Weekend Preview: 2015 Kickoff

No. 6 Texas visits Reckling Park and No. 21 Rice for a four-game series to open the 2015 college baseball season this weekend. These proud programs have struggled at times to reach their own lofty standards in recent seasons, however, they both come into the series trending up. Rice features one of the best pitching staffs in the country while Texas brings new found momentum from last year's run to the College World Series.

Wayne Graham has taken Rice from a college baseball afterthought to a national power. Under Graham, the Owls have reached the NCAA tournament an incredible 20 straight seasons, which is the fourth highest active streak in the nation. All seven Rice College World Series appearances have come under Graham's watch, including the 2003 National Championship.

Looking deeper, the last five seasons have not been quite up to the same level that Rice fans have grown accustomed to under Graham. In the first 11 years of the Super Regional era (1999-2009), Rice advanced to an amazing nine Supers and six times advanced to Omaha. In the last five years, Rice has made just one Super Regional appearance and the Owls have not been to the CWS since 2008.

While that trend is somewhat negative, there are two factors that should spark optimism for Rice in 2015. First, this pitching staff may be the best Wayne Graham has ever put together at Rice. Second, Wayne Graham is in fact a legend in our game and it's never good policy to bet against a Hall of Famer. Graham built this program from scratch and it's unlikely that 2008 will be his last trip to Omaha.

It is quite simple to sum up Augie Garrido's career and impact on college baseball: if Augie were a school, his five national titles would be tied for third all-time. Garrido is the master of all masters and he proved that yet again last year.

The Longhorns were in a dark place coming into 2014. Texas had missed the NCAA tournament in two consecutive seasons. And here is the most mind-blowing fact: in 2013 Texas failed to win even one Big 12 series.

Yet here came the 2014 Longhorns with two key seniors, outfielder Mark Payton and Nathan Thornhill, and a bevy of talented but green freshmen. Garrido went old-school with this group and led them to a third place finish in the College World Series.

The only downer in this series is the injury report. Arguably the three best arms in this series will not throw this weekend. Jordan Stephens and John Duplantier of Rice and Morgan Cooper of Texas are all on the shelf for the series. Stephens had Tommy John surgery last March and will pitch later this year while Cooper had his Tommy John surgery last November and he will miss the entire season. Duplantier, a draft-eligible sophomore, has recently experienced general arm soreness and the Rice staff is being cautious with him.

Duplantier's absence is most disappointing as he is a first-round talent with a mid-90s fastball and a devastating breaking ball in the upper-80s. He is Rice's most gifted arm and a dynamic athlete on the mound. At 6-foot-4 and 210-pounds, Duplantier offers both future projection and present premium stuff.

The most intriguing aspect of this matchup pits the elite Rice pitching staff against an experienced and uber-talented Texas lineup. Even without Duplantier and Stephens, the Owls will start proven veterans Blake Fox (12-0 1.46 ERA) and Kevin McCanna (8-3, 2.69 ERA). The lefthanded Fox is a perfect 18-0 at Rice while McCanna was outstanding in the Cape last summer.

The Rice bullpen is similarly strong led by junior closer Matt Ditman (9 saves, 1.83 ERA). The Owls are also excited about the depth of this staff with arms like Austin Orewiler, Trevor Teykl, Austin Solecitto, and Ricardo Salinas ready to go.

C.J. Hinojosa (Texas Athletics)

Cal Quantrill
(Bob Drebin/StanfordPhoto.com)

The college baseball season gives us the gift of some outstanding matchups throughout the spring, and opening weekend looks like no exception this year. Indiana visiting Stanford this weekend is an intriguing matchup on its own, but the Friday night showdown between the team’s two aces is arguably the marquee pitcher’s duel going on anywhere in the nation.

Indiana junior righthander, Scott Effross has spent a large chunk of his college career pitching out of the bullpen, but he made it quite clear last summer in the Cape Cod League that he could be a starter at an elite level. Effross has the quality four-pitch mix to thrive as a true Friday night ace, and he has the swing-and-miss, lively 90-94 mph fastball to dominate high level lineups. And, his slider and his exceptional command of that pitch is likely going to give the righties in Stanford’s lineup some real trouble this Friday night.

What Stanford counters Effross with, however, is an arm that could be the best pitcher in the country by spring’s conclusion. And, that arm is sophomore righty, Cal Quantrill. Quantrill assumed the Friday night starter role as a freshman in 2014, but you certainly wouldn’t know he was a freshman by watching his poise and command. Sometime during the summer in his stint in the Coastal Plain League Quantrill took his game to yet another level. His velocity jumped to 92-95 mph, he continued to show what was perhaps the best changeup in the nation and he developed a sharp, low-80s slider. Not only will Quantrill enter the season as one of the most feared and polished aces in the country in just his sophomore year, but he’s also become one of the most sought after prospects in the 2016 draft.

Both Indiana and Stanford have some question marks in their lineup in 2015, but the matchup of these two elite aces will showcase what make them two highly intriguing teams this spring.

For many of the nation’s top teams, opening weekend feels like a time to ease into the season. But, for the teams playing in the Clearwater Tournament in Florida this weekend, there will be no dipping of the toe into the shallow end of the pool. As Louisville, Cal State Fullerton, South Florida, and Alabama State get ready to square off, it’s clear that each of them will be diving head first into the deep end of competition.

Kyle Funkhouser (University of Louisville Sports Information)

• Virginia outfielder Joe McCarthy had back surgery and will be out 12 weeks.

• Tyler Stubblefield had knee surgery to repair a torn ACL. He should return at some point this season, but was slotted to be Texas A&M's Saturday starter prior to the injury.

• Cal Poly's Mark Mathias, the defending Big West Player of the Year, had labrum surgery in December, and while it went well, he'll be out until March and likely will serve as the DH upon his return.

• Gio Brusa (Pacific) is experiencing some oblique issues as noted above, but could still take the field.

• College of Charleston has decided to use Bailey Ober out of the bullpen to start the year after experiencing forearm tightness in an attempt to work him back to full health. Ober was a Freshman All-American last season and was a big part of Charleston's Super Regional run.

• The Mountain Valley Conference Freshman of the Year last season, Danny Collier of New Mexico, is experiencing back issues and it's unsure whether he'll be able to take the field.

• LSU will be without two talented members of their freshmen class, infielder Greg Deichmann and lefthander Jake Latz. Deichmann will miss 4-6 weeks due to a stress fractice in his foot while Latz will shut down for the first two weeks due to a recent elbow injury. Latz also missed fall practice due to a stress reaction in his pitching elbow.

• Pete Alonso suffered a broken right foot in practice this past week, the same foot he suffered a stress fractuce in during the fall. Alonso followed up a solid freshman season with a huge summer one, hitting .354 with 18 home runs on his way to being named the Northwoods League MVP.

• East Carolina will be without do-it-all senior Reid Love for the first week of the season, who injured his left hand. He was expected to open the year as their Friday ace in addition to serving as the team's leadoff hitter.

• Florida State first baseman Chris Marconcini is expected to have knee surgery today and will miss 3-6 weeks.

• UC Santa Barbara is one of the favorites to win the Big West and head coach Andrew Checketts considered moving Preseason All-American closer Dillon Tate into the starting rotation. As of opening weekend, Tate and his 99 mph fastball will remain in the bullpen as the Gauchos rotation will consist of Justin Jacome, Shane Bieber, and Domenic Mazza. UCSB sports one the nation's best hashtags in #Chomaha.

• Oklahoma State at Arizona State might be this weekend's bridesmaid for best series. The Cowboys and Sun Devils have two of the more experienced rosters nationally with Oklahoma State losing just the back of their bullpen from a Super Regional team. Arizona State enters two new eras at once as they move from the on-campus Packard Stadium to beer-selling Phoenix Municipal Stadium, and also begin season one under new skipper Tracy Smith. Smith comes to Tempe after two consecutive historic seasons at Indiana, advancing to the CWS in 2013 and earning a Top 8 National Seed in 2014.

• At this time last year we only knew A.J. Reed as a good college player. He was on most preseason All-American teams (Second Team for Perfect Game) but primarily because the pool of two-way players was small. Reed only hit .280 as a sophomore with a pedestrian 4.04 ERA previous to his monster junior season.

Who is the 2015 version of A.J. Reed poised for a big breakout junior season? Each member of the Perfect Game college team took a chance to answer that question:

• Thomas Eshelman – far from a sleeper as far as production at the college level, Eshelman enters the season as PG's 113th ranked 2015 overall draft eligible prospect. Pitchers who command the strike zone as effectively well as Eshelman has through his career are often taken earlier in the draft than once expected. Look no further than similar control artists such as Tim Stauffer in 2003 and Wes Roemer in 2007 (Mike Rooney).

• Christin and D.J. Stewart – take your pick between the Team USA Stewart teammates (no relation) who posted big numbers last summer. Florida State's D.J. Stewart is the reigning ACC Player of the Year and enters the season as the favorite to once again win the award, while big things are expected out of Christin Stewart and Tennessee (Frankie Piliere).

• Chris Shaw – Shaw's power came alive last summer on the Cape swinging a wood bat, leading the circuit with eight home runs after hitting six during his sophomore year at Boston College. And that's only the beginning for the 6-foot-3, 248-pound slugger (Jheremy Brown).

• Grayson Long – somewhat of a longshot on this list as he's currently ranked 155th in PG's current list of the top 250 prospects eligible for this year's draft, but his tall, projectable stature, improving stuff and polished changeup are reminscent of another Aggie, Michael Wacha (Patrick Ebert).

• The 2015 college draft class is in a word, murky. Twelve months ago Carlos Rodon was a household name and a no doubter for the first three picks in the draft, with many having him peged as the favorite to go first overall since his dominant freshman season. There is a lot of real estate between Rodon's resume prior to his junior year and that of current Duke righthander Michael Matuella, the default college draft prospect in 2015. Matuella has elite tools and stuff but lacks a track record in both performance and good health. He begins the 2015 season and his path to the draft in front of what undoubtedly will be a large collection of scouts as Duke takes on Cal in Berekley, Calif.

Read Nick Kappel's recent feature on Matuella here.

• Two things to feel good about entering Week 1: All reports on the new baseball have been positive. If nothing else, it appears that we will back to scoring from second base on singles again, and even if home run totals don't improve we're still in a better spot. It's time for the off-side outfielders to back up to normal depth again.

• Similarly, television coverage of college baseball continues to skyrocket thanks mostly to the commitment of ESPN and the new SEC Network. There's nothing better than increased exposure for an outstanding product and this is great news for college baseball.