Entry #20 - 3/7/04

Adversity...Our young ball club has just experienced their second dose since the beginning of the season and I'm sure it won't be our last. Baseball can be very cruel and just when you think you have it solved; it jumps up to bite you. Baseball is a game of adversity. In this game how you deal with your disappointments is far more important than how you deal with your successes. I want our players to understand that most all good things come through adversity. We get stronger when we test ourselves. Adversity can make us better. We must be challenged to improve, and adversity is the challenger. I try to stress to our players that if you prepare like crazy, have a positive attitude, work as hard as possible and give great effort, then you will never be a failure. That is, unless you blame others when you fail.

Criticism and Praise…I take criticism and praise with a grain of salt. I tell our players each year, “Guys, you’re going to receive criticism. Some of it will be deserved and some of it will be undeserved. Either way, deserved or undeserved, you’re not going to like it. You’re also going to receive praise on occasion. Some of it will be deserved and some of it will be undeserved. Either way you are going to like it.”

“However, your strength as an individual depends on how you respond to both criticism and praise. If you let either one have a special effect on you, it is going to hurt the team. Whether it’s criticism or praise, deserved or undeserved, makes no difference. If we let it effect us, it hurts us.”

My Dad used to tell me, “You can’t worry about the things you have no control over. If you get caught up in things over which you have no control, it will adversely affect those things over which you have control.” We have little control over what criticism or praise others send our way. Take it all with a grain of salt. Let your opponent get caught up in other people’s opinions. But don’t you do it.

We headed to Charlotte, looking to get off to a good start in the conference race. Our guys were excited to get the conference season started and in the second inning of game one we exploded with six runs. Matt Traylor had the big blow, a towering three run shot to right field. We added five more in the third as Caleb Moore, Steven Douglas and Greg Roberts led off the inning with consecutive singles. Shane Byrne and Andy Howdeshell then delivered back to back doubles, followed by an RBI single by Blake Church. We added two more in the fourth as Tim Turner hit his second homer of the year, a deep blast half way up the trees in centerfield. We tacked on a few more runs late as senior Troy Moock got his first hit of the season and our final hit of the evening. We ended the evening with twenty hits as “Mooker" earned Coach Goulet that steak dinner. I was very happy for Troy as he has really worked extremely hard and made a huge commitment to baseball. Troy has become a great leader in our program and he simply loves the game. By his enthusiasm you would never guess he is not in the lineup everyday. As a coach he is one of the first guys you like to see when you arrive at the park. Troy is going to make a great coach one day. Meanwhile, Jeremy Hall delivered another great start earning his third win in a row. Jeremy is becoming a “Donkey”. In the coaching profession a “Donkey” is a positive term in which we describe pitchers who are tough, stubborn and simply hard to beat. In past years at ETSU, Matt Baber and Reid Casey were our “Donkeys”. Freshman, David Yates was sharp again as he finished off the game with two innings of no hit baseball and three strikeouts.

Although it was a decisive win, I was disappointed with our play late in the game because I thought we got sloppy. We made some errors, booted routine double play balls and dropped a foul fly ball. I expressed to our guys that good teams always make the routine plays, especially under pressure. No matter if you are up ten runs or down ten runs, you must focus and concentrate just like it is a tie game in the ninth inning. That way when you are in a close game, the routine play will be automatic. You can never take a pitch off.

In Game Two I knew we were going to be in a dogfight. We scored a few runs early, but every time we scored, Davidson would answer to tie the game. We finally put something together to take a 5 - 3 lead on a homerun by Shane Byrne and doubles by Andy Howdeshell and Josiah Glafenhein. But Davidson would not go away and tied the game in the bottom of the fifth. The scored remained tied until the seventh. Now we found ourselves in a close game and our failure to make the routine plays late in games ultimately led to our demise, as Davidson scored four unearned runs, all with two outs. We could not get anything going in the final innings and lost 9 - 5. During the course of the game I felt like we would eventually put something together and find a way to win, but when we let them take the lead due to us botching a couple of routine plays, the wind was taken right out of our sail.

So now it was Sunday and we faced another "Rubber Match" game. This game was uncharacteristic of most Sunday Games in the Southern Conference, as this one was going to be a pitcher's duel. Their pitcher was sharp as was Tim Turner as we had a 1 - 0 lead going into the bottom of the sixth. But with two outs, runners on 1st and 2nd and a 0-2 count on the batter, Davidson got a clutch double and took a 2 - 1 lead. Every time a hit is given up on a 0-2 pitch, every deceased baseball coach rolls over in their grave. They added two more runs, as again we could not make the routine play. In the end we lost 4 - 1. Needless to say it was a disappointing series, but I must give Davidson credit as they simply out pitched us and out played us in the final two games of the series. Their kids simply made more plays than our kids.

Now it is back to getting prepared for a huge week for us. We have two midweek games versus Tennessee Tech and Radford, followed by a tough three game series at Georgia Southern. There is no time to feel sorry for ourselves. I told our players that I’m interested in winning. That’s it. We are going to prepare like crazy to get back in the ‘W” column. We have still won 8 of our last 11, and if we just make the routine plays at Davidson, we easily could have won all three. That is one of the great things about baseball. A challenge is always around the corner. It will be interesting to see how our ball club responds. Until Next Time…

Coach Skole