Towson Tigers Weekend 11 Preview

Towson TigersThe Towson Tigers are in Beantown this weekend, taking on the 23-13 Northeastern Huskies, who currently lead the Colonial Athletic Association by a game and a half. Over the last twenty or so years, Northeastern has transformed itself from a large commuter school to one of the nations leading research universities and is noted for it’s innovative cooperative education program, consistently ranking as one of the best schools for interns. It’s a far cry from it’s humble beginnings in 1898 as the Evening Institute for Younger Men in the Huntington Avenue YMCA.

No, it wasn’t like that and, surprisingly, no, that won’t the song at the bottom of this page.

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Towson Tigers Game 40 Recap

Towson TigersI remembered, rather late in the day yesterday, that University of Maryland Baltimore County is right down the road from my house, so I decided to pick my daughters up from preschool and take them to a baseball game. It was…quite an adventure.

I have to admit, I did not realized how large UMBC is, with, uh, an actual campus and, like, college buildings and stuff. In any case, thanks to my distrust of GPS and very unhelpful directions from the handful of people I asked, we ended up driving around most of that campus before finding the gate that led to the baseball field. Which was locked. Fortunately, I noticed a bit of the fence around the soccer field had been knocked over, so I carried my girls down a hill, through the gap, and across a very soggy field, until we finally reached The Baseball Factory Field. Which is very un-factory like, though it does have lights, which is nice.

We arrived just in time to watch Towson give up 12 runs in the third inning, which took so long it was the little ones’ bedtime, so we left. So, as far as baseball goes, it was a pretty fruitless trip. But, as far as spending time with my daughters and watching them have a great time dancing around the bleachers, it was absolutely fantastic. And it’s nice knowing there’s baseball right down the road from my house.

So you got that going for you.

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Towson Tigers Game 40 Preview – Looking for Revenge

Towson TigersTowson seeks revenge today for one of their most painful losses of the season, when they gave up five unearned runs to University of Maryland Baltimore County in the top of the ninth, dropping a game they led 4-1. That marked the first of six straight losses for the Tigers, but since then they have played much better baseball. A win today will give Towson an even 8-8 record for the month of April, going into their final series of the month against CAA leader Northeastern.

UMBC has been on a similar trajectory. After that come from behind victory on March 14, the Retrievers were only 3-9; since then, they have gone 10-11. They are even tougher at home, where they sport a 9-5 record. Their three leading hitters are generally the first three hitters in their lineup: junior second baseman AJ Wright (.281/.356/.463 and the reigning America East Player of the Week), senior catcher Zack Bright (.288/.319/.441), and sophomore third baseman Christian Torres (.283/.387/.368). On the mound, UMBC’s best pitcher continues to be sophomore closer Stephen Schoch, who ranks 27th nationally with 12.34 K/9 (neat). Schoch, a big, submarining right-hander, has racked up 38.2 innings over 17 appearances, picking up seven saves, and compiling a tidy 1.86 ERA and 3.79 strikeouts per walk.

I will have more on Stephen Schoch soon…

I was going to make a joke about not being a tease, but it’s not the kind of Google image search you want to do at work.

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Towson Tigers Weekend 10 Recap

Towson Tigers

Towson’s coach, Matt Tyner, often talks about “the process”. Playing every play, every pitch, every at bat with the same focus, backed by preparation. Playing with awareness, with confidence, that you know what to do and are ready to do it. It’s not just a matter of cliche’d fundamentals, but really being totally committed to every single moment of the game. A matter of mindfulness, if you’re into that sort of thing.

Nearly all coaches, of course, say things like this, but it is a subtle shift in priorities. You look at things top-down or bottom-up. The top-down perspective says, “Do everything possible to win the game (even if it’s outside of your abilities). Play with 110% effort (even if it means doing something you’ve never tried). Leave it all on the field (if you lost you must not have tried hard enough).” The bottom-up perspective says, “Make the right play, every single play (because you don’t want mistakes to snowball). Practice with 100% exact effort (because then you will play that way by default). Visualize every play before it happens (so you don’t leave any opportunities on the field).

As this season has gone on, you can see the process taking hold of the Towson baseball team. Though they dropped two of three games this weekend, the Tigers pushed one of the best teams in their conference to the brink in both losses. One could argue that they lost two innings this entire series. The mistakes that defined the first month of the season are becoming more and more rare.

University of North Carolina Wilmington used fourteen pitchers this weekend. Towson used six, two in each game, and not one threw a wild pitch. Tigers’ pitchers hit a single batter; UNCW hit five. The Seahawks, one of the best offenses in the Colonial Athletic Association, scored 13 runs this series. Towson scored 14 in one game. The Tigers are not one of the big boys, not yet, but this weekend proved, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that they can hang with them. The process is working. It’s a beautiful thing to see.


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Towson Tigers Weekend 10 Preview

Towson TigersWhen I previewed the Tigers’ game earlier this week against University of Maryland Eastern Shore, I mentioned how fun it has been for me to learn a little bit about all of the schools Towson has played this season. I love history and trivia, and I’ve been able to turn up some interesting little nugget about each of the Tigers’ opponents. Well, as you may have guessed, this is where I write, “Until now.”

Maybe I’m just tired (I am), or maybe I should do more research than reading a Wikipedia page (I should), but I can’t find one interesting thing about the University of North Carolina Wilmington. I don’t say that to disparage the place. I’m sure you can get a great education there. It’s, um, really big. Hey, it’s not in Delaware, so it’s got that going for it! (What do I have against Delaware anyway?) Why the heck are they called the Seahawks? Isn’t that what they call osprey on the west coast? Don’t we call them osprey over here on the best coast? I’m so confused.

Let’s get on to the baseball.

Basically me writing this right now.

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Towson Tigers Game 36 Recap

For the second time this season, Towson got over a bad loss by putting it on Delaware State, using a pair of long balls to power their way to a 6-2 victory. But this game was highlighted by a couple of fantastic pitching performances.

The Hornets struck first, scoring two runs in the opening frame on two walks, a double, and a groundout, aided by a wild pitch. After that inauspicious beginning, though, it was all Towson. Specifically, it was all Josh Seils and Mason Anderson. As much as I love mining nuggets of positivity out of mines of despair, these are the types of games I can’t wait to sink my teeth into. Let’s jump right in.

WHEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!

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Towson Tigers Game 36 Preview

Towson TigersTowson plays Delaware State today for the second time this year, so you can read that game preview to learn some tidbits about the Hornets. In the first game, Delaware State was only 2-12, but since then they have gone just 3-16, which is actually a better winning percentage. Don’t take anything for granted, I guess is what I’m saying. Of the bats I previously highlighted, Cole Garey and Jared Gillis have fallen off a little bit, but junior outfielder Darnell Maisonet is having a fantastic season, .329/.456/.512. Just like last time, the Tigers are coming off of a heart-breaking loss and hope to use DSU as their own personal stress ball.

HOW DO YOU LIKE IT?! HUH?!? YEAH, KEEP SMILING, ARGHHHH!!!

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Towson Tigers Game 35 Recap

Towson TigersIt is easy for someone like me, with no real connection to this team, an outsider observer, to look at a game like this and say it’s fine, the future is what’s important, one more loss is not going to change the trajectory of this season. It’s OK, because players got valuable experience. Mistakes were made, but those can be turned into lessons. There will be another game tomorrow and short memories are valuable things.

But for players, coaches, families, and fans, that is a bunch of crap. They want to win and losses like this hurt. They hurt bad. Losing a game you were winning by two runs going into the ninth inning is awful, but losing that game by seven runs is absurdly cruel.

This loss wasn’t a fluke, but an avalanche of every problem that has plagued the Tigers all season long. And it would be easy to recount those problems, to analyze every walk, every error, every wild pitch and hit batter, and add my pound of misery to the scale. But that is not why I’m here. If you’re reading this, it’s not why you’re here. We’re here to celebrate the positive. Not because it’s easy, but because it’s hard.

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Towson Tigers Game 35 Preview

Towson TigersWhile my main priority here, obviously, is baseball, it has been quite fascinating to learn about some of the schools Towson has played this year. When you see a location-specific name like University of Maryland Eastern Shore, the natural tendency is to assume, “that’s just some satellite school,” and not think anything of it. but in doing so you can miss out on a lot of history (and some pretty fine centers of higher education). From it’s inception in 1889 as a preparatory school for the institution that would become Morgan State University, to it’s role in the early half of the 20th century providing advanced agricultural and law programs to African-American students, the history of UMES provides a snapshot into the evolution of civil rights and education in our part of the country.

It even shares slight parallels to Towson’s baseball program, as UMES was once a football powerhouse, but lost the program after being unable to maintain the high cost of a Division I program while providing athletic opportunities to women under Title IX (a fate that almost befell the Tigers baseball team). They still sharing the record for most alumni to play in a single Superbowl and hold a place in history as part of one of the first interracial intercollegiate football games.

Oh yeah, baseball…

Did I lose you yet

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Towson Tigers Weekend 9 Recap

Towson TigersThe Citadel’s master plan worked like a charm, as a Saturday doubleheader prevented a game from being played on Sunday and the Tigers were unable to rally for a doubleheader sweep on Saturday, thus dropping the series to the Bulldogs. Even so, Towson has been playing much better of late and are an even 5-5 for the month of April.

Family obligations kept me from watching much of Saturday’s games, which is a shame, because I was very impressed with the video quality, multiple camera angles, and instant replay on The Citadel’s online broadcast. If your team, or a player you follow, is playing them, I highly recommend checking it out. I was able to get my first decent look at David Marriggi, which was nice, as he pitched probably his best game of the season. I still don’t have a good idea of their scouting reports, but both Marriggi and Michael Adams look like they could pitch professionally, in some capacity, as guys with good size and repeatable deliveries who have shown they can miss some bats.

Towson plays a couple of games this week before returning to conference play over the weekend. Hopefully they can build a little momentum, especially a few guys who opened some eyes this weekend.

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