Baseball makes minor adjustments leading into eight-game Spring Break schedule
After starting the season 0-7 and getting swept out of Arkansas and Arizona, the Central Michigan baseball team has eight games in Florida during Spring Break to get back on track.
Head Coach Steve Jaksa said senior pitcher Sean Renzi will be moving back to the bullpen and be in the closer role to give the team a proven commodity in that role. This year he is 0-2 with an 8.31 ERA. He was 5-2 with a 2.33 ERA in 2015.
The team lost all three games in the opening-series against Arkansas and then lost all four games last weekend in Arizona to Grand Canyon, St. Mary’s twice and Tennessee.
“You learn winning and losing, you learn both ways,” Jaksa said. “We want to make sure that we’re not trying to do too much. A few of our guys (last weekend) tried to do too much. Sometimes you can get in the way of yourself."
CMU has allowed 62 runs, 73 hits and four home runs in its first seven games. Defensively, the Chippewas have 23 errors, compared to four by opposing teams.
On offense they have 18 runs, 47 hits and one home run. The team is batting .215 combined while opposing teams are batting .319.
CMU was 35-22 in 2015 and won the Mid-American Conference regular season title. Six of the 11 MAC coaches selected the Chippewas to win the MAC West in February's preseason poll.
“You have to be consistent if you’re going to be good at it,” Jaksa said. “You can’t have a lot of highs and lows. The highs and lows in baseball don’t work. You gotta be a consistent performer, a consistent thought process guy and you gotta get yourself ready to play every day.”
The team was scheduled to fly to Florida Thursday and will then spend 10 days there before traveling to Ohio to play Bowling Green in a non-MAC game and Xavier in a three-game series.
CMU baseball Spring Break schedule
Deland, Florida
1 p.m. March 4 vs. Illinois
1 p.m. March 5 vs. Villanova
3 p.m. March 6 vs. Stetson
Snowbird Baseball Classic, Port Charlotte, Florida
1 p.m. March 8 vs. Boston College
1 p.m. March 9 vs. Butler
3 p.m. March 11 vs. North Dakota State
Noon, March 12 vs. Illinois State
10 a.m. March 13 vs. St. Joseph’s
“We’re looking forward to playing all of them,” Jaksa said. “We've got eight games to play. We’re gonna go about our business and say ‘We have to play Illinois game one.’ We know who we’re facing. Then we go Villanova and Stetson so that little tournament’s gonna be a real good tournament for us.”
Senior pitcher Nick Deeg (0-2, 2.92 ERA) will start on Friday against Illinois, while Michael Brettell (0-1, 3.38 ERA) and Pat Leatherman (0-1, 15.19 ERA) will start on Saturday and Sunday, respectively.
