ASU Baseball: Inconsistency and inexperience plaguing young Sun Devils

Photo: Nicholas Badders/WCSN

There’s no denying the fact that the Arizona State baseball team is loaded with talent. There’s also no denying the fact that the Arizona State baseball team is incredibly young.

Opening their second series of the 2018 season against the Saint Mary’s Gaels the Sun Devils were again hindered by an inconsistent start from sophomore left-hander Spencer Van Scoyoc, coupled with the inevitable growing pains of running out a starting lineup including five freshmen.

Van Scoyoc has been viewed as a bona fide Friday night ace by head coach Tracy Smith and the ASU coaching staff since he arrived on campus last year, but lack of control has kept him from reaching that status thus far.

Rated as the number eight left-handed pitching prospect in the country coming out of Jefferson High School (Cedar Rapids, IA) by Perfect Game USA, Van Scoyoc registered 28 innings in 10 appearances as a freshman and finished with 30 walks. Through two starts in 2018, with a record of 0-2, Van Scoyoc has walked 10 batters in just 7.1 innings.

“[Van Scoyoc has] good stuff, but it’s simply not being able to locate his secondary pitch consistently, and I think you have to do that as a starter at this level, particularly in this league,” Smith said of his sophomore’s struggles. “It’s just confidence in the repetition and trusting your mechanics.”

With the most daunting stretch of their non-conference schedule fast approaching, a two-game midweek series at Long Beach State before coming back home to host defending Big 12 tournament champions Oklahoma State March 2-4, Arizona State has to put its best foot forward in order to stay relevant.

To that end, Smith did not shy away from the notion that Van Scoyoc might not be entrenched as the Friday night starter for the entirety of the season.

“Are we giving up on Spencer Van Scoyoc? Absolutely not,” Smith said. “That young man is going to have to have a big role for us to be good this year, and maybe it’s not on Friday night. But it’s not for lack of trying.”

Moving to his everyday lineup, Smith is seemingly keen on playing three true freshmen in the infield now that Spencer Torkelson appears to have the inside track at first base over Jeremy McCuin. That coupled with the fourth-year head coach entrusting Drew Swift and Alika Williams at shortstop and second base respectively means the struggles can’t come as a surprise to anyone.

Nevertheless, at a program with the history and expectations of Arizona State, not to mention a program in a conference as talented as the Pac-12, those miscues have to be corrected as quickly as possible in order for this team to have any amount of success.

“I have a lot of confidence in this group. I think once they settle in and understand the college game, this group’s going to take off. But what we can’t do is what we did tonight, when you don’t even give yourself a chance, by giving too many free bases and then not taking outs when the team’s laying down a bunt,” Smith said. “You do that, I don’t care how old you are, you’re not going to win.”

In addition to the freshmen, Smith is also guaranteed to rely heavily on his three best sophomores, in the persons of Carter Aldrete, Hunter Bishop and Lyle Lin, to act as the veterans of the group along with the elder statesmen of them all, junior outfielder Gage Canning. It can be tricky to run out a lineup comprised of almost entirely underclassmen, when the sophomores leading the freshman are still prone to some growing pains themselves.

Aldrete came into Friday’s game against Saint Mary’s leading the team in errors (3), and has yet to register an RBI, while Bishop had just two hits in sixteen at-bats to his name before turning in an 0-3 night against Gaels starter Nick Frank.

“It’s going to take some execution, it’s going to take some of the guys that we call veterans, that have one season under their belt, to start playing like that too,” Smith said.

Smith has used the phrase “cautiously optimistic” to describe his group throughout spring practices and into the infancy of the season, which seems like the perfect label to summarize the potential of the Sun Devils.

Swift came into Friday night’s game against Saint Mary’s leading the nation in on-base percentage (.813), while Torkelson is leading the team in home runs (3) and tied for the lead in RBI (5) through five games. Though Williams has yet to record his first collegiate hit, his .374 career batting average at Rancho Bernardo HS (San Diego, CA) appears reason enough to believe that he’ll figure out college pitching at some point this season.

Arizona State now sits at 2-3 on their young season, and for better or worse the youthful lineup it put forth in this game will most likely be the one that it sticks with for the remainder of 2018. Only time will tell if the results live up to the expectations this team has for itself.

Bobby Kraus is a baseball beat writer for the Walter Cronkite Sports Network. You can follow him on Twitter @bobbykraus22