years and I am shocked at the LACK OF BASIC SKILLS at this level. I am talking ALL SPORTS.

Calm down, clear your head and GO BACK TO THE BASICS. Backup each other when that ball goes off the bat, know where your opponent runners are and where to throw the ball should it come to you and learn TO CALL OFF YOUR FELLOW PLAYERS when attempting to catch a ball. Errors have cost this team so far this season in major games. We can still come back in this game.
 

4EverAGopher said:
Watching the game. Really rough start again. However, another error allowing a ball to drop does not help when playing the #2 Florida State Seminoles. I have been watching MANY COLLEGE SPORTS over the years and I am shocked at the LACK OF BASIC SKILLS at this level. I am talking ALL SPORTS.

Calm down, clear your head and GO BACK TO THE BASICS. Backup each other when that ball goes off the bat, know where your opponent runners are and where to throw the ball should it come to you and learn TO CALL OFF YOUR FELLOW PLAYERS when attempting to catch a ball. Errors have cost this team so far this season in major games. We can still come back in this game.
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9-3 at this point. We are losing to a better team.

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Nice win over ND. FSU has some really good bats. The ladies need a win over Cal to go .500 this weekend and that will be OK.
 


Glad to see the team bounce back with the 4-0 win over Cal today. Fiser is so much fun to watch. Offensively, the bats came back to life in the last two games of this tournament. Especially the bench players who were clearly hitting the ball in the last two games. That is a great take away moving forward.

It would have been nice if Sydney could have fell into a groove in her start vs. Florida State. The relief pitchers I felt held their own in their appearances in this game. There were some bumps, but overall they both did a pretty solid job. IMO the only negative was offensively.....the meat (batters 3-6) of the lineup had a very rough game. Too many LOB's. But you can contribute some of that to the outstanding pitching by the FSU pitchers. Overall we were not necessarily getting base hits, but the girls were tagging the ball pretty good. Nice to see that.

Today's win much deserved. Team ended on a high. Fun game to watch. We might have lost a huge bat with the transfer of Kendyl, but then we would not have the opportunity to watch Emma grow in that position as a catcher. Love her defensive game.
 


4EverAGopher said:
Today's win much deserved. Team ended on a high. Fun game to watch. We might have lost a huge bat with the transfer of Kendyl, but then we would not have the opportunity to watch Emma grow in that position as a catcher. Love her defensive game.
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Nice win today for sure. No offense, but I would rather have two years of Kendyl and we could find somewhere else for Burns to play or Burns could play sometimes and let Kendyl DP once in awhile. Nice to see Denhartog and Miller go yard. The offense will be fine this year in the B1G. Our pitching is a HUGE drop-off after Fiser. It might be really fun to see this Canadian as a frosh next year. This year we will go as far as Amber can get us. I don't see any of the other pitchers being significant. Teams like FSU can just keep bringing in pitchers. We can't This will be a fun season. Those were good wins over ND and Cal that make me optimistic. FSU is just too much on offense for our non-Fiser pitchers to compete with. We will compete for the B1G, make the tourney, and then we can hope for some luck. If we could have found a way to beat the Vols that would have been great.

This weekend we need to sweep ULL and Missouri State and then split with Bama. A 4-1 record would be a really big step forward.
 

4EverAGopher said:
Glad to see the team bounce back with the 4-0 win over Cal today. Fiser is so much fun to watch. Offensively, the bats came back to life in the last two games of this tournament. Especially the bench players who were clearly hitting the ball in the last two games. That is a great take away moving forward.

It would have been nice if Sydney could have fell into a groove in her start vs. Florida State. The relief pitchers I felt held their own in their appearances in this game. There were some bumps, but overall they both did a pretty solid job. IMO the only negative was offensively.....the meat (batters 3-6) of the lineup had a very rough game. Too many LOB's. But you can contribute some of that to the outstanding pitching by the FSU pitchers. Overall we were not necessarily getting base hits, but the girls were tagging the ball pretty good. Nice to see that.

Today's win much deserved. Team ended on a high. Fun game to watch. We might have lost a huge bat with the transfer of Kendyl, but then we would not have the opportunity to watch Emma grow in that position as a catcher. Love her defensive game.
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Whose mom are you? [emoji3] This is a fun team to watch. If they figure their bats out they have a chance to win every time Fiser pitches. You do realize KL is batting roughly .400 for Florida right? Emma Burns is doing a great job learning how to be a catcher. Actually she is pretty dang amazing. KL vs. EB is not even close. That is in no way a bash on EB. She is great. We would definitely rather have KL over EB. Bizzare statement you made. If you just talk EB and leave KL out of it OK.

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MNsoftballfan said:
No doubt, BUT I think it is time to really see what Lowary can do.
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I agree. Lowary looks like she has some talent, but is she injured? So far in the early season, the 2019 Gophers seem to have the same problem as in the past 4-5 years --- only one top-flight, competitive pitcher (except 2017) and an impotent offense against any team even close to the top-ten nationally. Hopefully they can improve on that. They need to get over the hump against top-ten teams.
 



Hrothgar said:
I agree. Lowary looks like she has some talent, but is she injured? So far in the early season, the 2019 Gophers seem to have the same problem as in the past 4-5 years --- only one top-flight, competitive pitcher (except 2017) and an impotent offense against any team even close to the top-ten nationally. Hopefully they can improve on that. They need to get over the hump against top-ten teams.
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I'll beg to differ with you on the offense at this early point of the season. No team will regularly put a lot of hits on a top 10 team assuming a top pitcher is in the circle that game. The Gophies put more hits on FSU than anyone this year year (10) even in that failing effort, and matched Tennessee's hits at 5. The Gophers out hit Ole Miss 4-3. Both the Tennessee and Ole Miss losses had critical errors that caused unearned runs. Against FSU, a weird big loss, the Gophers left 12 runners on base and had a chance to tie it in the 4th but didn't get it done.

To me, I'm looking forward to seeing how the Gophers work to protect Brandner...
 

Panthadad2 said:
I'll beg to differ with you on the offense at this early point of the season. No team will regularly put a lot of hits on a top 10 team assuming a top pitcher is in the circle that game. The Gophies put more hits on FSU than anyone this year year (10) even in that failing effort, and matched Tennessee's hits at 5. The Gophers out hit Ole Miss 4-3. Both the Tennessee and Ole Miss losses had critical errors that caused unearned runs. Against FSU, a weird big loss, the Gophers left 12 runners on base and had a chance to tie it in the 4th but didn't get it done.

To me, I'm looking forward to seeing how the Gophers work to protect Brandner...
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I understand your point about hits. My point, which I didn't really explain well, had to do with getting key hits at crucial points and then scoring runs that can get them a lead against top teams so they aren't playing from behind the whole game. It's not how many hits, but when they get them.
 


ComoGopher said:
They don't have a second pitcher. That is a problem.
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I think that's why we were suggesting giving Lowary a chance. She seems to have talent and is left-handed; not clear how she'd do against top teams but worth a try. Certainly going with one star pitcher, no matter how good she is (Groenewegen or Fiser) will take you pretty far, but it won't get you to the CWS.
 



Hrothgar said:
I think that's why we were suggesting giving Lowary a chance. She seems to have talent and is left-handed; not clear how she'd do against top teams but worth a try. Certainly going with one star pitcher, no matter how good she is (Groenewegen or Fiser) will take you pretty far, but it won't get you to the CWS.
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I think Lowary has some kind of arm issue that limits her innings.
 

ComoGopher said:
I think Lowary has some kind of arm issue that limits her innings.
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During the FSU game I believe the announcers said Smith also has arm issues. So even though the Gophers have 5 pitchers on the roster only Fiser can compete against quality opponents, it seems.
 



Glad to see Emma hit two home runs today and Sydney get the win.

Getting ready to watch the next game at 6 pm vs. Alabama through my ROKU. If anybody is wondering, go to the ESPN app, then to channels, and click on the SEC ESPN Network +. Right now it is showing under the upcoming today videos. Yes, I do have DISH satellite and not sure if your TV provider is needed to view this game or not. Just letting people know, if they are interested.
 

Gophs needed that bunt with no outs in the top of the 2nd. Oh well.
 

Inconsistent calling by the plate umpire does not help the Gopher cause. Glad Fiser was able to hold it together and pitch out of the bad calls in the bottom of the 4th. Great pitching dual so far.
 

4EverAGopher said:
Inconsistent calling by the plate umpire does not help the Gopher cause. Glad Fiser was able to hold it together and pitch out of the bad calls in the bottom of the 4th. Great pitching dual so far.
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Yeah. Inconsistent is being nice. That was a clear 3rd strike to the 3rd batter that the umpire missed in the 4th. Replay showed it clearly over the plate at the belt. She luckily got out of the inning. Umpire then calls strikes for Jensen on pitches clearly outside the river. Hard to win at Alabama with home cooking.
 

Still undefeated when giving up 0 runs and 0 wins when giving up a run
 

Good game, but no clutch hitting again. Had two good chances to score and couldn't deliver. Arneson couldn't get the bunt down with runners on 1st and 2nd with no outs and struck out - then Miller and Burns both got outs. Jensen took 3 pitches outside the river called strikes (can't really blame her) with Burns on 3rd. That was the ball game.
 
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If Minnesota's coaching staff can figure out how to get past these, as Panthadad2 stated, "home cooked umpires" and create runs when runners are on, they can certainly win games like this. Third 1-0 loss in a row vs Bama in Alabama. Yes it is a tough task and hard to swallow. However, this team appears to be getting better as the season continues. Hope this lights a fire under them during the rest of this tournament.
 

The ladies can figure it out against Bama today. No reason that they can't. Someone just needs to hit a dinger at the right moment.

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Well I hope they start amber again she did great. If they don’t the coaching staff should be fired. I thought it was cowerdly of them not to start the nation recognized pitcher against the FSU team. That was just bush league. If you think you are the best play the best. All the talk for 2 year crying about how we got screwed on hosting. Well step up and play the top team. If they don’t start Amber I think it is really telling what kind of a pitcher they think she is.
 

Calsoftball said:
Well I hope they start amber again she did great. If they don’t the coaching staff should be fired. I thought it was cowerdly of them not to start the nation recognized pitcher against the FSU team. That was just bush league. If you think you are the best play the best. All the talk for 2 year crying about how we got screwed on hosting. Well step up and play the top team. If they don’t start Amber I think it is really telling what kind of a pitcher they think she is.
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Cowardly? The coaches know the staff and they did what they thought was right. I assume Amber will throw again against Bama but who knows?

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rugger14 said:
Cowardly? The coaches know the staff and they did what they thought was right. I assume Amber will throw again against Bama but who knows?

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Against top teams the past 4-5 years the problem hasn't been pitching, but the almost total lack of clutch hitting, as panthadad2 wrote above. You can't win if you don't score.
 

I'm hoping to see the Gophs be a little more aggressive early in the count in game 2 vs Alabama. Visiting teams seem to get an "Alabama large" strike zone when batting, so no sense in getting behind in the count every at-bat.
 

You gotta pinch run for HB in that scenario.

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