Starting Pitchers for Weekend Series Against No. 2 Arkansas Announced
Before the 2025 college baseball season began, the biggest concern about No. 2 Arkansas was could its offense improve to take advantage of excellent pitching?
It turns out, the Razorbacks have improved at the plate (second-best team batting average in the SEC). But the pitching hasn’t lived up to its lofty preseason expectations. The Razorbacks have just the seventh-best team ERA (3.77) in the SEC and opponents batting .235 against them (ninth-best in the SEC).
No. 14 Vanderbilt has been a pleasant surprise in terms of just how good its pitching staff has been this year. The Commodores have the ninth-best team ERA in the nation (3.23) and are top 10 nationally in nearly every other major pitching category and even leads in hits allowed per nine innings (5.99). And the Commodores just might be the Razorbacks’ kryptonite.
The Razorbacks’ have with 57 home runs in 26 games (that’s an average of 2.19 per game and ranks fourth in the nation), have a .602 team slugging percentage and .445 on base percentage. The Razorbacks’ 9.8 runs per game is the sixth highest in the nation. But they strikeout a lot.
Arkansas has averaged 7.42 strikeouts at the plate this season. Vanderbilt has the third-highest strikeouts per nine innings in the nation at 12.9 K/9. That might be the deciding factor in the series when it’s all said and done.
We’ll find out soon enough with the series starting at 7 p.m. Friday on SEC Network. Both teams have already announced their starting pitchers for the weekend, which are listed below.
No. 2 Arkansas at No. 14 Vanderbilt Weekend Starters
Our starters vs. the Razorbacks 💪 pic.twitter.com/EbLNWP12du
— Vanderbilt Baseball (@VandyBoys) March 27, 2025
Game 1
LHP Zach Root (3-1, 4.02 ERA, 31.1 IP, 46 K, 9 BB, .231 b/avg.) vs. LHP JD Thompson (2-1, 4.06 ERA, 31 IP, 42 K, 7 BB, .219 b/avg.)
Game 2
RHP Gabe Gaeckle (1-0, 6.57 ERA, 24.2 IP, 27 K, 15 BB, .223 b/avg.) vs. RHP Cody Bowker (2-1, 2.64 ERA, 30.2 IP, 40 K, 10 BB, .171 b/avg.)
Game 3
LHP Landon Beidelchies (3-0, 3.76 ERA, 26.1 IP, 25 K, 7 BB, .265 b/avg.) vs. RHP Connor Fennell (2-0, 1.93 ERA, 9.1 IP, 21 K, 2 BB, .182 b/avg.)
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