It's been five years since the Cardinal were last held
scoreless in a Pac-10 game. The 2006 edition just managed to
accomplish that feat on consecutive nights. The Stanford baseball
team, from an offensive prospective, just may have sunk to their lowest
mark in a decade with back-to-back shutout losses at Oregon State this
weekend. After a 3-0 loss to the 11th ranked Beavers on Thursday
evening, Oregon State came right back with a 1-0 win on Friday to
clinch the series victory.
You certainly can't fault the Stanford pitching staff for their woes to
begin the Pac-10 season. The Cardinal have now lost six of their
first eight conference games and find themselves currently in last
place. In those six losses, the Stanford offense has mustered a
mere nine runs. Even
last year's club, that hit under .300 for the first time at Stanford in
ten years, didn't sink to this level.
Meanwhile, in those six Pac-10 losses, the Cardinal pitching staff has
more than held their own posting a 3.76 ERA. Numbers like that
from a pitching staff generally lead to a conference championship - not
a last place standing.
On Thursday, Greg Reynolds was as dominant as ever through the first
five innings. The junior right-hander, who continues to impress
scouts to the point where a first round draft selection is becoming a
very real possibility, allowed just two hits (both singles) during the
initial five frames. Reynolds had no problems pitching through a
pair of errors behind him and, once again, gave his team an excellent
chance to win.
Oregon State though was able to finally find a way to solve Reynolds in
the bottom of the sixth. A bloop single from Darwin Barney was
sandwiched in between a pair of walks to load the bases with none
out. Bill Rowe then followed with a single to deep shortstop to
score the game's first run. That would turn out to be all the
Beavers would need, but Shea McFeely followed with a single through the
middle scoring two more OSU runs. Reynolds did an excellent job
to limit the damage after that hit eventually striking out the final
two batters of the inning to keep the Cardinal within striking distance.
All total, the Cardinal ace went seven strong innings on Thursday
yielding three runs on seven hits. He walked four and struck out
seven during his 128-pitch outing.
Freshman right-hander Max Fearnow, who continues to push his way into a
regular role out of the bullpen, struck out the side in the bottom of
the eighth.
What made Thursday so discouraging offensively for the Cardinal was
that they didn't even face one of Oregon State's aces.
All-Americans Dallas Buck and Jonah Nickerson were held back for the
second and third games of the series respectively to keep them throwing
on their scheduled days. So instead, Stanford saw sophomore
right-hander Mike Stutes - a Santa Clara transfer - on Thursday.
Stutes was having a solid year pitching as both a reliever and
occasional third starter. He would, however, come through with a
memorable performance in the series-opener this weekend propelling the
Beavers to the victory.
Stutes allowed just three hits and managed to pitch around four walks
during his 6 2/3 innings on the mound. Stanford threatened in the
top of the first putting runners on first and second with none
out. But a Chris Minaker line out and a Randy Molina double play
ground out ended that threat.
Stanford hit into another double play in the fourth while also having
runners thrown out trying to steal in the second and fifth frames.
Trailing 3-0, the Cardinal had their best chance to score in the top of
the seventh. Back-to-back two-out walks from Stutes set the table
and ended the starting pitcher's evening on the mound. After a
four-pitch walk to Chris Lewis loaded the bases, Ryan Seawell stepped
to the plate as a pinch-hitter. But on a 2-1 offering from
reliever Joe Paterson, Seawell popped out to first base leaving three
runners on.
After a leadoff single from Cord Phelps in the eighth, the final six
Stanford batters went down in order (four via the strike out) to end
the game.
Friday's tilt saw exactly the same offensive production from the
Cardinal : zero runs and four hits. This time, Stanford went up
against undefeated Dallas Buck. The junior, who also has a chance
at a first round draft selection this June, had won 18 of 19 decisions
during the last two years. However, he hadn't been nearly as
dominant this season posting a 3.99 ERA entering Friday (after sitting
in the low 2's last year).
Buck though had little problems weaving his way through the Stanford
lineup on Friday. The Cardinal put a pair of runners on with two
outs in the first inning, but a John Hester fly out ended the
rally. Then in the third, a Jim Rapoport double followed by a hit
by pitch of Minaker and a Michael Taylor single loaded the bases.
But it would be Hester grounding into a 5-4-3 double play to again keep
Stanford off the scoreboard.
That third inning rally would be Stanford's best chance to score until
the ninth, to say the least. Buck retired the Cardinal in order
1-2-3 over the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth innings.
He only managed three strike outs during the stretch, but all total,
the right-hander retired 17 consecutive hitters until Taylor drew a
four-pitch walk in the top of the ninth.
Trailing 1-0 at the time, Stanford had a golden opportunity to tie or
take the lead in the ninth inning. Hester followed the Taylor
walk with a single through the left side to put runners on the
corners. A pitching change then brought ace closer Kevin
Gunderson into the game. With a southpaw on the mound, Coach
Marquess countered by sending the left-handed hitting Randy Molina to
the bench in favor of a right-handed bat in Seawell. Needing just
a fly ball to the outfield to score the tying run, Seawell,
unfortunately, was unable to deliver. On a 2-0 pitch, he grounded
into a routine 6-4-3 double play to force out Hester and end the game.
Clearly, the one bright spot from Friday's action was the emergence of
Jeremy Bleich as a starter. In a bit of a surprise considering
fellow starters David Stringer and Matt Manship have been throwing
pretty well of late, Marquess decided to shake things up by inserting
the freshman into the rotation. Bleich has appeared in 15 of
Stanford's first 27 games out of the bullpen recording a team-high
seven saves. He kept that strong momentum going with a fabulous
outing on Friday evening.
Over the first six innings, the southpaw allowed just two hits (a bloop
triple and a single) and no runs. He never endured an inning with
more than one baserunner while also notching four punchouts.
Bleich allowed a leadoff single to Cole Gillespie in the bottom of the
seventh, and despite a pitch count of just 73, was then removed from
the game. Nolan Gallagher was summoned from the bullpen and there
was no question that Gallagher was on his game from a "stuff"
perspective. He didn't allow a hit in his two innings of work
while picking up three strike outs in the process.
Unfortunately, consecutive balks with the sophomore on the mound
brought home the eventual winning run. In that seventh inning, a
sacrifice bunt moved Gillespie to second before he was balked to third
by Gallagher and then balked home. With runners on the corners
and one out, Gallagher attempted the fake-to-third, throw-to-first
move. According to the umpiring crew though, Gallagher stepped
too close to home plate as opposed to the direction of third base and
thus the violation was called. And with Stanford again not
mustering any sort of offense, that's all it would take for yet another
defeat.
Thursday:
Stanford 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 - 0 4 2
Oregon State 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 X
- 3 7 0
WP: Mike Stutes (3-2)
LP: Greg Reynolds (2-3)
S: Kevin Gunderson (8)
Friday:
Stanford 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 - 0 4 0
Oregon State 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 X
- 1 3 0
WP: Dallas Buck (7-0)
LP: Jeremy Bleich (2-2)
S: Kevin Gunderson (9)
Notes:
* Stanford's managed just eight hits combined in the first two
games for a total team batting average of .143.
* The duo of Bleich and Gallagher held the potent Oregon State offense
to just three hits on Friday. Bleich lowered his season ERA to
2.08 (6 ER/26.0 IP) while Gallagher's now sits at a team-best 1.46 (4
ER/24.2 IP).
* Taylor and Hester each picked up single hits in both games to extend
modest hitting streaks to four games. Not a single Cardinal
batter recorded a multi-hit game in either contest.
* Prior to this weekend, Stanford was last shutout in a Pac-10 game on
April 28, 2001 (4-0 at California). That was a stretch of 109
consecutive conference games without being shutout.
* Over the last three games (27 innings), the Cardinal have managed
just two runs. Both of those scores were on Monday night against
Pacific and both were unearned tallies.
* Now at the exact halfway point of the regular season, Stanford's team
batting average has dropped all the way down to .264 - 23 points below
last season's output. At .264, this would be the lowest team
average in Marquess' 30 years as head coach if the season ended
today. It would be the Cardinal's lowest average since the 1975
club hit just .262.
On Deck:
Saturday's scheduled series finale between the Cardinal and
Beavers was postponed due to rain. The teams will now play on
Sunday afternoon with first pitch slated for 12:00 P.M. Oregon
State will send the right-hander Jonah Nickerson (5-3, 2.47 ERA) to the
hill while Stanford has yet to officially announce a starting
pitcher. In all likelihood, either David Stringer (2-2, 3.41 ERA)
or Matt Manship (1-3, 4.39 ERA) will get the ball.
Pac-10 Update:
In possibly the Pac-10 series of the year, Arizona State took
two-of-three games from USC in Tempe this weekend. The Trojans
scored five runs in the top of the ninth inning on Thursday night for a
dramatic 13-12 come-from-behind victory. But ASU stormed back
with a run in the ninth and a run in the tenth on Friday for a 10-9
win. Then in the rubber contest on Saturday afternoon, the Sun
Devils plated a single run in the bottom of the ninth to post a
thrilling 8-7 victory.
Other action has seen UCLA take two-of-three from Arizona (3-4, 13-8,
8-5) in Tucson. California and Washington State have split the
first two games of their series up in Pullman (9-2 Cal, 5-4 WSU) with
the rubber matchup scheduled for Saturday night. Meanwhile,
Washington won two-of-three over visiting BYU (10-1, 2-4, 12-1) in a
non-conference series.
- Standings -
USC
8-4 - 22-16
Arizona State 6-3 0.5 27-11
Oregon State 5-3 1.0
24-9
UCLA
5-4 1.5 20-15
Washington State 5-6 2.5 23-13
California 5-6
2.5 17-17
Washington 4-5
2.5 24-14
Arizona
3-6 3.5 15-18
Stanford
2-6 4.0 15-13
Despite their early difficulties in
conference action, a win on Sunday would move Stanford to within two
games of third place. A series at struggling Arizona is next on
the docket. However, a loss on Sunday keeps the Cardinal in sole
possession of last place with a conference record at five games under
the .500 mark.
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