The miscue by the runnner was the fact that she should not have tried to run against a catcher like Katie Stewart with a cannon of an arm! The throw was a frozen rope! The fact that Washington faked the early catch and let it go thru to Vivi for the out only made the play more outstanding!!
I wouldn’t be upset if we did the same for our Thursday match. Then again, it won’t hurt us too much and we’re pretty solid.
Emails went out today to season ticket holders to pre-purchase Regionals and Supers. Regionals: May 17-19 Reserved grandstand: $36 GA: $24 Supers: May 23-26 Reserved grandstand: $30 GA: $20
Dunno what’s going on with Simpson, but I hope she’s able to snap out of whatever. Her confidence at the moment seems shaken. We’re going to need her down the road.
As Simpson was skipping the first and second pitchers of a hitter's at-bat, I was thinking "In three years in this program she hasn't corrected the skip. Did she skip that much in high school? Is it Mike's fault for teaching her to throw lower and causing this skip? Or was that always there and good enough to overwhelm high school and club teams?" Her fans can say all they want about giving her more playing time in order to help improve her form. But, c'mon. It's been three years and she hasn't gotten better.
I keep believing she’s going to figure it out. At this stage of the game I’m having doubts. She has the skip part down and all she needs now is the hop and jump.
I totally agree with you Racer! The last time I commented on her performance I got boo hooed, we got to do better, give her a chance, she'll come out of it comments. She's good but she just hasn't developed enough to crack the rotation in Mike White's elite pitching staff. In 2022 she was 8-4, 3.57 ERA, 86 innings pitched in a 3 pitcher rotation. Hulon (0-0) and O'Leary (1-4) were on the staff but did not contribute. In 2023 she was 4-1, 2.60 ERA, 62 innings pitched in a 4 pitcher rotation. In 2024 she is 0-0, .98 ERA, 21 innings pitched in a 5 pitcher rotation. Next year again should be a 5 pitcher rotation with Czech graduating and Cambria Salmon coming in. Not sure things are going to improve.
I noticed that Czech got the Senior send off and remembered she's got a bonus COVID year she could have used for next year. This tells me Mike told her there wasn't a place for her next year. I don't know if Simpson is going to get "the talk" like O'Leary got telling her "if you want a full time starting job, best to look elsewhere" at the end of the season. But maybe Simpson loves Texas enough to accept her job as a closer - albeit with a large lead. I almost went and made a cut up video of her pitches she made last night to show the skips and over-the-head pitches she made trying to compensate for the low ball. Added: And when she walked the first player and that player scored later, her ERA went above 1.00.
UT sent out email saying that Saturday's game will be a double-header. 1:00 and 4:00. Sunday's game moved to Saturday.
They sent out another update saying that the stadium would be cleared between the first and second game. Last time they did that they lost about 40% of the fans. I emailed Del Conte about using common sense and letting people keep sitting where they were and getting booted if the "Sunday" ticket holders showed up. Keep the stadium packed. He said he'd look into it. With today's notice I emailed him again. He responded (he reads his email quickly) that it was out of his hands. Mmmm, really?
Last night, in the 6th inning you could see Kavan was starting to lose control of her pitch. I kept muttering, "C'mon Mike, she's getting tired. Pull her. Pull her. Pull her." Nope, Mike wanted her to work her way out of a bases loaded situation on her own. A learning experience, I guess. (He had Simpson and Morgan warming up side-by-side in the bullpen but chose not to pull in Morgan until the 7th).
It worked out but I was saying the same thing!! Like he said post game ‘she needs to know she can’t hit the “help” button every time she gets in trouble!’ This team is so fun to watch! Post season is going to be exciting!!
Last of the COVID-bonus kids. Yesterday as they were going through senior ceremonies I realized that Jolie Mitchell was not included. Looking up her playing years it was 3 years at Notre Dame and not 4 as I had assumed. Which means.....Mike White has asked her to come back for 5th year, whereas he didn't do the same thing for Washington, Whitaker, and Czech. I'm surprised at Czech because she's a more reliable closer than Simpson. But maybe Czech has post-softball plans. During the senior event, the announcer said, "And this might be of interest to Estelle Czech, her friend Tight End Jared Wiley has been drafted by the Kansas City Chiefs!" and Estelle got excited and hopped up and down for a bit. And afterwards, it was discussed the Czech and Wiley are dating. Anyhoo, baring players from the class of 2020 who also redshirted that year plus any 5th year transfer into this program after the WCWS, this will be the last 5th year bonus baby for the Texas team. Looking at the past COVID-bonus kids (who played 5 years): 2021 Molly Jacobson Kaitlyn Washington Shannon Rhodes 2022 Lauren Burke Mary Iakopo Hailey Dolcini Jenae Jefferson 2023 Lou Gilbert 2024 Bella Dayton 2025 Jolie Mitchell
Its starting to set in that this could be the final season for Longhorn Network. I will miss us having our own network. Really gonna miss the professionalism that Cat and her crew brings to all our Softball broadcast. I hope ESPN allows Cat to do the color at one of the Super Regionals. She has earned that.
I don't think Czech, Washington, or Whitaker have a covid year since they were spring 2021 recruits. Mitchell has a covid year because she was 2020 recruit and had a red shirt year.
I've been checking the weather in Lubbock for the weekend. If we want any chance of winning Big 12, I think we don't need any rainouts. I'm hoping for a doubleheader Friday
I believe tiebreakers are only used to determine seeding for the tournament. A tie results in co-champions
Racer, what would happen if we didn't play a game or 2 due to rain and OU lost 1 game but played 3? Would that give them a half game lead over us for conference championship?
On my Twitter feed a posting popped up from some unknown to me site. It listed the top 64 schools and then focused on the potential slots of the top schools in the WCWS brackets. Texas was #1 and OU #2, like the national rankings. What was bizzaro to me and I had to look at it a couple of times was that on the next screen it showed Texas* as one of the top 8 seeds and then listed OU as "At Large Bid". The * meant schools that got in as automatic qualifiers. I found this bizzare to think of OU as an "At Large Bid" and them expecting Texas to be an AC by winning the Big 12. This year I do believe that OU will be knocked out somewhere in the WCWS and will not make the finals. They beat USF 2-1 on a Saturday. On Sunday I tuned in and they were tied 2-2. Then one inning later they were behind 4-2 and then they turned on the hitting and eventually came from behind and beat them 11-7. Maxwell pitched 6 innings on Friday and 4 innings on Sunday. That's their weakness.
