2013 CUSA Baseball-- Just 2 Days 'til Opening Day!
Now that the football season is finally over, time to turn our attention (well, at least for some of us) to C-USA's best sport. Heading into the 2013 season, I supsect Rice and USM will be co-favorites to win the conference, with the Owls getting the nod due to historical precendent (and another elite pitching staff), while the Eagles appear to be absolutely loaded-- both offensively and on the mound. UCF should be solid and a post-season lock, but they lose the vast majority of their offense from their stellar 2011-2012 squad. Can ECU regain the Top 35 form of their 2008 - '10 seasons? Can Tulane and UH finally return to Top 50 caliber form after several seasons in the wastelands?
On the surface, Rice appears to have lost a ton of talent-- two starting pitchers (Reckling, Benak), 60% of their bullpen (Chargois, Duffey, Wall) and four of their top position players (Rathjen, Fuda, Manuel, Chargois). However, the cubbard is far from empty, as the Coach Graham continues to do an excellent job of restocking. The pitching staff still features a couple likely first couple round draft picks in Austin Kubitza (3-year Friday starter) and John Simms (likely to start year as closer, but has been weekend starter in past), another couple guys with weekend starter experience (John Stephens, Chase McDowell), a couple guys who had excellent Freshman campaigns in the bullpen who will play more prominent roles in 2013 (Zech Lemond, Rutter), three experienced bullpen arms returning from 2012 injuries (Spurlin, McNair, Fant), and our usual compliment of Freshman arms (including Kevin McCanna, who will likely be our Sunday or mid-week starter). Rice returns the majority of it's infield, led by preseason all-american 2B Christian Stringer, along with 3B Hoelscher, SS Stainback and C Perrott. In the outfield, Sr Ratterree will be returning in RF, hoping to regain his offensive form after a dismall 2012 season. He'll be joined by true Fr speedster and switch hitter, Leon Byrd in CF, and either Cook (who was a starter in 2011), Aquino, true Freshman Beau Rathjen (Jeremy's brother) or one of a couple JUCO transfers in LF.
As always, Rice's strength will be in the depth of it's pitching staff; however, it will be the offense that will determine how far the Owls go this year. It will likely improve upon last season (not saying much), but the question is, how much improvement? Certainly, if Lance Berkman decides to retire and returns as an Assistant Coach (while finishing his degree), it should help the offense considerably.
Rice opens at home against Stanford, then travels to Hawaii for a four-game set, before returning to Houston for the Minute Maid tournament against likely #1 UNC, A&M and Baylor. Love the tough OOC slate.
(This post was last modified: 02-13-2013 07:31 AM by waltgreenberg.)
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