TEAM-----------------CONF.--------OVERALL---------RPI

Southern Miss--------6-0-----------16-6-------------40
FAU-------------------5-1-----------16-9-------------102
Western Kentucky---5-1-----------12-11------------187
Marshall--------------4-2-----------15-9-------------181
Charlotte-------------3-3-----------11-13------------162
UTSA-----------------3-3-----------11-14------------170
Middle Tennessee----3-3-----------8-16-------------210
Louisiana Tech-------2-4-----------14-10------------64
FIU--------------------2-4-----------11-14------------197
Old Dominion---------1-5-----------16-8-------------120
UAB-------------------1-5-----------12-14------------173
Rice-------------------1-5-----------9-18--------------155

Our Conference Opponents:
Highest RPI: LA Teach (64)
Average RPI (156.5)

Remember when C-USA used to a 'baseball conference'? What a joke this conference has become. We suck in football as a league, and we have become a consistent one league team in basketball and baseball. No wonder our fans are becoming more and more apathetic. And don't get me started with the gross "All-day, CUSA" commercials. If you look at AAC commercials they have planes flying over packed stadiums with fireworks. Action. In our commercials we have assistant golf coach interviews talking about how members of the CUSA have integrity, character, and passion. That is not going to create a lot of excitement I'm sorry. If we destroy every single one of these awful teams and go 29-0 in conference play we will probably still be a two seed. The one thing we should be good at, baseball, we suck at too. Will it ever get better? Is there any chance of us moving up? Where is the light?

(03-28-2019 12:04 PM)Yu-Es-Em Wrote:  TEAM-----------------CONF.--------OVERALL---------RPI

Southern Miss--------6-0-----------16-6-------------40
FAU-------------------5-1-----------16-9-------------102
Western Kentucky---5-1-----------12-11------------187
Marshall--------------4-2-----------15-9-------------181
Charlotte-------------3-3-----------11-13------------162
UTSA-----------------3-3-----------11-14------------170
Middle Tennessee----3-3-----------8-16-------------210
Louisiana Tech-------2-4-----------14-10------------64
FIU--------------------2-4-----------11-14------------197
Old Dominion---------1-5-----------16-8-------------120
UAB-------------------1-5-----------12-14------------173
Rice-------------------1-5-----------9-18--------------155

Our Conference Opponents:
Highest RPI: LA Teach (64)
Average RPI (156.5)

Remember when C-USA used to a 'baseball conference'? What a joke this conference has become. We suck in football as a league, and we have become a consistent one league team in basketball and baseball. No wonder our fans are becoming more and more apathetic. And don't get me started with the gross "All-day, CUSA" commercials. If you look at AAC commercials they have planes flying over packed stadiums with fireworks. Action. In our commercials we have assistant golf coach interviews talking about how members of the CUSA have integrity, character, and passion. That is not going to create a lot of excitement I'm sorry. If we destroy every single one of these awful teams and go 29-0 in conference play we will probably still be a two seed. The one thing we should be good at, baseball, we suck at too. Will it ever get better? Is there any chance of us moving up? Where is the light?

I came to the realization that it is unrealistic to think CUSA “should” be good at baseball.

Rice’s success was built on one coach who established the program at a time when few programs cared about baseball.

Other than Rice and USM, there’s not much of a winning tradition anywhere.

The FU’s are in a baseball rich area but don’t have fanbases. FIU had some good years in the 90s and then landed on probation. Haven’t been good since.

Really, you have a few programs that are better than they have ever been. FAU has been a consistently solid team—previously had up and down seasons. LA Tech’s program is exponentially better than it has ever been. Marshall is way better than they have any business being.

If those programs regress back to their normal levels, it could get much worse.

Rice still schedules their front end like it's 2003.

(03-28-2019 01:05 PM)shiftyeagle Wrote:  Rice still schedules their front end like it's 2003.

I dont see anything wrong with that. They should.

Charlotte did that midweek as this is their midweek schedule:

@ Clemson (27)
Morehead St (101)
@ Arkansas (4) - return trip from last year, scheduled 2 but one got rained out
NC State (11)
@ Wake Forest (115)
Clemson (27)
UNC Ashville (192)
@ South Carolina (63)
Wake Forest (115)
UNC Greensboro (49)
Charleston Southern (259)

Non conference weekends though they definitely took the easy road:
Delaware (247)
Canisius (197)
Kent St (122)
Coppin St (232)

I was thinking about Conference USA baseball this morning (these are the things I think about, ya know). As bad as the league is now, it wasn't that long ago (2016) that this same lineup of teams got 4 bids and finished top 5 in RPI. Even 2017 C-USA which would have been a 1-bid league had we won the tournament was #6 in RPI. It's been these past 2 seasons where you've seen a massive drop.

Couple reasons that C-USA has crap baseball and bad RPIs:

1) C-USA teams generally load up on bad teams at home in the non-con. When you do that, you're asking for your RPI to take a hit. Why? Because home games hurt more when you lose and help less when you win because of the RPI formula. Plus you have 50% of the formula that is directly tied to opponent's winning percentage. You know it's bad when our OOC will probably be one of the better in the league.

2) Schools in the conference keep bad coaches longer than they should. Charlotte is actually a job where you can win some, but they've kept their mediocre coach way too long and it holds them back. MTSU finally got rid of their coach last year. WKU will do the same after the season, hopefully.

3) Most C-USA programs don't give a damn about baseball. Look at some of the facilities in this conference, they're terrible. You aren't going to recruit decent players when you play in a HS stadium in front of 100 fans. That's probably a huge reason why the talent level has dropped off like it has within the conference.

You just hope that we keep it going (along with FAU) and maybe Rice turns it around with their new scholarship program in place, but it might take 2 or so years for Bragga to start improving the roster there. Then you need a couple other programs to step it up. It'd be huge if some of these schools around #200 in the RPI could just get in the 100-125 range on an annual basis.

(03-28-2019 04:09 PM)BeagleUSM Wrote:  Home games hurt more when you lose and help less when you win.

You can't stress their importance enough.

(03-28-2019 01:15 PM)Reggie Favre Wrote:  

(03-28-2019 01:05 PM)shiftyeagle Wrote:  Rice still schedules their front end like it's 2003.

I dont see anything wrong with that. They should.

They get monkey-stomped every year now

(03-28-2019 01:05 PM)shiftyeagle Wrote:  Rice still schedules their front end like it's 2003.

Yep.

And they pack the games in too. Looks like Bragga did a better job of spreading them out this year.

We really should drop UTEP, Rice, ODU, Charlotte...and add ULL, Troy, and maybe Ark. State, App State, or South Alabama.

Here ya go. If we win today, we get 11 RPI points. A loss and we lose 94.