(Photo: Sammy Nute/WCSN)
PHOENIX — Arizona State is one of, if not the most historic programs in college baseball, but the team has looked like a shell of itself this season.
Then-ASU athletic director Ray Anderson brought head coach Willie Bloomquist in to restore that history. A former player who bleeds maroon and gold and knows what it takes to get to Omaha. The Sun Devils (7-9, 1-2 Pac-12) hired the 1999 Pac-10 Player of the Year to change the culture, but right now that culture is being challenged after a 6-4 loss to New Mexico (11-6, 3-0 Mountain West).
The players need to play better. That’s obvious. But Bloomquist is the only person in that clubhouse that knows how to win in the Maroon and Gold. ASU has a losing record approaching the middle of March, and the manager knows he needs to be the one to get his squad out of the rut at this juncture.
“That’s an embarrassing performance on our part,” Bloomquist said. “Just guys not sticking to what we preach and what our offensive mindset should be. We’re representing very poorly this program, and to me, that falls on my shoulders. We just discussed it now, and that’s something that I’ve got to do a better job (of).”
Bloomquist would love for any of his players to step up because hearing the message from a peer is more effective, but that is not where the team is at this point. The skipper loves his players, even joking that he would allow most of them to date his daughter, but this group does not have that edge needed at this point.
“You have to have a little bit of that friction in the clubhouse for you to be any good, in my opinion,” Bloomquist said. “Right now, we have a bunch of guys that are phenomenal kids that I think are a little bit tentative to do that with each other and I’m trying to encourage ‘it’s okay.’ Doesn’t mean you don’t like the guy. It means you care about the program enough to hold someone accountable. When we start getting that, I think the tides will turn very quickly. But if we don’t, as I told them, we’re gonna be vanilla tapioca pudding. That’s not good enough around here.”
Tuesday’s performance certainly was not good enough. ASU scored three runs in the first inning, but none of them came from hits as the first run scored via freshman designated hitter Brandon Compton hitting the ball at UNM first baseman Reed Spenrath with the bases loaded and no outs. The other two runs came from UNM starting pitcher Andrew Neil throwing two wild pitches with runners on third base.
Sophomore outfielder Kien Vu was in a similar situation as Compton in the eighth inning with the bases juiced and no outs, and yet the same result occurred, scoring the fourth and final run of the game. The Sun Devils had opportunities with eight walks, but they could not cash in as they left 10 runners on base
Bloomquist mentioned before that there would be an emphasis on being aggressive, but he has not enforced that as much as he would like.
“In today’s world, we can’t run them after the game,” Bloomquist said. “Otherwise, they would probably be running right now. We have to do a better job of emphasizing that (being aggressive) in practice. That’s where I take my responsibility. I guess I’m not being tough enough on them in practice.”
There was a focus in the postgame press conference about today’s landscape of college baseball. It is eerily similar to the sentiment that today’s ASU players are not cut from the same cloth as some of those that played in the past.
Baseball is a grind with playing almost every day, but that appears to be difficult for some of the players nowadays.
“Midweek games are always tricky because of the intensity usually of the weekend series and then having to come back and tee it up against a midweek opponent,” Bloomquist said. “That’s always the trap games. (Arizona) coming up this weekend. I’m not saying we were overlooking, but we’ve tried to adjust everything we can in our practice schedule so these guys are focused for midweek games. Last year, we took Mondays off. We’ve got to take a day off every week in today’s generation.”
If there is something that can turn the momentum around, it’s a rivalry game. Bloomquist mentioned that the environment in Tucson is “intense” and “hostile,” so this road trip might be the boost the team needs to galvanize the troops in an environment that is them versus everybody.
There is also the added motivation that the selection committee picked Arizona over ASU for the NCAA Tournament last season. The Sun Devils lost a couple midweek games last year that they should have won — this New Mexico loss could also come back to bite them — but they still feel snubbed and it creates a certain mindset for the upcoming weekend series.
“I would say that hasn’t been forgotten,” Bloomquist said.
