I don’t recall if it was the ACC or NCAA Tournament, but one of the announcers made an off hand mention that the staff had planned to convert Holmes to an OF but they used him in the infield this past season as a necessity due to depth issues.
Between summer and fall ball, we’ll see if that looks to be happening or not. Fall baseball will be a really big tell since guys sometimes get shuffled around during the same because of the makeup of their teams.
So this is what I have as our current starting lineup picture, not including any incoming HS commits or potential draft returnees. Perrotta and Murray are technically draft eligible but I’d put the chances of them going pro as pretty low (in the case of Murray, next to zero). Also take all of this with a grain of salt because it very well could change tomorrow or in the next couple of days depending on who else we land in the portal. The L/R in parentheses is what hand each player hits with.
This is assuming Holmes moves to the OF as speculated above instead of taking over at 3rd. The lineup as it stands would be a definite upgrade in terms of speed and defense but there’s definitely still a need for at least two more power bats, at 3rd and either catcher or DH. 3rd base is by far the biggest need right now. What’s interesting to me is if Will Yow and Bryant James both make it here, I’m not sure where you’d currently slot them in. I think those are the two position players who have the best chance of playing day one, but both are SS/CF guys with tons of speed and bat to ball ability, which are spots we’ve already filled by adding Mineo and Howard. I guess having competition and depth is always better than the opposite.
No Sam Harris? Assuming he goes pro?
I think he’s closer to 50/50. He probably should come back but wouldn’t be surprised either way.
Currently ranked 249th on BA’s MLB draft rankings list which would put him near the end of the 8th round.
Think we should pursue a catcher with having 2-3 on the roster? I know Jake started the year with an injury, but his pop time doesn’t seem the best…
We’ve got three on the roster currently and two coming in via HS, so you add one more from the portal that’s six which is probably overkill. But Broderick can play the OF and I think McCafferty can play a lot of different positions, so it might not hurt us too bad from a roster building perspective.
It all depends on what our coaching staff thinks of Weatherspoon. Gotta remember he was an O’Connor commit originally that decided to stick with the new staff and had a really good fall which won him his starting spot. If Pollard and company believe the hamate bone was the root cause of his issues behind the plate then I could see us sticking with him, otherwise we need a replacement there from somewhere. We cannot afford to have another season where passed balls and throwing out runners are as much of a struggle as they were this year.
https://x.com/64analytics/status/2064522351413277080?s=46
#1 in these rankings so far, but don’t we use them as an analytics provider? So we probably overindex a bit in their rankings
64 Analytics is not Schwimmer’s company. Although, we may also be a client of 64 Analytics.
We’re number one basically due to volume at the moment. Good publicity but we will almost certainly not end up in the top spot.
Can Elko’s dad help fund the roster this season?
I imagine the donors probably assured Coach Pollard they’d help, especially the ones that tried to come up with money to keep Coach Oak.
Removed RHP Jayden Davis from the HS commits list, he has flipped to Liberty.
Very nice pickup.
Biggest pickup of the offseason so far in my opinion. Ranked 13th on 64analytics and has big time tools at the plate as well as in the OF. Was the #1 SS in the state of VA coming out of high school. He did struggle the last couple weeks of the season but this was a much needed power bat for the middle of our lineup, and we didn’t have to sacrifice any speed to get it.
It does now make me question whether or not Holmes is actually moving to the OF. Crosland to my knowledge played exclusively in LF this past season for the Terps, would assume that the plan is for us to go Crosland/Mineo/Jackson at the three OF spots.
Where does Holmes go? 3B with not much of an arm???
Can Elko play 3rd?
If he had the arm strength to see some PT at catcher this past season, one would assume he’d be able to play some at 3rd as well. But I do think playing him at 2nd would be preferred, kinda like with Tiroly.
My guess right now is Holmes probably plays 3rd, and if he struggles there we move him to DH. Need to add another option at 3rd regardless.
As long as I don’t see Murray at 3B I will be happy. Hell I will take Murray as a pinch hitter to go in and work a full count from time to time.
Can Crosland play 3B? He was a SS in HS even though he only played LF last season.
Is Crosland a draft risk?