Draft Round-up

A quick word on the MLB draft. Things are looking good for next year as Ben Paulsen was the only tiger drafted in the first three rounds so he is gone. Thats a tough loss for Clemson but as a junior he was pretty much gone no matter what, good luck to him--one of the most consistent performers in the past couple of years at Clemson. Dwyer and some of this years recruiting class seem to have scared off some of their potential suitors by having too high of an asking price. MLB drafts are a little different than basketball and certainly football. Players have more leverage and can get drafted but never sign--happens quite often. Players have a signing bonus demand and if the team wont agree to it then they can go to college or play for an independent league. This State article points out that Clemson isnt in the clear yet--DJ Mitchell signed in the 10th round but the Yankees were willing to pay the $400,000 signing bonus, so you never know. Right now Dwyer is asking for second round money apparently so he can use and benefit from another year of college without hurting his draft stock too much.

So much has been made of Strasburg but it remains to be seen if the Nationals will fork out the cash for him (Scott Boras is his agent), so its quite possible he doesnt even play minor league ball next year. Interesting system of high schoolers, college players, independent leagues, international signings, and above all sports agents they got going in the MLB. But for the present it seems that Jack and the Tigers are sitting pretty for next season.

Thoughts on the Baseball Tourneys

Quick thoughts after digesting the events of the weekend:

• Lot of talk about a flop over in Durham this past weekend. Tough loss to Virginia, to be sure, but I'm not too concerned about a 1-run loss. Studies for games in the majors have shown teams tend to win 1-run games at the rate of their win percentage, but there's a lot of variation in the numbers. This leads to a kind of "luck" for in 1-run outcomes. I imagine these studies more or less hold true for top-shelf college competition (like the ACC variety) and by my count, Clemson is now 7-5 in 1-run games: more or less where we'd expect them to be and nothing to complain about, really.
• The loss to Duke was another story. While Duke got into Dwyer and later McKinney, our balls in play weren't falling against Andrew Wolcott. That's the way Clemson is constructed this year, though. While the pitching staff is far from a bunch of slackers, the offense is the strongest unit--we're out there to put runs on the board, not necessarily prevent them from coming in.
• A lot of people will say that's not a great recipe for post-season success, and the road to Omaha is paved in solid pitching performance. I buy that to an extent, but the good news is Clemson has done just as well, if not better, on weekend games against the best the opposition throws at us. We're not just punishing poor pitchers, but good pitchers as well.
• Regionals should be up in a couple of hours. Here's to praying that Stephen Strasburg, his 103mph fastball, and San Diego State don't land in our regional, and pitying the host team that gets SDSU. They might as well not show up.

Update: haha Virginia!