Infield errors

Cade Doughty 0.919
Jacob Berry 0.900
Jordan Thompson 0.896

Look at these cumulative fielding percentages after today's game for our second baseman, third baseman, and shortstop, respectively. These are atrocious. I have been following LSU baseball for many years, and I pay close attention to the statistical side of the Tigers' performance, and I am hard pressed to remember a worse fielding infield. At this point in the season there are 29 errors among these three players. Tre Morgan is the only infielder who is playing respectable defense--his fielding percentage is a very good 0.989 (and only three errors).

Add to that that these three players are not getting to balls that other players in the league are getting to. I rarely see these three players dive to stop a ball from getting through the infield, and there are grounders that I would expect an SEC-level infielder to stop that are getting through our infield unmolested. And add to that are the number of times when the infielders don't seem to know who is responsible for a given play--they sometimes run into each other or otherwise get in the responsible player's way, and this doesn't count toward the error count. And so far this year we have turned only 16 double plays, compared to 25 by our opponents. The easy double-play ball that JT booted in the eighth inning this afternoon could have gotten us out of the inning with minor damage.

All of this is putting real pressure on our pitching staff. I am sure that there is no one more concerned and upset about the poor fielding performance than JJ and these three players. No one wants to be embarrassed by how they are playing the field. CD and JB are making up for this with great hitting, but JT is not. Is there anyone on the bench who is a good field, no hit kind of player? We would be better off with a .200 hitter playing shortstop and fielding the position cleanly than we are with a .270 hitter with a 0.896 fielding position at arguably the most important defensive position on the field.

Agree and it also puts pressure on the batters to get more hits and RBIs to make up runs gained by our infield errors.