We mentioned in an earlier thread how rain was a good thing for the Arkansas football program this week, but as is often the case it has an adverse effect on baseball.
Dave Van Horn‘s club was slated to begin fall drills Tuesday but because of the rain has had to postpone that start date until Friday. The Hogs will be able to practice 45 times as a team before Oct. 22.
Last week I had the opportunity to sit down with Van Horn to talk about fall practice for a piece that will appear in this week’s Hawgs Illustrated magazine. Among other things the ninth-year Razorback coach said this would be one of the more challenging fall practices he has had at the school.
“We’re real optimistic,” Van Horn said. “We don’t have a lot of superstar names returning, but the ones we do have are very good. It’s just a matter of trying to put this team together.”
Arkansas will also be practicing for the first time with prototype bats that have been modified under new NCAA guidelines. The bats slow the exit ratio – or the speed the ball leaves the bat. That, coupled with the loss of power-hitters like Zack Cox, Brett Eibner and Andy Wilkins, could provide a different looking team than we’ve become accustomed to in the last couple of seasons.
“We lost a few guys in the top five and we don’t expect to replace them in terms of home runs and maybe even those type of combined batting averages, but we can put a lineup on the field that’s going to be good one through nine,” Van Horn said. “It might be a little different style. The bats are going to be modified again and we’ve known that, and we’ve been recruiting to that. I think we were proactive and got athletes that can play that game. We still have guys that can hit it out of the park but we’re not going to live and die off of it.”
Arkansas is coming off its second consecutive 40-plus win season. The Razorbacks lost a pair of 12-inning games to Arizona State in the NCAA Tempe Super Regional, but will have to replace 17 players off last season’s 35-man roster.
Arkansas begins its 2011 season on Feb. 18 with a three-game series against Delaware State at Baum Stadium.
Follow Matt Jones on Twitter @NWAMatt.
when i came here i assumed it was going to be filled with boring info, but really it turned out to be really interesting. keep writing!
Oh, a great write-up! No idea how you were able to write this post..it’d take me weeks. Well worth it though, I’d suspect. Have you considered selling banners on your blog?
There are actually a whole lot of details like that to take into consideration. That may be a great level to bring up. I offer the ideas above as general inspiration but clearly there are questions like the one you deliver up the place a very powerful factor will probably be working in sincere good faith. I don?t know if finest practices have emerged round things like that, however I am sure that your job is clearly recognized as a fair game. Both girls and boys feel the impression of only a second’s pleasure, for the remainder of their lives.