(Photo: Sammy Nute/WCSN)
TUCSON — In the bottom of the fifth inning, Arizona State baseball found themselves staring at an eight-to-three deficit against the Arizona Wildcats. With the bases loaded and just one out, ASU’s rivals were close to putting the game out of reach. That was when Arizona’s sophomore Brendan Summerhill came up to bat. Summerhill reached on a fielder’s choice, allowing Arizona’s sophomore Adonys Guzman to score.
At least, that was the initial call. The play went under review to ensure that there wasn’t obstruction at second base. If the call was reversed, the frame would end on a double play. The duration of the review was approximately four minutes long, but for the 4,000+ Arizona fans in attendance, it likely seemed much longer. Finally, after a closer look, the ruling on the field stood as called, sparking a passionate response not just from the crowd but from ASU head coach Willie Bloomquist as well.
After the ruling was confirmed, Bloomquist approached the umpires with visible frustration. From his gestures and his facial expressions, Bloomquist was clearly enraged with the call itself, not helped by the four minute wait time and resulting in the umpires ejecting Bloomquist from the game entirely.
However, what caused the fiery reaction was more complicated. Bloomquist wasn’t upset with the umpires at the call, but at the lack of a justification from the umpires. What Bloomquist specifically challenged was whether or not there was a clean slide at second base, and he simply wanted to know what the umpires saw.
“I did need a five-second explanation on what he actually looked at and reviewed,” Bloomquist said. “If he told me, ‘yes I reviewed the slide and that was a clean slide’, I would have walked off the field.”
Bloomquist’s heated exchange with the umpires was an unforgettable moment in a very forgettable game for ASU. By and large, how the Sun Devils performed on Sunday evening was far from ideal from their perspective. The Sun Devils were unable to secure the weekend series sweep against their rivals and Arizona embarrassed them by a score of 14-3.
Headed into Sunday night’s game, an alarming pattern became apparent for the ASU offense; missed opportunities. Games dictated by a lack of offensive execution had begun to increase in recent weeks.
That was no different tonight. While the Sun Devils hit a respectable batting average of 11-37 (.297) tonight, they hit a mere three-for-15 (.200) when runners were in scoring position.
“We’ve got to do a better job with guys in scoring position,” Bloomquist said. “We’ve just got to do a better job in situational hitting.”
While the pitching has been more consistent than the batting for ASU, that area was not blameless today. In the first two games of the weekend series, the Sun Devils only trotted out four pitchers. On Sunday night, that number was six. Going forward, a priority for ASU is finding out who starts on Sundays.
“We don’t got a whole lot of length on that Sunday start,” Bloomquist said. “It just goes back to the key of getting a good start from our guys, and getting some length really allows everything else to fall into place.”
Sunday night was the first Sunday that redshirt sophomore Tyler Meyer, who has struggled in his return from shoulder surgery, didn’t start. He will, however, be starting on Tuesday night against Utah Valley. For ASU, the hope is that Meyer ignites a spark not just by keeping the runs allowed to a minimum, but giving the offense more breathing room as well.
“We’ve got to get back home and evaluate who’s healthy and who’s ready to go this week,” Bloomquist said. “If he can get back to his form that he’s capable of and we’ve all seen (Meyer) do, hopefully he can get back to that and start easing back into where he’s a big piece on the weekend for us.”
