LSU Baseball Still Trying to Find its Swing as SEC Play Approaches
LSU coach Paul Mainieri watches behind the home plate cage as catcher Alex Milazzo takes hack after hack practicing what Mainieri and hitting coach Eddie Smith have been preaching all week.
Mainieri notices something, trots around the cage and gives Milazzo some tips before trotting back around the cage to see if Milazzo picked up on the lesson. Three swings later, Milazzo sends a rocket back up the middle, much to the cheers and fist pumps of his teammates, and of course his coach.
"He was just telling me to have my hands out in front of the barrel of my bat that way you can really hit the ball to the opposite field," Milazzo said.
There they are, the two most important words for the LSU hitters need to take to heart, opposite field. That's been the common theme for the LSU batters this week in practice as the Tigers try to find some consistency in an offense that's been striking out far too often and not putting the ball in play.
It's an issue that has created cause for serious concern 13 games in. In these opening three weeks, LSU is batting .235 as a team and have recorded more strikeouts (103) than hits (95).
When the team returned from Houston fresh off of a 1-0 loss that saw the Tigers be no-hit for the first time in a nine inning game in the modern era, Mainieri held a team meeting on Monday.
"When we met with them on Monday and I started reading off statistics, individually and as a team, I told them it's time for you to understand how important this is now," Mainieri said. "The way you're doing it now does not work. Let's back to the basics and start to do this the right way.
"I really think for us to get better as a team we just have to recognize who we are and be able to use the whole field because we have to strike out less," Mainieri said.
Mainieri believes the early season struggles have to do with a combination of a number of issues. The youth and inexperience of the team was one that he pointed to but it wasn't the first concern he alluded to.
"I don't think we're the confident team that I've become accustomed to having at LSU," Mainieri said. "That's simply because they haven't experienced as much success as other teams at LSU. It's hard to hide certain statistics and they're numbers this year that I've never had in a coaching career. Until they can start to make some adjustments and have the success I believe we're capable of having, the true confidence is not going to be there."
Confidence, like Mainieri said, is something that comes from having success, which is why he's hoping this weekend's series against UMass Lowell can be the start of his team getting back on the right track.
With 13 down and 40 to go, Mainieri recognizes the time is now for his team to start showing improvement on offense.
“I still believe that certainly our best days are ahead of us,” Mainieri said. “The sooner the better. The sooner we can get to those better days, I'll be happy. But I have a good feeling that they’ll be coming soon.”