Postmortem on Last night's 5-1 loss to Arizona and Preview of Santa Barbara

The simple facts are these after the 5-1 loss last night vs Arizona: 

• We strike out 14 times (8 of those called 3rd strikes)
• We leave 10 men on base, a majority of those with 2 outs. 
• The middle 4 of the order (Zach, Brandon, Johnny, and Willie) go a combined 3-14 with 7 K's.

Stuff like that, against lesser competition, you can get away with, but in Omaha, if you leave that many men on base vs a team like Arizona was last night, you're not going to win, and sure enough, we didn't. 

Now, our backs are to the wall tomorrow afternoon at 2 p.m. vs Santa Barbara in a Win or Go home game for a team that had one goal and that's win the whole thing or have this season be a complete failure. 

Let's look at Santa Barbara by the numbers:

Offense: 

.262 Average as a team (.725 OPS, .242 Secondary Average)

329 total runs (251 Runs Created)

.318 wOBA (Weighted On-Base Average)

.244 BABIP (Batting Average on Balls in play)

Breaking down their likely starting lineup for tomorrow's game:

1. Andrew Calica CF: .260 Avg. (.435 OB%, .372 Slugging%, .807 OPS, .381 Secondary Avg.)
2. Clay Fisher SS: .286 Avg. (.335 OB% .377 Slugging%, .712 OPS, .195 Secondary Avg.)
3. Devon Gradford RF: .333 Avg (.414 OB% .455 Slugging%, .869 OPS, .220 Secondary Avg.)
4. Austin Bush 1B: .269 Avg. (.349 OB% .479 Slugging%, .828 OPS, .336 Secondary Avg.)
5. JJ Muno 2B: .295 Avg. (.370 OB% .451 Slugging%, .821 OPS, .254 Secondary Avg.)
6. Dempsey Grover C: .278 Avg. (.390 OB% .390 Slugging, .780 OPS, .316 Secondary Avg.)
7. Kyle Plantier DH: .190 Avg. (.316 OB% .278 Slugging, .594 OPS, .169 Secondary Avg.)
8. Josh Adams LF: .229 Avg. (.325 OB% .366 Slugging, .691 OPS, .264 Secondary Avg.)
9. Ryan Clark 3B: .264 Avg. (.327 OB% .340 Slugging, .667 OPS, .146 Secondary Avg.)

Runs Created

Calica: 33.3

Fisher: 29.3

Gradford: 21.1

Bush: 37.4

Muno: 33.5

Grover: 29.3

Plantier: 8.3

Adams: 16.4

Clark: 26.0

In that lineup, the guys that stand out that we'd need to watch are Calica, Bush, Fisher, and Grover. 

Defense

Range Factor is 38.9

Pitching

Its likely we'll see their #2 tomorrow in Joe Record. 

If its Record, here's what we need to know about him. He's 6-5 on the season with an ERA of 3.91. He's nowhere near as good as their best pitcher they threw yesterday vs Oklahoma State in Shane Bieber. He's thrown 89.2 innings, walking 38 and fanning 63. 

Digging deeper into those numbers, when you look at his FIP (Fielding Independent Pitching), its 3.40 and his LOB% (Left on Base Percentage) is .647, which is poor, so there should be opportunities for the bats to get going tomorrow and put the pressure on this guy and get that count up. 

For us to win, we MUST get off to a faster start, and the bats have to on from Inning 1. We need a solid performance out of Danny (Garcia). We have to keep their top three guys off the bases, because they will do damage if you let them get on base. 

I believe that we will get that solid performance that's badly needed from Danny, and survive tomorrow and get to Wednesday.