re: Stop beating up on Coach Paul Mainieri

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When the coach tucks his tail between his legs, the team is not far behind.

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Do you really think people here expect LSU to run the table in baseball?

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No it isn't.

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LSU baseball is - and will continue to be - the most highly respected and envied baseball program in America for years to come.

LSU baseball fans got a tad spoiled in the 90's. On top of us being über-talented and simply having significantly better players and more of them than everyone else, we also got a tad lucky with CWS and national title game success (it was really somewhat of a statistical anomaly LSUs ridiculous success rate in Omaha...we were certainly good/great, but no one is that good...we were good enough to put ourselves in position and then Lady Luck and the Baseball Gods took over and somehow we always seemed to get hot at PRECISELY the right time, typically in Omaha, and shockingly rolled off 5 titles). It goes without saying: we certainly took advantage of our inherent advantages and made the most of a "hot table" in the 90's, The game is different now with scholarship limitations and parity and shrinking talent gaps. Also, the bat changes have basically amplified all of those things I just mentioned.. So in a game where parity had already taken hold and begun to spread as the talent got distributed more evenly, they then implement a huge fundemental change to the game (the bats) which on its face by itself stand-alone would make games closer and more competitive to begin with. So it's a basically a tidal wave of changes that there's only one possible result: MORE PARITY.

So let's think about this… Speaking generally and on a macro level, LSU was waaaaay out in front of "the rest" of the country 15-20 years ago (talent, facilities, fan support, mostly mostly mostly talent due to the other two). Over that time the rest of college baseball hasn't completely caught up - they never will long term with LSU - but they certainly have closed the gap a little bit and made themselves more competitive and therefore more likely to occasionally "knock off" LSU, certainly more capable of doing so than they were in 1990-2005ish (the flip side is also true.......due to the limitations and changes, LSU has lost some people here and there and -independent of everyone else "catching up" - LSU itself has become more vulnerable to getting knocked off occasionally....talent that these other teams are getting to close the gap sometimes is coming directly out of our pocket, for whatever reason we can't make it work and occasionally some players get away...whereas in the past we ALWAYS got exactly who we wanted, there was never a concern of losing someone that we wanted to another college.)

LSU was the unquestionable big dog with inherent advantages. The big dog likes the status quo. NCAA didn't like status quo and wanted to attempt to expand the game nationally. NCAA changes things to even the playing field in hopes of growing the sport as a whole. NCAA changes more things (bats) that inevitably and not surprisingly even the playing field even further. Is it really any shock or surprise that LSU has gone from winning a national title every other year to a national title every fourth or fifth year?? Lol, no it's not surprising at all when you take a step back and look at the college baseball landscape as a whole. It makes perfect sense. It is exactly what "they" wanted. It is what it is, times are different and we adapt and our fans probably need to get used to the new landscape and not beat ourselves up and feel embarassed if we don't make it it to Omaha's every single year and if we don't win the national title every other year, because the landscape has shifted away from us (or anyone) dominating year-in-year-out.

What does it all mean?? It ain't as easy these days as it was for Skip. LSU - and NO SCHOOL for that matter - will ever win 5 titles in a 10 year span again......mark my words, it will NEVER HAPPEN AGAIN.

LSU baseball is fine....Regardless of an extroidinarily tiny sample of 6 disappointing/frustrating postseason losses (I count SIX....that's right: merely 6 postseason games under PM that I'd like to have back....StBr, StBr, UCLA, UNC, Houston, Houston)....Point being: let's not all freak out and think the empire has fallen because of six baseball games...Dissapointing games?yes, certainly...discouraging 3-year string of premature/unexpected exits? Sure.....pattern developing?...maybe, maybe not.... but the end of an empire? LOL, No. LSU is still the big dog (if there is one....at the very least, we're the biggest and most consistent of the big dogs). We win the SEC tourney basically every year, we finish in the Top-third of the SEC regular season standings basically every year, we win a regional 60-70% of the time, we win a Super regional and advance to the CWS about 40-50% of the time, and we'll win the national title once every five years or so. Find me another team (besides floridaSt), that can exceed those success rates on a consistent basis.

LSU baseball is more than fine....it's great. The Houston losses sucked, and we certainly blew it so it's understandable that some people are being a little over dramatic on the heels of a semi-shocking early exit at home. But let's not lose our sense of reality here: LSU baseball is - and will be for as far as the eye can see - college baseball's premier program.

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Texas does it. And they were dog shite for the last two years.

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8 in 15 years. LSU shouldn't have similar expectations?

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So you made this thread crying about criticism of Mainieri and then started a thread shitting on Les Miles?

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OK so PM has been here 8 years and been 3 times. There is still another 2 years for to go a couple of times.

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