Should you buy back in?
A pivotal and telling series for Ole Miss at LSU and some Arch Manning thoughts
We have a couple of new podcasts out.
I hopped on the Oxford Exxon Podcast with Collin Brister and Chase Parham. We put together our All-Bianco teams by doing a snake draft of any and all players in the Mike Bianco era — 10 hitters, five pitchers and a bench player. It was a fun exercise. You can check that out here or anywhere you get podcasts.
Collin and I then previewed what is now a massive series for the Rebels against LSU in Baton Rouge this weekend and what to make of Ole Miss beating No. 14 Southern Miss in Hattiesburg on Wednesday. You can check that out here or anywhere you get podcasts.
We have the same and more to discuss today.
Rebels take down No. 14 USM , 4-1
I thought Ole Miss’ win on Wednesday night in Hattiesburg was one of its best played games of the season. There is the obvious reason that the Rebels only have two other wins against ranked teams this year, both coming in their SEC-opening series at Auburn, which seems like years ago at the point. Ole Miss simply hasn’t beaten many quality opponents this year, and they certainly have not beaten anyone good on the road. It was a great win for RPI purposes, too, as this team continues to claw for its postseason life. More on that in a minute.
Beyond all of that, I thought Ole Miss played a really clean game. Drew McDaniel was good for the second consecutive outing. He went five innings and allowed one run on four hits with eight strikeouts and two walks. McDaniel has now completed five innings in back-to-back starts against the likes of Southern Miss and Mississippi State. He has always had tremendous arm talent, but has struggled to locate and seemingly lacked confidence at times. His only blemish was allowing a solo home run in the bottom of the 2nd inning. Ole Miss took the lead in the 4th on back-to-back home runs from Kemp Alderman and Kevin Graham. Four weeks after returning from a wrist injury, Kevin Graham is starting to look like Kevin Graham again. Alderman is seeing the baseball well right now. Tim Elko added an RBI single in the fifth and the bullpen cobbled together four scoreless innings to nail down the win.
That’s the type of game that has eluded Ole Miss this year. A cleanly-played game in which the combination of pitching and hitting was good enough to beat just about anyone who stood in the other dugout. This type of performance was lacking when trying to avoid being swept at home by Alabama and Tennessee. It was lacking when Ole Miss had a chance to take control of road series at South Carolina and Arkansas after heroic Dylan DeLucia performances in game one, and it was lacking in the final two games of a must-win home series against Mississippi State. That’s why Ole Miss is in this position its in, because it couldn’t play clean games when it had to have a win. Wednesday night is the type of performance that gets you into the winner’s bracket as a No. 2 or No. 3 on night one of a regional.
Mike Bianco said after the game that he didn’t think this team this team needed the confidence boost that accompanies a win like that, but rather that the Rebels simply needed RPI-boosting wins. Bianco knows his team way better than I do, but I sort of disagree. It looked like they needed that win. Bianco gave a gigantic fist pump when Brandon Johnson snuck a fastball on the outside corner in a full count for the second out in the 9th. The emotion the team showed after the win was noticeable. I don’t really know how to articulate this well or prove it, but the Rebels looked different on Wednesday night. They seemed to carry themselves with a different level of confidence than they did throughout the month of April and up until last weekend. Maybe I am wrong. Or maybe I am right and it still ends up being irrelevant after this weekend — but, to me, it was noticeable.
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Are you ready to buy back in?
I am not quite there yet. I think Ole Miss is more alive for an NCAA Tournament birth than some would like to admit. But as encouraging of a performance as Wednesday night was, I still need to see more than three wins over a hapless Missouri team and one good win at Southern Miss to believe this team is a different group than what we have seen for the previous two months. This weekend’s series at LSU is the quintessential ‘prove it’ weekend. If you are a fan and toiling with the idea of buying back into this once lifeless group, I think this weekend at Alex Box Stadium will tell you exactly what you needed to know and provide you with more clarity as to whether the Rebels have turned a corner.
Ole Miss now sits at 48 in the RPI after Wednesday’s win, jumping eight spots from where it started the week. As we discussed in Monday’s newsletter, the Rebels likely need to win each of their last two series to feel great about their chances of earning an at-large bid into the NCAA Tournament without more work to do at the SEC Tournament in Hoover. There’s a path to making it with only three wins in the last two series, and Wednesday’s win at Southern Miss will certainly help if that ends up being the case, but I think a 13-17 regular season finish in league play will require Ole Miss to win two games in Hoover — and even then I think the team might be sweating it a bit.
For the sake of this content item, the point is this: if Ole Miss is able to win these last two series, that is pretty solid evidence that the Rebels have turned a corner. Texas A&M and LSU are both ranked and have aspirations of hosting regionals in their own ballparks. If Ole Miss beats both of them on their path to earning an at-large bid, people will buy back in.
It may not matter in the end. Making the NCAA Tournament won’t save Bianco’s job, nor will it change the disappointment that was the 2022 regular season. But it will give this team a chance to rectify its missteps. And while the path toward a Super Regional or Omaha is certainly harder on the road than it is at home, at least the opportunity exists. Not to get too far ahead of myself (I have already stated I need to see more before buying back in), but if this team were to get in, would you really want to see them in your regional if you are a host? As the youth say, that’s a no for me, dawg. That would mean Ole Miss would’ve gone a minimum of 5-2 against ranked opponents to close the season (not counting whatever happens in Hoover) as the pitching continues to improve and the offense begins to look more like the one most thought it would be in February when the season began.
This team wasn’t supposed to be this bad on paper. And while Ole Miss fans aren’t used to it because of the unique way the Mike Bianco era has unfolded, this happens every single year in this sport. There is a team, or multiple teams, that vastly underachieve in the regular season, get hot in a road regional and make a run. N.C. State last year is the latest example. I am not saying that it will be Ole Miss this year. Again, it’s just four games. But I, presumably like many of you, am on the verge of buying back into the Rebels’ postseason chances. I think this weekend will provide clarity. That’s in and of itself pretty wild position to be in considering where this team was two weeks ago.
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LSU scout
The Tigers are 14-10 and are coming off a series win at an Alabama team engaged in a late-season free fall. LSU has won seven of its last nine SEC games.
The Tigers announced their rotation, sort of
Friday: Ma’Khail Hilliard
Saturday: TBA
Sunday: TBA
Hilliard is good SEC right-hander who has been around a while. He’s coming off Tommy John Surgery and has pitched well this year. He wasn’t supposed to be LSU’s ace, and in the preseason, it was debatable whether he’d even be in the rotation, but he’s filled a role the Tigers needed. Hilliard actually threw six innings of two-run baseball against Ole Miss in 2019 in a Friday night LSU win. Ole Miss went on to win the final two games to claim its first series in at LSU since 1982.
As far as the other two slots, Blake Money has been LSU’s Saturday since conference play started, but has struggled badly in his last three starts. Money failed to complete three innings each of his last three times out. The Tigers going TBA for game two is certainly newsworthy. Samuel Dutton has been their third starter. He’s been pretty good for them. I am not sure why they’d go TBA on Sunday unless they are considering starting Dutton in game two.
Tigers offense rake
LSU has one of the best lineups in college baseball. First-year head coach Jay Johnson brought All-American Jacob Berry with him from Arizona to comprise a lineup of Berry, Dylan Crews, and Gavin Dugas. For my money, that might be the most frightening three-hitter stretch in this conference (Tennessee is disqualified until I personally examine their bats). This will be a test for both the Ole Miss pitching staff and the offense. I don’t think the Rebels are going to win a 2-1, 3-1 or 4-2-type game. I think the pitching staff will do well to hold LSU to 5-6 runs in each and it will be up to the offense to punish a vulnerable LSU pitching staff. The Tigers’ weaknesses are their defense and rotation. This will be a great litmus for how real last weekend was in terms of the offense looking different.
Ole Miss has a tremendous opportunity ahead of it this weekend. The Rebels have a pulse. Will they maintain it?
Arch Manning made news this week
In an interview with On3’s Sam Spielgelman, Manning shed some light on his recruitment. You can read it for yourself, but the real news from an Ole Miss perspective is that he did not mention Ole Miss at all. This apparently came as a shock to some if message boards are any indication. I am not really sure why.
There has been little to no buzz surrounding Manning and Ole Miss over the last six months. Ole Miss got a commitment from 2023 4-star quarterback Marcel Reed last month and has recruited 5-star 2023 QB Jaden Rashada pretty hard. It seems pretty clear that Arch Manning is not going to Ole Miss and that this staff has chosen to go in a different direction regarding a 2023 quarterback. I have no idea the reason, nor do I have any insight on Manning’s recruitment. All I know is that this shouldn’t have been a surprise if you have been paying attention for the last nine months.
I am not justifying nor criticizing the way this unfolded because I don’t know how or why it unfolded the way it did. Manning is in line for a gigantic NIL payday if he chooses Texas, Alabama or Georgia, presumably one bigger than Ole Miss can offer. Maybe the kid didn’t want to come to Ole Miss. Maybe Lane Kiffin doesn’t see it as a fit. All I know is that 17-year-old quarterbacks are volatile investments. I am not saying Manning won’t pan out. He may very well become a superstar, and that will sting for Ole Miss fans I suppose, but I also believe there are other options, that the program is in a good place and that Kiffin and this staff will have a good quarterback most every year they are in Oxford. Also, with the way the transfer portal has changed the sport, who the hell knows what might happen in three years? Programs have less control over their high school signees than they do of transfer portal guys now. Why? The high school signee can leave at any time for anywhere via the one-time free transfer rule, whereas a transfer (like Jaxson Dart) is sort of locked in at Ole Miss for a couple of years having exhausted his one free pass.
I suppose my point is that there are so many different ways to get talented players, particularly talented quarterbacks, in this modern age of college football that I don’t find Arch Manning going to school elsewhere to be a significant indictment on Kiffin, Ole Miss or the football program. The hysteria will be rooted in the kid’s last name only.
On the horizon
Sunday baseball recap pod with Collin Brister
Reaction Monday newsletter with baseball thoughts, some NIL stuff and more
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