It's been since the season previews that I've updated baseball and softball coverage, so it feels about time to get a new installment in. A little over a month has gone by and in that time, we've learned plenty about both teams amid the first season with new coaches. Both teams have returned to Ann Arbor and started up their conference slate, so today we'll cover how the non-conference went, who is hot and who is not, and where to set expectations as the weather gets warmer and we get knee-deep in B1G play: 

 

Softball: Doing Enough

The first season without Carol Hutchins in nearly four decades was going to be a bumpy one, and the roster left behind after transfer portal exits was a stripped down one. We acknowledged as much in the season preview and the start of the season has reflected the inevitable bumps that were going to come with that reality. As it stands right now, the team is 15-13 (1-2 in conference play), but despite the bumps, they're doing alright as it comes to the national picture. Let's break it down.

The season results so far: The team got started with a contest against USF in Tampa, a tough extra innings loss that saw it end on a walk-off wild pitch. From there they went to Leesburg, FL, for a tune-up against low level squads. Three of the four games ended in a run rule and then it was on to Clearwater for the big invitational tournament hosted by ESPN. That weekend went pretty well all things considered, Michigan notching a couple solid wins by defeating Louisiana and Mississippi State, while dropping games to ranked teams UCF, Duke, and Oklahoma State. Adjusting for quality of competition, that 2-3 weekend was fine for a rebuilding Michigan team. 

It didn't get any easier after that, with the team heading cross-country to Palo Alto, CA, to play a tournament hosted by Stanford. That's where things began to take a turn for the worse, a 1-4 weekend with losses to Boise State and Nevada, in addition to being swept by host Stanford. Michigan scored 5 runs in 5 games that weekend. The Judi Garman Classic in Fullerton, CA, was a better experience as Michigan spent spring break in SoCal. They got revenge on UCF and then beat the hosts CSF, losing games in shutouts to ranked teams UCLA and LSU before picking up another one-run win over Seattle. 3-2 was not amazing, but it definitely could've been worse and building a resume is the objective. 

The Wolverines then traveled home, but weather quickly got in the way. They beat Kent State on March 9 but then had four home games canceled until they got to play Bowling Green nearly a week later, a run rule victory. St. Patrick's Day Weekend was spent down in Lexington, KY, where weather again intervened. Michigan beat Longwood 2-1 but lost to #14 Kentucky by the same score, while an additional game with Kentucky and a tussle with DePaul were canceled. Finally, the team kicked off B1G play last weekend against the Ohio State Buckeyes, a series that got postponed until Sunday/Monday and saw the Bucks take 2 of 3, their first series win against Michigan in decades (as an addendum, Michigan beat Oakland yesterday in a run rule). 

[AFTER THE JUMP: send offense plz... for both teams]

[Bill Rapai]

What does it mean?: That was a very choppy section, with a lot of ups and downs, but it is not terrible. The team had some disappointing results, but they largely avoided catastrophic losses that would tank the RPI and picked up enough decent wins, even if not in the prettiest of fashions, to be alright for the NCAA Tournament. There are 32 at-large berths to the tournament, so counting AQs from power leagues, you want to be in the top 35 of RPI to feel alright. Right now Michigan sits 23rd. Their 13 losses are to the following teams, in order: USF (52), UCF (44), Duke (7), OKST (1), Boise St. (38), Nevada (91), Stanford x2 (4), LSU (5), UCLA (3), Kentucky (20), OSU x2 (34). The Nevada loss is the only one there that you'd really want back, but even that is not the end of the world when there are over 300 teams in the country.

Michigan played a loaded non-con (they played four of the top five teams in RPI!) with a not-ready-for-primetime roster and the high loss number reflects that. What also matters is they did get wins over Louisiana (16), Miss. St. (30), Boise St. (38), UCF (44), and CSF (37) + now one win over OSU (34). The Wolverines didn't get slaughtered, they managed to keep their head afloat. That's pivotal for trying to get into the NCAA Tournament. They have the second best RPI for a B1G team and given that the B1G typically puts 3-6 teams in the tournament, a finish in the upper quartile or so of the conference standings should get Bonnie Tholl's team into the NCAAs. They did enough in the non-conference and we need to keep our mind set on the positives. Now it's up to them to take care of business in-conference. 

[Bill Rapai]

Who's hot, who's not?: The shorter answer about who's not, and stop me if you've heard this one before, is "the offense". The team OPS is under .700, with a single hitter (Lexie Blair) hitting over .771. The team has hit just 12 HRs in 28 games and half of those are from Keke Tholl, who has finally flexed her muscles. No one else has more than two. Their team SLG% is .352, just barely inside the top 200 in the country. The Wolverines have scored 2 runs or fewer in 13 of 28 games(!) so far this season. Yes, they've played a tough schedule, but that is not going to win you a lot of games, at least not without elite pitching (which thankfully, Michigan has gotten a decent bit!).

If there is a bright spot on offense, Lexie Blair is your one. She's hitting .372 with a .424 OBP and six steals, the only downside being no power. By now we know what Lexie is and she's never been a big power hitter, but she has had 6 HRs in a season twice in her career. She's still sitting on a goose egg right now. Beyond that Ellie Sieler is hitting .311 but doesn't add much offensively beyond that and Keke Tholl is the reverse, a low average but the one source of reasonable power on the team. Everyone else is not hitting for average (by softball standards) and also not hitting for power. Freshmen Maddie Erickson and Janelle Ilacqua are getting to play quite a bit but haven't made a major impact offensively, while returners Audrey LeClair, Melina Livingston, and Ella McVey are not providing much of anything on this side of the ball.

Thankfully, Lauren Derkowski has been very good in the circle. She's already doubled her IP from last season and has a lower ERA despite drawing a lot of A-matchups she wasn't last season. Derkowski is striking out over one batter per inning and opponents are hitting under .200 off of her. Right now, she's my vote for team MVP. Transfer Jessica LeBeau has not been nearly as effective, with an ERA close to 3.00. Granted, she's drawn her fair share of brutal matchups, with LeBeau getting the nod against OKST and UCLA, but you'd like to see some improvement as the year goes along. The dichotomy between the starters was on display last weekend against Ohio State, when Derkowski held OSU to one run in 10 innings to help Michigan pull out a marathon win on Saturday, but LeBeau was bombed in game #2. Neither were particularly sharp in the third game, but the Wolverines could use a little bit more from LeBeau. They could also use more from anyone else, as Emerson Aiken and Hannah George have not been serviceable in games that matter.  

[Bill Rapai]

What to expect moving forward: There's another big weekend coming up when Michigan heads to Lincoln to take on the Huskers. The Saturday game is on BTN, if you want to watch, while the other two are on BTN+. Nebraska is the third B1G team in the RPI rankings (32nd), similar to OSU, and the Huskers won the BTT last season. This will not be an easy opponent and two out of three should be the goal here. Michigan heads to East Lansing to play the Spartans next Wednesday, which should be a win, and then the conference home opener is against Illinois over Easter weekend. It's not an easy B1G slate this year, with Purdue being the only "must-win" opponent on the schedule besides MSU. Cannot afford to drop games. Placement in the standings will matter as we look towards making the NCAAs. Any additional offense would be nice. 

 

[Marc-Gregor Campredon]

Baseball: Searching for offense

Tracy Smith's first season coaching Michigan Baseball began with a win and since then, it's been a similarly bumpy ride to Michigan Softball. Their record, 13-11, is also quite similar, though a 3-0 start to B1G play is a nice building block. Just like with softball, we'll recap what's happened, what it means, who is driving the results, and what to expect moving forward. 

The season results so far: As mentioned previously, Michigan Baseball started their season with a win, 6-2 over Fresno State back in mid-February. That was a nice start to the year, though slightly dampened by a loss later that evening to Michigan State. The team then split the final two games out in Arizona, losing to UC San Diego and beating Grand Canyon to close the opening weekend 2-2. All four of those teams can be described as "decent" so it was an acceptable opening weekend, rivalry considerations aside. The next weekend was out in Fullerton, a week before Softball would be there. The series was marred by postponements/cancelations, but the team did get two games in against CSF, sweeping both. 

They stayed out in California to start spring break, dropping a pair of games to UC Irvine and a ranked UCLA team, prior to getting on a plane to Houston. Playing in Minute Maid Park, the Wolverines were handled easily by three ranked squads, TCU, Texas Tech, and Louisville. Michigan briefly went home to play Oakland, an ugly 4-1 loss, before going back on the road to Kennesaw, GA, where they swept UAB but lost to the hosts Kennesaw State. Tracy Smith's team made one final pit stop in Cincinnati, where they beat Xavier, before heading home to take 2 of 3 from Bradley. A couple MAC midweek games the last two weeks have resulted in a split decision, a one run loss to Akron but a one-run win over CMU (walk-off style!), sandwiched around a three game sweep of Penn State last weekend to begin B1G play. 

[Brad Carlson]

What does it mean?: As you can guess, Michigan sits 69th (nice) in RPI, well outside the tournament picture. No real surprise and that's not a change in expectations. Erik Bakich's final team was not going to make the cut had they not won the BTT, so there wasn't a major reason to expect Tracy Smith's inaugural team to, with roster and coaching turnover factored in. They didn't pick up any resume-building wins in the non-conference and the B1G is an even lesser conference in baseball relative to softball, so unless the team snags the AQ bid again, NCAA Tournament play is likely not happening. That's fine, this was a season where I was more interested in seeing how Smith would begin to re-shape the roster and whether the pitching staff would improve. Michigan does not need to make the NCAA Tournament for it to be successful in the program trajectory. 

Who's hot, who's not?: A surprising story on offense for Michigan has been the emergence of Joe Longo, who did not play in a game as a freshman but as a sophomore has started the year as Michigan's best hitter. Longo has an OPS clearing .900, is tied for the team lead with 3 HR, and is hitting a sizzling .344. The rest of the offense has been pretty cold, a team scoring clip of 5.5 runs per game that ranks 224th in the country. Ted Burton has added some offense, as you'd expect from the veteran, while veteran Jack Van Remortel and transfers Gabe Sotres and Cody Jefferis join freshman Mitch Voit to make up the rest of the core of the offense. The team is looking for more power though, hitting only 0.75 homers per game (212th) and a poor showing from senior Tito Flores, one of last year's best hitters, has been a storyline. The offense needs some more juice and let's hope the warmer weather brings it. 

Pitching was going to be the bigger focus of the season after how poorly things went last year, when Michigan's unspeakably bad team ERA of 7.00 nearly sank the season before the BTT run rescued things. The good news is that there has been improvement, with Michigan's ERA as a team being reduced to 5.36. The bad news is, that's still not ideal, 118th in the country. More importantly, a pressing issue has been a lack of pitching depth, with a few shining stars but a lot of ugly. The MVP of the staff has been Connor O'Halloran, the Friday starter who has been marvelous for Michigan this season. O'Halloran boasts a 2.18 ERA on the season and a sub-1.00 WHIP with over 11 K/9 innings. The lefty has more than halved his ERA from last season and Michigan has won five of his six starts, unsurprisingly. 

[Marc-Gregor Campredon]

Noah Rennard has been very sharp out of the bullpen as well, being moved to starter last weekend against PSU. Rennard amazingly pitched an inning and a third on Saturday, then went out and got the start on Sunday, going nearly six full to get the win over the Nittany Lions. Jacob Denner has been in the rotation this season and is okay (better than last year), while Chase Allen has joined the rotation but taken a step back from last season, with opponents hitting .321 off him. Freshman Mitch Voit has done double duty as a reliable late inning arm, but everyone else in the Michigan bullpen has an ERA above 5.00. Kurt Barr and Ahmad Harajli have both gotten a crack at mid-week starting spots but neither have done incredible (Barr much better though). Michigan lacks the depth of arms needed to compete in those games, and that's been behind disappointing losses like the one to Akron. In other words, the pitching is improved over last year but the stench of last year's debacle still is giving the team some problems. 

What to expect moving forward: Michigan heads out on the road for their first away series of B1G play and it sends them to Champaign to play Illinois, currently the third highest ranked B1G team in RPI (the Sunday game is on BTN, the other two on BTN+). The Illini went 1-2 on the road at Nebraska last weekend, who Michigan will coincidentally see the week after that, when the Huskers come to town. Nebraska is currently sitting at 14-8 but with a weak strength of schedule (and thus RPI). It's still very early in the B1G schedule, so we have to wait to see how the tiers in the conference shake out as RPI is a very imperfect metric. Michigan draws Western Michigan in for another mid-week game in between. It would be nice not to lose another one of those, especially not to the 5-17 Broncos.