Everything From Georgia Tech Head Baseball Coach James Ramsey Prior To Opening Day Vs Bowling Green

The Yellow Jackets season begins on Friday as they look to build off an ACC regular season title. They will have a new head coach at the helm after Danny Hall retired. Head coach James Ramsey talked to the media head of the opening day matchup vs Bowling Green. Here is everything he had to say.

On Tate McKee being the starter on opening day....

“It's well documented. We're pretty deep on both sides of the ball. I think on the pitching side, you know, we've definitely landed on who probably the eight best candidates are to get lengthened out. We've told them that early in the season, you know, what we view as a starter, you know, maybe a starter that's throwing in a two- two game in the sixth inning, it might be a guy that's starting the game off for us. These decisions don't come lightly. I think we know that if you looked at our lineup opening day last year offensively, for instance, I think Hernandez hit seventh. Um, you know, we told guys the other day the emergence of their roles um in week one, but yeah, we're going to open up with Tate McKee on Friday. We're going to have Mason Patel definitely earn a spot in the weekend rotation and go with him Saturday, and then we're going to have freshman Cooper Underwood start for us on Sunday. I'm excited for a lot of reasons. Those three guys have done everything we've asked of them. Really proud of the work that Coach Taylor and Coach Richmond have put into the offseason throwing programs with guys. They're really intentional about whatever we saw out of them in the fall. We're going to ask him to take steps forward. Um Cooper (Underwood) is a guy that, you know, just like Charlie Wilcox as a freshman and even Jamie Vicenz, they've all stepped in, and I would be comfortable saying that any of those guys are a weekend starter for us, even on an opening weekend against a good Bowling Green team. Cooper's the guy that down the stretch, we felt really comfortable uh from a performance side, and then some of his process data, you know, it's undeniable when you look at it that he's one of our best arms. On the outside looking in, you know you have, as I mentioned, you have Wilcox, you have (Jackson) Blakley, you have (Justin)Shadek, you have (Dylan)Loy, you have guys that are going to throw in high leverage spots. All those guys are going to be available on Friday, and so we'll just see kind of how the weekend plays out, but one thing that we do like to do is extend guys out of the gate. I think the frequency of bullpin appearances early is something that can hamstring you later on in the season. Those are the three guys we're running out there. We're proud of them, and I think you know, if you ask our hitters, you know, who they like to face and don't like to face, those, you know, like I mentioned, those seven or eight guys, all would get votes um, in a different area. So, that's where we're going to start.”

On how healthy the team is going into the first game….

“Knock on wood, you sit here, and we're really fortunate. I do think we controlled all the controllables on the injury side, which is, you know, just pitch counts and ups and downs, and positionally, you know, you have to monitor the soft tissue stuff early in the season. I know it's talking about guys' health situations, you know, it's right now we have a clean sheet almost uncomfortably, so everybody's full participation in practice on the mound. Our players are so mature with the way that their pregame routines, their pre-practices, I mean, they're here hours in advance of a cage or a bullpen opening. They're here on their days off doing what they need to do. Um, you know, just they like to be in here. They like to foam roll, or they like to sit on a massage chair or whatever it is. We're really healthy, and you know, at the end of the day, you want the stress as a head coach and as a coaching staff of saying all the options are available. Um and that's offensively, that's defensively, but I think it gives us a really good script this week that we're running through all the scenarios that we've already installed, but kind of the final run-throughs of who actually would be playing in a defensive replacement situation. It's really nice to know we can count on everybody from the jump.”

On how to manage all the expectations on the team this season…

“I think it's something that I tried to get ahead of initially when the first couple of polls came out. I think now I mean our guys are all on social media, and you know they have to deal with all that. I think now you know, and kudos to Anthony and our whole PR team, but it's like there's something new every hour, like honestly it's so I think that's been good though because it's gotten so dizzying. It's which acronyms rank us here and who's the preseason player of the year. I mean, Burress has like nine of them right now or something. I do think it's been good to to to lose track of it because at the end of the day, the thing that we've set our sights on is Bowling Green. I mean, we finished you know, on Super Bowl Sunday. I honestly think it was our best scrimmage in every phase. We scripted three different games of two innings, basically variety and told the guys pregame to play with emotion. You know, act the way you're going to act when you hit a double. Act the way you're going to act when you strike out the side. That was the cool part of seeing this thing come together, that guys are actually walking it. I think they're ready. So I think part of it is we're going to have to continue to protect ourselves from, we're either going to prove everybody right one way or the other. We're either going to be as good as we think we are in the first 10 games this season, we're not going to win as many games or the margin if we if we go 10-0 and the margin's not six runs per game a win, then we're going to look at as staff, hey, we could be better. I think that's the cool part about the non-conference schedule. We play a tough schedule. We're playing a lot of quality in-state opponents. We don't just stay at home the whole time. So, we're going to find out definitely, you know, the things that we've done in a scrimmage setting and see, you know, that play against somebody else in between the white lines.”

On roster retention…

“I mean (Mason) Patel, you know, I said to our whole team that for me like it's a trust thing and it's knowing that you know if you're going to win or lose with Mason Patel on the mound like there's not a single person in the clubhouse, you know, I hope there's no one in our fan base that ever says it's the wrong idea to give him the baseball. I think he came in and worked his tail off over the summer and did a good job dedicating himself in the weight room with coach (Steve) Tamborra and you saw the fruits of that labor pay off right away in the fall. At the end of the day, I mean, he's one of those heart and soul guys that when he chooses to show emotion, it's of the right variety, and when he chooses to stay stoic, it's always of the right variety. That is a huge piece when you're talking about building a program to win championships. The pitching piece has to be at the focal point. Having a guy like that, hey, when it's nothing, and you win or lose on Friday, you know, it's the old saying of momentum and your starting pitching, right? To know that we have Patel, his name etched in there, and he's in the weekend rotation, it's a hat off to him, but it also gives our team a huge bump that when he takes the mound, we feel really good about our chances to win.”

On the importance of having a guy like Will Baker…

“I mean, it's not hyperbole to say we have probably seven guys that played as good as anyone on the team, and Will Baker is firmly in that mix. The maturity of him coming in and, you know, playing in Australia, he exposed himself to all the competition he could. He'd come over to the United States and play against elite competition. He played a lot for us as a freshman, and he played really well and but I think there were things that the speed of the game, the consistency side, playing five times a week. Then he goes to the Cape and stays up there the whole time, which for a position player, you know, is not always the first thing on those guys list and worked really hard. He's really mature about approaching his at-bats. Like you can talk to him on a really high level and so you know he definitely you know was one of the big winners for us of you're talking about a guy once again that started plenty for us so we already knew kind of that there would be that natural progression but I mean man it's been you know hitting righties hitting lefties hitting hard hitting soft spraying the ball uh foul line to foul line you know I think he's a guy that um you know we're crazy not to give every opportunity to play as much as we can and at different positions. I think if you look at you know being strong to the middle of the field. You look at all the superstars we have in the middle. Those guys could all go play a different position. And guess what? In a tight game, they may be playing other positions. In a game where the score kind of gets one way versus the other, you're going to see them slide to a secondary position. You're going to see Hernandez play the infield. You're going to see (Jarren) Advincula play short. You're going to see, you know, maybe Kurce roll over to third or Zuckerman go to second, or I mean, that's the fun part about this group. And Baker's one that his pro aspirations are going to be of a super utility nature, but he played shortstop last weekend a lot in scrimmages, and you would not know he is not an ACC starting shortstop with the level of play we're getting out of him in the infield. So, Coach Schulman deserves a ton of credit. They've worked tirelessly on the defensive side, and he's made huge strides.”

On if the weather has affected practice…

“The weather has kind of, you know, just like this weekend, it's going to be what it is, right? Um, we preach adaptability all the time, and yeah, we've had to. I mean, there's been times where, you know, we have had to take two days off, and we don't like taking two days off back to back this close to the season. We were able to get back on a really normal schedule and I think it was good. There was one day when the guys threw well. They may not have thrown their best, and it was a good hey, we're not going to script all your outings out of the bullpen. I think the same thing was we had to play I think it was 12 to 14 innings on one of the days before the ice storm kind of came in and if we have to play double header early that was kind of what we were preaching we may you know you guys need that workload and you need to know you got to hydrate you got to be smart and picking your spots and um you know I think that's been the the part that we've leaned on as a staff. There's always a positive side to some of that adversity, and I think the guys have been really mature about how they've gone about it.”

On if he has a pitch count in mind this weekend and how long he will go with the starters….

“You have two guys at the front that are older and experienced, who, you know, I would say probably have a little less limitation than, you know, a freshman trying to monitor some of that. On the flip side, we talk about planning for things and we talk about scripting things and and we all sit back there and we want to make plans and then there are certain things like positionally that we may script before the weekend and not to say performance has zero to do with that but you have you know a certain number of games where you can sit there and do it and then I promise you by week three in the ACC you're you know everybody's going to be able to go max pitch counts and they're able to going to be bounced back twice in a weekend and so I would say right out of the gate there's not huge anything out of the norm for us. I think we've been doing a good job about protecting it while also letting guys build on a gradual basis up to uh their maximum pitch counts.”

On mentoring Drew Burress…

“It's more about Drew, right? He's been just incredibly special from the first time you start recruiting him. You realize that, listen, numbers are numbers, and there's nobody that's better at putting up numbers than him. But there's something to be said about he can handle so much more than your normal athlete can handle. That'd be the only thing that I've had. I have gone through the heavy draft scrutiny of ending up on the other side of being the best player in the country and being a first-round pick. It's like you have a little bit of that, and I loved it. I loved every bit of wearing the C, and when things got tough, it was when things were going good, it's finding a way to spread out the love. I think when things are not going good there's nobody that our staff and our players in the locker room trust more than Drew Burress. So, I think it was, you know, it's something that I also don't take lightly, and you know, it's the stay away from the always and the nevers, but it's, you know, that's not in the laid plans of going to be an every year thing in this program. I think you have to prove it on the field and off the field. If it becomes undeniable that you are that much of a leader and have that much of an impact, then you are able to wear the C on your chest. But I think for him, he's done such a good job with any other expectations he's had in his life, and he's so grounded that I thought it was just necessary to put him at the forefront. He's well deserving of that, 20 years from now, no different than me, you're able to say that is a really monumental thing. It probably meant more to me than a lot of the trophies that came along with it is just to lead a group of guys that have your back and to be able to win championships and to end the season in the middle of the country.”

On how he is helping Drew Burress enjoy the final season…

“I think you know the answer to your question about just how you handle squeezing every ounce out of this journey. I think we just talked to the guys about whether it's gratitude or whether it's just family. I mean, when you've got brothers in the clubhouse, you don't want to let them down. You want to enjoy it. But I think we've all had to, you know, acknowledge it that, hey, this is a really special group. This doesn't come along very often. I think that's been a reminder for all our guys. I mean, any draft-eligible player doesn't mean that they're going to be gone. It means they could be gone. If you're a draft-eligible player and you've got a chance for this to be your last season, you'd better take it for granted. I mean, I went into my junior year thinking that that was probably going to be it. And then I was, you know, brought to tears losing in a super regional in Tallahassee, and just it wasn't as easy as that moment, but it was saying these are the best days. As many years as you might play in the major leagues, um there is something special about playing college baseball and being a part of a group like this, especially when it's been built over multiple years.”

On who has stood out as the potential starting pitcher in big games…

“Yeah, I think some of the guys I mentioned earlier all fall into that category. I think most ACC, SEC, or any conference coach, Sun Belt coach, is going to tell you that everything their season is based on is paramount to winning weekend series. And so, you're going to pour everything you can into that. There are times when you look back at last year, and you'd have three or four of our best arms, maybe even five or six of them that were red, meaning they are absolutely not throwing in a Tuesday game.

This team, I would like to think, can overcome that if that is the case. But I think reasonably, you're going to have a lot of guys helping each other shoulder the load. I think going in and elaborating on your question, the fourth game of a week, you know, you start looking at it for us, is the fourth game of a regional. If you're playing the fourth game in a regional, it probably means your season's on the line. And so, you know, if you look back up and you go, hey, if we had had a guy go um and throw several more Tuesdays and our offense would have played better on a Tuesday and you win one of three one-run Tuesday games, whatever it was, you probably are hosting a regional last year. I think we'll continue to look at that. We're pretty forward-facing with analytics, and if the guy matches up well and he threw 32 pitches on Friday, then why not start him and extend him? You want to start with a lead. You want to extend leads, and then you want to be able to have some shutdown innings. So, we'll spread it around. I told those guys that we met with a lot of guys, whether they were in the rotation. My big message was you're going to make starts. And I don't want to sit here and guarantee you the number you're going to make, but those Tuesdays, you know, occasional Wednesday, a Thursday, we play four ACC series that have a Thursday, Friday, Saturday. You are challenged with, do we bump somebody up early? Do we stay on? t I think we're going to have all those answers that we piece together as a staff and think a lot through.”

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