“Maturity, the ability to make adjustments, competitive mindset and lack of self pity.”
That’s what Missouri baseball coach Kerrick Jackson said he needs to see from his team as the Tigers enter the back half of the baseball schedule if Missouri is going to get moving in the right direction this season.
The first half was a rough go for the Tigers as they started 0-9 in SEC play, marking the first time in program history Missouri started that poorly in conference play. The previous record was an 0-8 conference start in 1973.
And the Tigers are just 9-8 outside of conference play with wins against power-conference opponents against just Illinois and UConn.
But that doesn’t mean there’s been no bright spots to the first half of the year.
“We are a physically-talented club,” Jackson said. “... We’re just, we’re not playing the game the right way right now. We’re searching for hits and not searching to have quality at-bats. We talk about, we go through our scouting reports on what pitchers are going to do, what our approach and what our plan is for them and then when we get in between the lines, we just seem to forget that. So we’ve got to figure out a way, as a coaching staff and obviously me specifically, of how can I get them to be more mentally focused and stay on task when the time presents itself.”
The Tigers have struggled mightily as a pitching staff through numerous key injuries, compiling a team ERA of 7.87 with only two players with more than one appearance who have a sub-5.50 mark.
But the Tiger offense has been solid, batting .283 as a team with an on base-plus-slugging percentage of .828 and 31 home runs as a team for a mark of almost 1.2 per game.
“The offensive part of it, it took us a while to get going, but we’ve been scoring runs,” Jackson said. “... It just takes something to click in order for us to be able to kind of catch hold and be able to take off. So, I believe that we’re on the verge of being able to do some really good things.”
While the pitching has struggled, multiple offensive players have played at a high level through the first half of the schedule, led by Jackson Lovich with a team-high .357 batting average, a co-team-high six home runs and 25 RBI, all while transitioning into the Tigers’ everyday shortstop role as Missouri has tried multiple options after a preseason injury to expected shortstop Gehrig Goldbeck.
Mateo Serna has added six home runs and a team-high 26 RBI, while Columbia College transfer Cayden Nicoletto has jumped onto the SEC scene with a .357 batting average, three home runs and 13 RBI.
But no offense is good enough to win without some level of pitching success. The Tigers are expecting multiple key pitchers back from injury soon, as well as getting Sam Horn up to speed after he returned from spring football, and are hoping a couple of younger options such as PJ Green are using the experience they’ve gotten early on in their career to become the effective options they can be.
“The more that he’s gotten out there, the better he’s been,” Jackson said of Green. “I mean, when you look at his ERA this year, he has one of our lower ERAs, even despite not being able to land his secondary pitches consistently, because that fastball is just different.”
The road to more success won’t be easy as the Tigers rarely go a week without playing a series against one of the best teams in the country. That’s just life in the SEC.
But the Tigers will officially hit the midpoint tonight when they host Arkansas-Pine Bluff and will hope to step into the second half of the season on a good note with another matchup against Pine Bluff on Wednesday.
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