Trying to Break Free of an Endless Cycle: Why Mizzou Baseball is Set to Face the Same Problems Each Season

Midway through an underwhelming season, take a look at the pervasive problems within the Missouri Baseball team and the struggles this season

April 2, 2025; Columbia, Missouri, USA: Missouri head coach Kerrick Jackson talks with his players during a pitching change. | Sam Simon

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. With that logic, Mizzou athletics and the baseball program are going insane.

The records speak for themselves. Since the University of Missouri began playing in the Southeastern Conference in 2013, the baseball team's finish in league play has fairly consistently been somewhere around 10 wins and 20 losses. They have never had a winning conference record in the SEC and are approaching yet another losing season. 

Each and every year seems to be the same show on repeat with different cast members for the Tigers. There have been struggles to keep any of the successful members from seeking a better role elsewhere and the budget for the show appears to keep falling. The show runners can't seem to get out of the hole that is beginning to look endless.

"Until the university and administration decide to take baseball seriously," a former player under then-Mizzou coach Steve Bieser told Missouri Tigers On SI, "we will likely see more of the same."

Lack of Commitment and Funding

Much of it began at the point that the university decided to not put funds into the program, and consequently let things slowly deteriorate.

While there isn't much Kerrick Jackson can say on that topic, he has hinted at it being part of the struggles that come with being Mizzou's head coach.

"There's other schools in our league that the ability to go out and spend dollars and dollars on portal guys is there," Jackson said in a post-game conference. "We have to rebuild and get things going in the right direction."

With the current season being far from satisfactory, on top of having an underwhelming first year at the helm, it's possible that Jackson's job is on the line. However, rushing in with that course of action and trying to find a different head coach without making any other changes would go with the definition of insanity.

"Obviously, nobody likes the current state of Mizzou baseball," the former player said. "I don’t believe it falls on the players or coaches, however. With the resources they are given and the league they compete in, I think the Mizzou job is the toughest in the nation. Regardless of who the coach is."

Parting ways with Jackson would mean that Mizzou would obviously have to find a new coach and essentially start all over — again. It would be challenging to find someone as qualified as Jackson to take over. The Mizzou athletics department would have to try to convince a respected coach to take over a program with subpar facilities, a lack of NIL funding, the lowest head coach salary in SEC baseball, and a program already in the middle of a rebuild.

It would be as difficult as it is to recruit top talent to come play at Mizzou.

Building a Culture with the Portal and Recruiting

Jackson wants to be here. He has made that very clear and has displayed his passion to get the program where he thinks it can go. He's had one recruitment class under his name and is beginning to build a culture.

"I have heard good things about the current staff and the culture they are building," the former player said. "Players seem to like him and his staff."

Many of them have confirmed that. Jackson has gotten important players to stay in Columbia when they likely could have found success elsewhere, and in some cases for more money. This potentially included impact players Jackson Lovich, Kaden Peer or Mateo Serna, who instead were able to grow further under Jackson.

"Every time we walk in and out of the door, come to the facility, we say hi," infielder Keegan Knutson said following the UAPB sweep. "I say hi to them all and say good morning to them all. It's a very family oriented atmosphere."

With just a glimpse at his recruitment capabilities using little NIL funds, Jackson has shown quite a bit of potential. If given adequate funds to allow him to compete with other SEC schools, the results might be different. For now, he mostly has to find his talent from NAIA, D-II, or JUCO schools and develop them to play against SEC talent.

Jackson got many of the players who are key contributors for this team in his first transfer class, including infielders Knutson, Peyton Basler, Cayden Nicoletto, Gehrig Goldbeck and outfielder Pierre Seals. The latter is one of the few transfers who came from another D1 school (Memphis). The rest arrived from JUCOs and had to quickly adjust to the D1 level under Jackson.

Despite that, Mizzou doesn't have the luxury of letting freshmen ride the bench and learn from the veterans, as many have been pressed into serice this season. Although Jackson has shared concerns about the game speeding up on the freshmen, Chris Patterson, Trey Lawerence, PJ Green and Brady Kehlenbrink have seen extensive playing time.

"These guys are all talented players," Jackson said. "They're getting a lot of experience at a very young age. So when these guys get older, with more experience, you're going to see everything kind of click and see us have a lot of success."

A key aspect of building a winning culture is the players, but at Mizzou the process is undermined by the transfer portal. Whenever a player starts to stand out, curiosity of where he might play next begins to form.

"Where NIL and transfer portal has maybe helped the football and basketball teams, it has completely choked the baseball team."

A former Missouri baseball player

Alongside the obvious lack of funding, it would be hard to convince players to choose Mizzou or to to stay when there are better opportunities and more money elsewhere. Even though the SEC stands out as being the toughest conference in the nation, it's simply not a level playing field.

"Mizzou cannot compete with (what other schools offer) and it is likely the main reason we cannot retain in-state talent," the former player said. "I don’t blame those kids one bit for going to other schools, where they make much more money, are given fantastic facilities and game atmospheres with a chance to play beyond the regular season."

The Woeful 2025 Campaign

More specifically with this season, the insanity refers to the team being forced to throw practically the same lineup and same bullpen pitchers out each game and expecting different results. It's not by choice, however.

Looking at their record and the ERAs of the pitchers, it's easy to say the unit is struggling. Objectively, it hasn't been great. But, there are forces outside of Jackson and his coaching staff's control that have made the season go far from expected.

For example, nearly every pitcher on their staff has been injured in some way, is coming back from injury, or is in a different role due to someone else's injury. From the injuries that have been revealed in post-game conferences, approximately 40 percent of players on the active roster have had some sort sort of physical setback that caused them to miss playing time.

This includes Goldbeck, who will need Tommy John surgery following the season. As a former Gold Glove shortstop, he was expected to anchor the middle infield with his Kansas City-Kansas Community College teammate, Basler. Instead, Jackson had little choice but to keep Goldbeck in the lineup as a designated hitter and push many players into unfamiliar positions to fill his crucial defensive spot.

It's one of the reasons why the Tigers lead the SEC in errors by a good margin. Meanwhile, third base has become a position that is shared between Basler, a usual second baseman; Knutson; a usual shortstop; and Patterson, who is a third baseman, but also a freshman. At shortstop, both frequent starters Lovich and freshman Trey Lawerence are among the injured.

It's difficult to get comfortable at a position when you don't know where you might be playing the next day.

"When you're chasing .500 (looking at potential lineup changes is) an everyday thing," Jackson said. "You're going to find some guys that are going to get in there and be consistent and play the game the right way."

But the most impactful injuries have come in the starting rotation. Everyone's had a setback.

It began with the announcement that Javyn Pimental, their best remaining starter from the 2024 season, needed Tommy John prior to the 2025 season. Daniel Wissler subsequently went down with an injury after his first start. Finally Ian Lohse was taken out by injury at the end of March.

Consequently, the Tigers have guys who were expected to be a midweek starter vying for the Friday night role. It's typically between freshman Brady Kehlenbrink and usual long-reliever Kaden Jacobi for the coveted spot. Freshman Wil Libbert has been the midweek guy recently.

It's not going to be easy to win a series against any SEC foe without an actual starting rotation, never mind the vast number of injuries among the relievers. Anyone not injured is overused and not throwing his best stuff. Overall, nearly 40 percent of the pitching staff is or has been injured for a significant portion of the season — and that's just the known injuries.

Their best pitcher by ERA is Missouri's usual first basemen, Cayden Nicoletto. He also has the second highest batting average on the team and is amongst the top of many offensive categories for the Tigers. The 0.00 ERA is only through 2.1 innings, but still. He was recruited as a pitcher and position player from Columbia College, yet was not expected to pitch against D1 competition since his pitches barely top the 70s in velocity.

The injuries have devastated the team to the point that when a journalist asked Jackson about if Mizzou could overcome another setback, he let out a painful laugh and shared a simple statement:

"I'm going to check if you have any more eligibility."

Besides the pitching, four of the five SEC teams that the Tigers have faced sit in the top 6 of the D1 rankings to begin their conference play. That doesn't make it very easy to get a win.

Expectations

On March 7, athletic director Laird Veatch made a bold statement about all the athletics at Mizzou.

"We need to compete and win at a higher level," Veatch said. "I never want us to shy away from expecting to win championships. We got to get to a point in all of our sports that we're going to compete for championships."

It may be a while for baseball. Going back to the records, Mizzou has averaged 10.5 conference wins per season out of the 30 games it plays each year. This is through the 11 seasons that the Tigers have faced a complete conference slate, which crosses three different coaching staffs.

There have been very few significant changes over the years with the program, with many of the same major problems persisting year in, year out. It makes fans wonder if baseball is a priority with the university.

It puts Jackson in a tough spot. He's had one full season plus this injury-plagued campaign and one full recruiting class. Moreover, impatient fans don't care about the same NIL and transfer portal issues every other SEC team has to deal with

If the university wants to continue with the path and strategies that have led to this point, Jackson should be granted more time to gain some momentum in the program, and try to accomplish his goals before they decide if they want to part ways. But it won't be easy.

That's part of the Missouri baseball landscape as well. It's seemingly always goigng to be an uphill climb.

"I do believe we were doing our best to build the program. We always had the underdog mentality and played with a chip on our shoulder knowing that nobody expected us to win anything," the former player said. "I hate to see everyone online blame the kids or coaches who are put in such a tough situation."