For the second straight weekend, the Ags welcome some new friends from the PNW to Olsen Field

For the second weekend installment of the 2023 Aggie Baseball Extravaganza, Schloss & The Boys will play host to a squad from the Pacific Northwest, with the Portland Pilots coming to town. Fun fact about the Pilots: in this case, “pilot” refers to boats and not planes, according to the official preview on 12thman.com.

Fred Armisen’s favorite baseball team (please do not fact check this) kicked off their season last weekend with a 3-1 series win at Utah Tech, in which they scored 17 and 21 runs in games one and three, respectively. Preseason all-WCC OF Jake Holcroft (.316/.381/.895) currently leads the team in homers (3). His 1.276 OPS is rather pedestrian compared to C Nich Klemp, whose 13 hits, two walks, and two HBPs in 17 at-bats math into a .765/.810/1.118 slash line. Raw OPS numbers can be nonsensical and downright useless at times, though they’re still quite popular. In this case, an OPS of 1.928 over the most plate appearances on the team feels noteworthy.

For our favorite baseball team, this weekend should be about turning the page. We spoke on Wednesday a bit about Tuesday’s loss to Lamar, and it’s worth reiterating that these things happen every year in college baseball. Hell, while Texas A&M was busy with the Cardinals, Vandy was busy losing to Central Arkansas. The next day, Florida lost to USF. Is it frustrating? Very much so. Do these games matter? Given that they literally count toward a team’s record and are subsequently factored into their RPI, yeah. Of course they matter! But is the sky falling? No. Not yet anyway. Though we’ve been fooled before (lol).

There are some on-field things to keep an eye on, however. It was mentioned on twitter that the Aggies have been out-hit in three of their four games thus far, which definitely isn’t a recipe for sustained success. It’s definitely worth noting on that front that drawing an absurd 25 walks last weekend almost assuredly played a part in the team’s relatively low hit total. In the game they did out-hit their opponent, the Ags trounced Seattle 14-2. So, yeah, doing that is probably a good idea, for sure. That said, if we’re heading into the Shriner’s in Houston in a couple weeks, and this is still an issue, then there’s definitely cause for concern. Until then, there’s so much talent on this roster for them not to figure it out.

Lastly, the Aggies will debut their brand new Corps of Cadets-inspired uniforms that they unveiled yesterday. This feels like one of those science-fiction-begets-science-fact kind of things, where Stewade and rcb05 made enough uniform parodies over the years that one finally came true. Regardless of what you may think about the idea, these uniforms were definitely executed extremely well. Can’t wait to see them on the field.

Probable Starters

Friday: Nathan Dettmer (0-0, 0.00 ERA) vs. Joey Gartrell (1-0, 3.60 ERA)
Saturday: Troy Wansing (0-0, 8.10 ERA) vs. Brock Gillis (0-0, 9.00 ERA)
Sunday: Chris Cortez (1-0, 0.00 ERA) vs. Nick Brink (1-0, 0.00 ERA)

How to Watch/Listen

Times: 6 p.m. Friday | 2 p.m. Saturday | 1 p.m. Sunday
Live Video: All three games can be streamed on SEC Network+, with Will Johnson and Boomer (!) White (!) in the booth
Radio: Tyler Pigg and JB Moss have the call on SportsRadio 1150 AM/The Zone 93.7 FM for Friday & Saturday, with Andrew Monaco on Sunday
Live Stats: tamu.statbroadcast.com (desktop); tamustats.com (mobile)