It’s College World Series time once again and it couldn’t happen at a better spot in the sports calendar. Finally, some relief from the Caitlin Clark drama and the boring NBA Finals in which they seem to play a game once every solar eclipse.
And let’s not get started about who is missing from some NFL mini-camp.
For the next 10 days or so, you get to watch college baseball players who you have never heard of take on other college baseball players you’ve never heard of in a battle of schools that still care far more about football in any month than they do about baseball in June.
I’m not a big fan of college baseball, but I am a big fan of the CWS, mainly because it involves college baseball players I’ve never heard. A few of them I’ll hear of eventually in Major League Baseball, but most will just disappear into softball leagues or running their own baseball “academy.”
But being an observer of the College World Series from the past, plus a few games this season, I offer you this primer for this edition. Get ready to be seeing and/or hearing a lot about …
YELLING: For some reason, pitchers seem to do more than their share of senseless yelling and screaming. Centerfielder robs a guy of a home run? By all means, yell away. Stretch a double into a triple? Get fired up! But some of these pitchers act like they’ve just won the lottery when they strike out a guy with two outs with a man on first. Settle down, guys.
ANCILARY ACCOUTREMENT: Also known as having lots of extra (unnecessary?) stuff. Used to be, when a guy wore batting gloves, that seemed over the top. These days, if you step in a batter’s box without an elbow guard, an ankle guard, plus a sliding mitt in your back pocket, then you might as well have been playing with a Wiffle Ball bat.
My question is this – doesn’t all this extra stuff slow you down? Think about it; how many times do you see a bang-bang play at first base and the batter is called out. You’re telling me that all the extra stuff isn’t turning a safe call into an out?
What is more likely to happen: You take one off the ankle (and it hurts for 5 minutes) or you cost your team a baserunner because you are carrying all this extra baggage down the first base line?
VELCRO MANIA: Tennessee’s Christian Little is unquestionably one of the best players in the country. He’s going to be fun to watch in the CWS. But here is what is not going to be fun to watch – Little adjusting his batting gloves after EVERY pitch. Fix them right the first time, pal! And by no means is he the only one who does this. I guess we haven’t made the technological advancements in Velcro that we thought we had.
EXPECTORATING EXPECTATIONS: Also known as spitting. It’s as timeless as the game of baseball itself, so get ready to see the loogies fly!
THE GRAND ILLUSION: If it were up to me, ESPN would show this every game and be justified in doing it. In 1982, Miami took the Hidden Ball Trick to a new level against Wichita State with an act of deception that may never be seen again. It all started when the Miami pitcher … never mind … you just have to see it to understand. Wichita State never did. Maybe that’s why the Shockers haven’t been back to the CWS is almost 30 years.
In the interest of equal time, ESPN should also show the Warren Morris home run that won the 1996 CWS just as often as they show the Grand Illusion. That, of course, came against Miami. Somewhere out there, Wichita State is still smiling about that.
CONFERENCE CONFAB: There are four teams from the SEC and four from the ACC, so that doesn’t leave much room for diversity. The good news is that if you love one of those conferences, you got plenty to choose from. By the same token, if you love the diversity of big schools and little schools from a variety of conferences, this is not going to be your year.
But it is going to be somebody’s year, which is why we watch in the first place.
Contact JJ Marshall johnjamesmarshall@yahoo.com