Beavers To Take The Field As Defending National Champs
 
Oregon State opens at Hawaii-Hilo  

Jan. 25, 2007


 
 

Courtesy Oregon State Athletics

Starting this week, Oregon State takes the field as college baseball's defending national champion. OSU - celebrating its 100th anniversary season of varsity baseball - plays its earliest-ever season-opener when it visits Hawai'i-Hilo on Thursday at 8 p.m. PST; the Beavers and Vulcans will also meet in a Friday doubleheader at 3 p.m. PST and Saturday at 3 p.m. PST.

As the Beavers take the field for the first time since edging North Carolina 3-2 in the final game of the College World Series on June 26, they'll be without many of the key players who won that 2006 national title with a dramatic run through the field in Omaha.

How quickly a lot of new faces - some returning to the squad after playing backup roles and some who have just joined the program - adjust to playing every day will go a long way toward determining whether the Beavers make it to the postseason for a third straight year.

"It's a huge challenge for us to find out what kind of club we can be," said Pat Casey, the 2006 National Coach of the Year who is entering his 13th season at OSU. "We're replacing most of our everyday starters and the nucleus of a tremendous pitching staff, and hopefully we'll rise to that and thrive on that challenge. We're going to play some people who have no Division I experience at all, and the game is going to be the teacher for us a little bit there. No matter how you look at it, there are going to be players in the lineup every day who haven't been everyday Division I players.

"Somebody has to rise up other than the guys we expect; somebody has to become a better player or a better team player or a better role guy. Somebody is going to have to step up and do some things beyond what our expectations of them are. Hopefully there are people in this program who have been good players who can step up and be great players, and people who have been average players who can be good players."
 

 

After their magical 2006 run to the national championship, the Beavers lost All-American pitchers Dallas Buck, Kevin Gunderson and Jonah Nickerson; All-American outfielder and Pacific-10 Player of the Year Cole Gillespie; Pac-10 Defensive Player of the Year second baseman Chris Kunda; All-College World Series third baseman Shea McFeely and first baseman Bill Rowe; and draft pick outfielder Tyler Graham.

But as OSU begins putting together its lineup for 2007, it can start with a pair of terrific players and leaders up the middle - catcher Mitch Canham (.299 batting average, 7 home runs, 54 runs batted in, 10 stolen bases during 2006) and shortstop Darwin Barney (.330, 0, 36, 16 SBs), both juniors.

Canham is a preseason All-America pick by both Baseball America magazine and Collegiate Baseball newspaper; he earned all-conference honorable mention last season. Barney was selected to Team USA for international play in the summer of 2006, is a two-time All-Pac-10 first team selection, and was named the Pac-10's preseason Player of the Year for 2007 by Baseball America.

"Mitch is the best leader in the country," Casey said. "There's nobody who has a leader better than Mitch Canham on and off the field. He's the heart and soul of our club.

"Darwin is a big-time player and he's a team leader. He's really going to have to take one of those spots as being one of our captains, one of our leaders, and he's capable of being as good a shortstop as there is in the country."

The Beavers also return junior righthander Mike Stutes (8-2 record, 3.10 earned run average) to the starting rotation; senior lefthander Anton Maxwell (3-3, 5.50) spent part of 2006 as a starter and OSU looks for him to regain the form that saw him win 11 games as a sophomore in 2005.

OSU also brings back several pitchers who made big contributions out of the bullpen last season: junior righthanders Eddie Kunz (5-1, 3.61) and Daniel Turpen (3-0, 2.90), junior lefthander Joe Paterson (1-1, 4.11) and sophomore righthander Mark Grbavac (1-0, 5.11).

Kunz earned preseason All-America honors from Baseball America. Turpen and Paterson could be among the candidates to round out the rotation.

"But we're also well aware that somebody who hasn't pitched in a Division I game is going to have to step up, and that includes freshmen and guys who didn't pitch last year," Casey said. "There are people capable of doing that, there's no question about it.

"When you start looking at Nickerson and Buck and Gunderson, you're looking at three of the best guys in the conference on one team, so how we approach the pitching thing may be a little different. We may not get a solid eight innings every outing out of our starters; we may have to break the game up a lot more than we did last year."

A pair of highly regarded freshmen are in that group - lefthander Blake Keitzman (11-0, 0.44 high school) and righthander Jorge Reyes (6-1, 0.32 high school). Sophomore righthander Brian Budrow (0-0, 10.12) saw some action last season while freshmen lefthanders Bryn Card and Alex Sogard redshirted.

Among the outfielders, the only returner to have started more than half of OSU's games last season is senior Scott Santschi (.271, 2, 29). Sophomore John Wallace (.326, 0, 19) played regularly as the 2006 season wore on and senior outfielder/designated hitter Mike Lissman (.316, 0, 10) is another experienced player the Beavers will look to for leadership. Junior transfers Chris Hopkins (.347, 2, 37, 25 SBs junior college) and Braden Wells (.358, 0, 31, 24 SBs junior college) and sophomore Koa Kahalehoe (.263, 0, 8) could earn their way into the lineup, as well.

Around the infield, the Beavers have three spots to fill and a host of possibilities - mostly newcomers. Sophomore transfer Jason Ogata (.255, 0, 9 Louisiana State), junior transfer Drew George (.367, 1, 37 junior college), freshman Joey Wong (.438, 3, 14 high school), redshirt freshman Brett Casey and junior Lonnie Lechelt (.087, 0, 0) are possibilities to join Barney, with junior transfer Jordan Lennerton (.416, 10, 63 junior college) perhaps taking over at first base.

"We have a lot of people who we think can help us; some are better offensively and some are better defensively," Casey said. "We've got to find a way to get the right guys in the lineup and see how that all fits in. Early in the season you'll see a little more versatility in who we play.

"Last year our lineup was fairly well set except for maybe one or two positions; this year we really have to find a way to get our best people in the lineup. Sometimes it will be whether we want to be a little better offensively or a little better defensively that is going to determine who we play ... we're going to have to play some guys in some different positions early to find out who's the best where, and that will be interesting."

The Beavers will begin finding out how the new combinations stack up in a hurry. OSU will play one of its most challenging non-conference schedules ever.

"We've really got to find a way to get ready to play early, because our competition level is going to be tremendous," Casey said. "But the expectations of what we want out of our program, and what our players want out of our program, and the things that we've accomplished have put us in that position, so that's a good thing."


 
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