(Photo Credit: Ralph Freso, EVT) I guess it's good to see some real emotion out of our players after Murphy orchestrated a fake fight. Now let's see if other teams fall for him being a real baseball coach when he's on the job search, because it's just an act. Honestly, if Lopez down at U of A orchestrated something like this we would all be on Cactus Ranch, Sparky's Bullpen and the newspaper comment boards letting U of A have it. Arizona isn't a team that can give out much criticism right now, considering Jon Gaston just pulled off one of the dumbest moves ever by shushing the Miami crowd. Point being, the fake fight is the type of antic that you would want to see done down in Tucson so we can all laugh at it, and now, there's just major disappointment amongst our fans that Murphy would make a mockery of his own team.
This is far and away Pat Murphy's most talented team offensively, and he couldn't put it together enough to win 2 games against a regional 4 seed. This series wasn't even close. Fresno State whooped ASU, and they deserve all the credit for not folding after Mike Leake had one of his best outings of the season on Friday. Coach Mike Batesole led his group of 8 seniors and convinced these guys that they are among the best, while Murphy tells his players how much they suck.
Murphy threw his own players under the bus multiple times, like telling ESPN that Greg Bordes was "the worst shortstop in Division-I baseball." How about actually praising Greg for doing a great job at short this season since Marcel Champagnie and Mike Leake couldn't do a damn thing defensively for you, leaving Greg to have to come in and do mop up duty at the position all season. Oh yeah, and how about developing something that resembles an actual bullpen so you don't have to rely on Mike Leake to throw two days after tossing 118 pitches. Come to think of it, you do have a bullpen, and his name is Tommy Rafferty. You rode the 5th year senior all year and you leave Mike Leake in to give up that bomb to Susdorf when his arm is jello. Way to possibly ruin a kids arm and his chances to play for Team USA this summer. Good call.
Murph doesn't deserve all of the blame. Brett Wallace and Ike Davis choked in the final two games, combining to go 3 for 17 and 9 LOB. These guys aren't amateurs anymore, so I can rail on them a bit. They we're just as much a part of that stupid fight as Murphy was. Supposedly its part of tradition, as Jeff Larish and Travis Buck did the same thing a few years back to get the team fired up. The problem Jeff Larish and Travis Buck actually performed in the clutch with help from their teammates. The rest of this year's edition of the Sun Devils didn't need any firing up, they were getting on base more than enough times to get left on by Davis and Wallace, who we're having the two best offensive seasons witnessed under Murphy's tenure.
ASU had 15 players drafted, and our top five commitments got drafted by pick #42. Maybe its time for someone else to come in for the rebuidling effort so Murphy can go to a cushy SEC job, like Auburn. My first pick is Virginia's Brian O'Connor. He's taken Virginia to the tournament every season since he moved to UVA after being an assistant at Notre Dame. He's a very intelligent baseball coach who can develop a pitching staff, and his players seem to want to play for him, which is more than I can say for the man we got in the dugout right now.
It all makes you almost want to root for an SEC team.
5 comments:
Weak. Ass. This sort of nonsense is the reason I've been avoiding DevilsDigest for the most part since last night, cause the asshats on there are ranting and raving without making much sense. I expected better from what is, for the most part, a solid blog. You showed in an earlier post that you maybe didn't know all that much about college baseball, this one just confirms it.
Just because it's a rant doesn't mean what I say isn't warranted. You call my argument weak, then you don't argue what is weak about it. You just say that people on DevilsDigest are ranting too much. I agree our fanbase is weak in support in comparison with other teams of ASU's caliber, but what exactly are you getting at besides calling me weak?
I think Mark of PFN knows enough about College Baseball and he prefaces the comments by calling it a rant.
that first mark^ sounds like a fag. And probably has no idea of what being a sundevil means.
just sayin'
Sloppy party bottom Mark (Number 1):
Try and at least be a little constructive with your comment. You not liking the post don't make you a bad person, but just whining in generalities makes you sound like a douche. How could it have been better? What is he missing? Shed some of that insight on us how bout.
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