re: Somebody’s gonna have to beat Tennessee in the Supers

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Like I said, we saw a hint in Hoover. LSU didn't throw an "ace" by any means against them, was missing a couple KEY bats, and still had some less-than-stellar defensive plays. But we hung around.

You put them against a pitcher who is mowing them down, inducing a lot of warning-track fly outs, and the defense not giving a couple runs up that didn't need to happen, let's see what their pitchers do in that game. Let's see what happens when they're tied or down going into the 8th.

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You touch on one of the advantages I think we—more than any team—still have over them. Those uniforms we wear still have “LSU” written across them. And theirs still have “Tennessee.” I don’t care how much swag they have, how many fur coats, how many hot girls in the stands wearing “Daddy” hats(which is pretty awesome btw). Or how long it’s been since we were the “Daddy” of college baseball. If it gets down to nut-cutting time, even if it’s subconscious, they know deep down they’ve never done anything and find a way to lose while we have done and won everything and can find a way to win.

The uniforms matter. The fans matter. The histories matter. The legacies do matter. But only if we can narrow the talent gap. I truly believe the things I just mentioned can almost magically raise the level of confidence and play of our guys. The brush of the buttons of the white “LSU” jerseys across their chests can help them believe. The magic of the “championship golds” can make them transform, to “level up” as the kids say. And induce doubt. But only if the gap shrinks. We need “Dugas” to level up. Need the “good” Jobert to show up. The 5-5 Pearson to hit 2nd. But mainly we need just plain old Cade Doughty penciled in somewhere 3-5. And we have to have Jacob Berry hitting 3rd or 4th. Just his being in the lineup—even if he’s hitting righty vs. righty—makes us sooooo much better. And we’ve mainly just talked about him coming back period, but not really whether he can hit left-handed or not.

But Jacob Berry hitting left-handed against a right-handed pitcher is, I think, the biggest offensive matchup advantage in the sport. And we’ve really kinda downplayed that somehow. We talk about missing him, but not missing him specifically hitting left-handed. Maybe Jay is playing the long game. We may be who we’ve been the last few weeks. But we could get more better (?) faster than any team going into the postseason and narrow that gap more than any other team. Combine that with the potential magic in our purple and gold, and I would love for our guys to get a shot at those Dreamcycle fricks. But that’s a lot of “if”s and “but”s. I still think Tennessee is a huge favorite against the entire field. But I’d love to watch our guys get a chance somewhere along the way. The ghost of Zeph Zinsman could make all the difference, and the corpse of Paul Byrd could bring it all home.