Ohio's pitching is keeping them competitive early in the season.
Bob Wren Stadium had a season-high 2,348 people in attendance Tuesday night with a setting sun when Ohio played Ohio State.
Baseball in Athens. Ohio doesn’t get much better than that. And for that moment, Ohio forgot that it had lost four of its last six games.
But the Bobcats struggled getting runners across the plate, as they couldn’t put runs on the scoreboard until the bottom of the sixth, something that they have been plagued by early in the season.
Batting Struggles
Tuesday night, Ohio (10-14) tallied runs in the sixth and seventh innings and entered the ninth down 4-3. Ohio State scored two runs in the top of the ninth for a 6-3 lead, ending Ohio’s late comeback.
There is no question that the Bobcats can hit the ball — they outhit the Buckeyes — but their bats must come to life earlier in games and stay consistent throughout the entire outing.
"We outhit them,” coach Rob Smith said. “We had more hits than they did on the game. Unfortunately, they scored more runs than we did in that scenario. Sometimes it's not always about the quantity, it's when you get them. And, unfortunately, we had some struggles getting hits with runners in scoring position tonight.”
Ohio might need to be more patient on pitches, and that comes with repetition and discipline.
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Success in Pitching
At the same time, Ohio's pitching has carried the team throughout the first half of the season, and as it enters the soul of Mid-American Conference play it will only look to improve.
Led by Jake Roehn, Connor Sitz and Jake Rudnicki, the Bobcats have an ERA of 4.37 with 180 strikeouts.
Tuesday night, reliever Michael Klein pitched four scoreless innings and had a career-high six strikeouts.
If Ohio's pitching staff can maintain that consistency throughout its entire bullpen, success won’t be hard to find.
Moving Forward
Baseball practice Wednesday was no different than any other. Starting with hitting, the Bobcats moved to fielding situations and an eventual scrimmage.
Smith was yelling at players to make the right decision as to where to throw the ball with a man on first and third. Bunting and stealing was emphasized. Smith isn’t expecting overnight success, but he does expect improvement on a day-to-day basis.
Ohio will stick with the same pitching rotation of Sitz, Rudnicki and Jake Miller against Ball State this weekend.
“We need to compete,” Smith said. “Baseball is a game of moments. You find yourself in certain moments, what I call game moments, that can dictate the entire game.”
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