re: Has anyone ever ASKED JJ why his pitchers are struggling so much

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I’d just like to hear from the coach

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Same here. It would be interesting to hear what he is thinking. What else are press conferences for?

No

I’ll email him

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What answer would you be satisfied with?

Any answer

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He has repeatedly said the team has been playing bad. That includes pitchers too. He says they have things to work on. I trust that’s what they are doing.

Hopefully we are seeing a two week team slump and this werjend we can turn things around. It’s better to slump now than slumping in two weeks.

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still don't understand the group of posters here who want to "Hold coaches accountable". WTF does that even mean?

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I have no idea what kind of answer people would expect a coach to give.

I guess people think the Rant has the power to withhold his paycheck if we don’t like his answers to our questions.

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Local media won’t asked the tough questions

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What would be the benefit of doing so?

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Benefit? How about reporters doing their job?

Baseball is a big fan-favorite at LSU, for the past 2-3 decades it's been the second most followed sport here. It might be small potatoes everywhere else in the nation, but in BR it's every bit as popular, discussed and analyzed as any sport outside of football.
LSU has been #1 90% of the season, and now suddenly the past 2 weekends you have Skenes, and then you have a complete disaster the rest of the way. It's like watching the football team miss every field goal and XP, or the basketball team go 6 for 20 at the FT line, several games in a row.

Do you not think there would be questions about that happening?

Let me start by saying I love JJ as our head baseball coach and am not bashing him at all.

BUT

Jay doesn't divulge much information when speaking to the media. Even when he goes on Mik'd Up he gives non specific answers to specific questions. Every time he is asked about the pitchers he gives a very "political" answer. By that I mean he says stuff like:

"We have confidence in our bullpen, we have seen them execute in big spots earlier this season and we believe they will execute when they are called upon."

Sometimes he even defends them by saying things like

"There were a few well executed pitches that we thought were close enough to be called strikes and if they were, you have a strikeout but it turns into a walk instead."

If you read between the lines of that last bit, maybe you can take that the pitchers are doing what is asked of them and they are pleased with the execution. I hope thats just coach speak and they aren't actually pleased with the way its been going.

He never has anything but positive things to say about Wes Johnson.

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The problem with this is, unless his "expert" diagnosis is public knowledge, he runs the risk of giving information on the details of our weaknesses to future opponents. That's why the whole phenomenon of coach speak exists - to give as little information as possible that might be used against you.

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That's fine for subtle issues, like "the Right Tackle has difficulty with speed rushes to the outside by blitzing defensive backs, so we have to keep a back in pass protection against the nickel or dime".

THIS is more along the lines of "our center can't make the snap in the shotgun, and we had 10 snaps that were either on the ground or over the QB's head. So we have to go back under center".

Every opponent sees the issue. Remove Skenes from the equation, and you have Floyd, who can easily be rattled and thrown off his game; and then a bunch of guys who can only throw 1 pitch for a strike. And it might not just be "a fastball", it's "a high, inside fastball" or something similar... so every opposing batter is sitting on just that one pitch from each guy. If he throws it, it's batting practice. If he doesn't, it's a walk.

It's gotten worse and more obvious over the year. We beat Arkansas (the best team we've faced) in games 2 and 3. Tennessee mauled us in game 3, but we took game 2. Auburn and Miss State took both games, and it was painful to watch after awhile. Did we pitch better earlier in the year, or did the opponent then just not know to sit on that one pitch from each guy?
And how is it that our batters don't seem to have the same insight against their pitchers? We're "supposed" to have the more potent lineup.

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So the op was concerned with the reporters. Got it

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uh, yeah... the OP was, has anyone even asked Johnson why they are struggling so much. He capitalized the word ASKED, which suggests that there be direct questions about it.

Again, a football analogy. If your center snaps the ball over the QB's head 6 times in a game, you ask what the issue is with the snap. Ignoring the obvious issue doesn't hide it from the next opponent.

Ignorant people don’t want discussions about individual situations and moves because they can’t participate. If you’re not just a cheerleader they want you silenced. That’s why they try to place everyone into these 2 categories.