I have been hearing all the national media praising Drew Pomeranz for his strong start to the season but has anyone flown under the radar more then Chris Sale from Florida Gulf Coast. Sale picked up a 4-2 victory over Clemson on Saturday where he went eight strong innings allowing only four hits and two runs. Sale’s record now increases to 7-0 with a 2.16 ERA. He has struck out 103 batters in his 75 innings of work. I saw Sale in the CCBL All-Star game this summer where he dominated the hitters. You can check out my recap of that game by clicking here.
I have been saying for the last couple of weeks that LSU isn’t as strong as people had them out to be. The Tigers dropped their first two games to Florida this weekend down in Gainesville which extended the Tigers losing streak to six games. The biggest problem is Anthony Ranaudo and his struggles over the last two weeks where he has pitched 3.2 innings while allowing 13 runs on 15 hits. Is Ranaudo injured more then it was let on at the beginning of the season? We should see as Ranaudo needs to become the ace of the Tigers staff if they want to be hosting a regional.
Army and Columbia both secured the rights to hold their respective conference tourneys with victories on Saturday. The Black Knights of Army picked up a doubleheader sweep of Bucknell (4-0, 5-3) to run their overall record to 26-13 while being 15-3 in Patriot League action. They will host an opneing round threee game series next weekend and if they win they would also host the Patriot League Championship Series. Columbia picked up a 10-8 victory in Game 2 of a doubleheader which clinched home field for the Lions next weekend against the winner of the Harvard/Dartmouth doubleheader on Sunday. Columbia finished the 2010 regular season with a 25-19 record while going 14-6 in the Ivy League.
Congrats to Michael Choice of UT-Arlington who broke his school record with his 32nd career home run (14th of the season) as the Mavericks picked up the 9-1 victory over Texas AM Corpus-Christi. Choice is currently hitting .395 with 14 homers and 43 RBI. I had the chance to see Choice where he impressed thus the reason why I had him rated as the 13th best player coming into the season. (Check out the full article) I wrote on him back on January 9th.
