Junior Errol Robinson safely slides into home plate during the game against University of Arkansas Pine Bluff. Photo by: Evan Turner
With just three weeks remaining in the SEC regular season, Ole Miss travels to Athens this weekend for a three-game series with the Georgia Bulldogs. The Rebels are coming off their biggest SEC series win so far this year after taking two of three from No. 9 LSU. It was a weekend in which Ole Miss answered a lot of criticism.
Ole Miss put itself in firm position to host a regional with its win over the weekend, but will need a serviceable finish down the stretch to remain in that position. It will face a different challenge this week in Georgia, a team from which you really never know what you’re going to get. Georgia has a series win over No. 7 South Carolina, and took the opening game at Florida before dropping the final. The team was also swept by Texas A&M and Vanderbilt last weekend.
“We’ve gotta play well,” Bianco said. “That’s what the game of baseball is all about, and why it’s so difficult. It’s not easy to play well every day and on the road against a very good team, a team that beat South Carolina just a few weeks ago at home. It’ll be a big challenge for us.”
Georgia has not found much consistency this year, but it does have one of the best Friday night starters in the SEC in Robert Tyler.
On the mound
It will be Tyler against Brady Bramlett on Friday. Bullard was a freshman All-American in 2014, and after an injury-riddled 2015 season he has anchored the Bulldog rotation.
“Tyler is terrific. He struggled a little bit at the beginning of the year, but seems to have gotten it going again,” Bianco said. “He’s a guy that’s going to throw the ball mid to upper 90s and yeah, you don’t see that every day.”
Tyler had a slow start to this year, and it shows in his 3-4 record and 3.34 ERA, but is dominant when his command is there to compliment his upper 90s velocity.
Bramlett didn’t have his best stuff last weekend against LSU, and did not factor in the decsion in a 7-6 Ole Miss win. Aside from that and a start against South Carolina, Bramlett has been effective at the top of the Rebels’ rotation, and is 6-2 this year and with an ERA of 2.61.
Sophomore left-hander David Parkinson might still be getting used to pitching in the SEC after being moved into a starting role a month ago, but he has adapted quickly. He earned a win in his first start against Arkansas, and allowed just one run in seven innings against Alabama the next week. Parkinson was on the wrong side of a complete game from LSU’s Alex Lange and suffered a loss last weekend.
Georgia will also send out a left-hander on Saturday in Connor Jones. Jones is 5-4 in 10 starts this year for the Bulldogs with an ERA of 5.02.
Freshman James McArthur will get the ball on Sunday for Ole Miss. McArthur had a slow start to the year and was held back a bit by a foot injury to begin the year. But the freshman right-hander has been a difference maker for Ole Miss in the last six weeks. He’s 5-0 in midweek games this year, and has allowed just one earned run in his last 26.1 innings pitched. This stretch resulted in an opportunity on the weekend for McArthur and he made his first SEC start last weekend against LSU. McArthur pitched 3.1 scoreless innings, and Bianco will be looking for a more extended outing from him this weekend. The rotation has been a question mark for Ole Miss at times this year, but Parkinson has filled the Saturday role nicely, and McArthur has the potential to be a difference maker for this team if he can be effective on Sundays.
Georgia has not yet announced who will pitch in game three.
At the plate
Both of these teams have had their fair share of struggles at the plate this year. Georgia ranks in the bottom three in the SEC in total batting, whereas Ole Miss is ninth. Georgia is hitting just .250 as a team, which is second-to-last in the conference, only in front of Alabama. The Bulldogs have struggled to score runs this year, and it has cost them games.
Skyler Weber leads the Bulldogs in hits (62), and is second in team RBIs (24), and also leads the club with 78 total bases. Daniel Nichols and L.J. Talley have five and six home runs, respectively, to lead Georgia in that department.
The Rebels have hit better as of late and now have five guys batting .300 in the SEC. Henri Lartigue has carried a heavy load, and J.B. Woodman’s three-homerun explosion last weekend has also provided a spark to a lineup that struggled to start SEC play. Those two, along with Colby Bortles, can make the middle of the Ole Miss lineup tough to get through when they are hitting well.
Analysis
Georgia, despite its struggles, still has an RPI of 29, meaning that this can be another feather in Ole Miss’ NCAA tournament cap if it can add a couple more RPI top-30 wins. This is also a weekend that Ole Miss’ hosting chances could be hurt. Georgia is a tough team when they want to be, and a series loss would put the Rebels on less stable ground in that regard. Robert Tyler will be tough to solve on Friday, but I think Ole Miss takes two on the back end of the weekend.
