Heels getting help from the bottom of the order
Jun 7, 2009
Pitching and defense – that was how North Carolina was supposed to slay the mighty East Carolina lineup.
With all nine players in the Pirates’ lineup sporting .300 averages, and two-thirds of them boasting OBPs of over .400, the Tar Heels weren’t supposed to be able to outscore the Conference USA champs.
But that’s exactly what Mike Fox’s team did – and it wasn’t the usual suspects doing most of the damage.
Fox admitted after the game that the North Carolina offensive philosophy consists mainly of making sure the other seven guys are on base for future MLB first round pick Dustin Ackley and fellow standout Kyle Seager.
If you were to look at the box scores from Carolina’s super regional sweep over ECU, however, the bottom of the order was doing quite a bit of damage, not just the usual suspects at the top.
“That’s what it takes in the playoffs,” Ackley said. “You gotta have everybody hitting, everybody contributing. It seems like the past couple of days and the whole playoffs, they’ve been there.”
In game one Levi Michael, Garrett Gore, Mike Cavasinni and Seth Baldwin, who entered the series batting .300, .297, .254, and .277 respectively, collected eight hits in 15 at-bats.
Sunday afternoon, during the team’s 9-3 Omaha-clinching win, it was Mark Fleury, Gore, Cavasinni and a combination of Jacob Stallings and Baldwin in the six through nine holes, but the results were nearly the same – eight hits in 16 ABs.
“Gore had four hits today, [Cavasinni] got a couple – they can swing it,” Seager said after game two. “If they’re hitting real well then that can take pressure off the pitchers, it takes pressure off of everybody. It’s good for our team to be a balanced attack where you can’t really match up too well with us.”
Whether knocking in the runs themselves (five of the teams nine RBIs in game one), or setting the table for others to knock them in (scoring six of the team’s nine runs in game two), the bottom third of the Heels’ order was nearly as important to the Carolina cause as any pitch thrown by Alex White or Adam Warren.
“That’s been the biggest run production, the bottom of the lineup,” Ackley said after his team’s 9-3 series-clinching win. “[They’re] getting on base and driving in runs. It’s helped us out a lot.”
Excellent starting pitching is still Carolina’s calling card, and is likely the best chance the Heels have of bringing home a championship from Nebraska beginning next weekend.
The difference now, is that with a suddenly deeper and more balanced lineup, White and Warren might not have to be their only chance.
