D3baseball.com Daily Dose

Ever wonder where your team stood in the NCAA Rankings?  Sure you can go and see if your team is near or at the top of a statistical category, but where do they rank in caparison to NCAA averages?  The following set of useless interesting numbers should answer all your questions for you.  So check out the stats below and see how your team stacks up.

Basic Team Averages
.307 Batting Average
.420 On Base Percentage
.429 Slugging Percentage
.850 On Base Percentage
5.85 ERA
1.71 WHIP

More Team Averages
38.5 Games Played
259 Runs
381 Hits
70 Doubles
10.4 Triples
20.3 Home Runs
54.2 Stolen Bases
69 Stolen Base Attempts
142.2 Walks
207.6 Strike Outs
6.9 Complete Games
4.9 Saves
2 Shutouts

Division III Wide Totals

6,817 Games
439, 898 At Bats
91,713 Runs Scored
134,875 Hits
24,790 Doubles
3,675 Triples
7,186 Home Runs
19,181 Stolen Bases
50,335 Walks
73,501 Strike Outs
2,429 Complete Games
1,728 Saves
723 Shutouts

Other Tidbits
78.5% of would be base stealers were safe
14 teams walked more times than they struck out
14 teams had a team ERA over 10
3 teams had a team ERA under 3

**Note these stats are taken from the NCAA website, I did not attend and personally score every game.  Also, some provisional D3 members may be included

A right handed pitcher for Emory Eagles in their 2007 World Series is now pitching in the regular relief stints of the Oakland Athletics’ AA Texas League Franchise Midland Rockhounds. Emory’s Jason Glushon was a 2007 free-agent signee who spent most of the 2007 season in the Arizona Rookie League before a late-season call-up to AA. The challenge for Jason was to “get his foot in the door”. D3baseball.com’s Ralph Turner caught up with Jason while the Rockhounds were in Frisco, TX for a four-game series.

His 80-82 MPH fastball was not going to take him far beyond Harvard Westlake High School in North Hollywood, CA in talent–rich southern California, so he and his parents looked back east for college. Considering Penn versus Emory, he credits his mother on landing at Emory. Under the excellent coaching of Jim Twardoski at Emory, Jason was able to develop the pitching technique of good control that kept his team close. Jason is not your prototypical pitcher, but the fundamentals that he learned at Emory, picking Coach Twardoski’s brain along the way, the Emory training schedules and demanding conditioning have served him well in the jump to AA baseball. He has succeeded to this point by not overthrowing and by throwing strikes.

The 2007 World Series was special for him. Living in southern California, he greatly appreciates what Chapman has accomplished over the last four seasons. Emory was lucky to get to Wisconsin in 2007, needing Sam Cunningham’s 2-run HR in the top of the 9th versus Ferrum, before winning in 12 in the Regional Finals. Glushon gave a wistful look when we mentioned the 2-0 opening loss to UW-Whitewater and Jordan Zimmermann. (Zimmermann is currently with the Washington Nationals AA Eastern League Harrisburg Senators.) He beamed with pride at how Emory battled back through the losers’ bracket. Glushon pitched 6 strong innings in the win over Cortland State for a 6-3 win. His “rubber arm” was also ready to go if needed for an inning or two the next day in against Kean as the finals. After all, it was for the national championship.

After getting his BBA at Emory in spring 2007 with concentrations in Business Finance, Communications and Operations Management, he boned up on his Spanish in the Arizona Rookie Leagues to talk with the young talent out of Latin America at that level. In the off-season, he worked at a sports management agency and took the LSAT. He is getting experience in all aspects of the baseball and is keeping his options open.

This season, it is back to the 6-10 hour bus rides around Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Missouri. The bus rides are what he remembers about Emory, and getting to know one’s teammates. The card games, the “Connect Four” games and general conversation are a part that Jason enjoys about baseball. Although not quite like “The Rookie” or “Bull Durham”, Jason has built friendships with his players. When asked for a favorite baseball movie, he responded “Field of Dreams”. He fondly remembers the road trip that he took with his Emory teammates, Joe Roth and Frank Pfister, as they took in 10-12 games at major league and minor league parks, plus Cooperstown and the “Field of Dreams” in Iowa.

We asked him for some imparted wisdom to his D3baseball.com friends and family. He gave three. First, learn from the people who have been down the road before. Secondly, the roads are as varied as you can imagine, high school, D-1 or D-III, but they all lead to same place. Finally, don’t accept “no” for an answer.

It’ll be very difficult for Trinity (Conn.) coach Bill Decker to top the 2008 season. After going 45-1, setting a new Division III record for consecutive wins to start a season and winning the program’s first national championship, Decker has completed what will likely be the signature season in his career.

But the season that defines Coach Decker for me is a 5-3 football campaign in 1999.

In addition to his baseball duties, Decker once coached defense under long time Trinity football head coach Don Miller. Miller led the Bantams’ football program for 32 years, won 177 games and eventually had the field co-named after him. Decker, the son of a high school football coach himself, was the quiet leader of a solid defense that complemented Miller’s ground game. But the Bantams sagged to a 2-6 record in 1998 after which Miller retired.

The 1999 roster was full of seniors who might have been lost in a transition year where a program waits for the old guard to cycle out as the new guard to moves in. To help prevent that, Decker added a little more responsibility to his plate and became the head coach for football, too.

As a student journalist, I covered the team and spoke with Decker throughout the year. Off the field he was gracious, patient and helpful to a nervous kid who had never interviewed a head football coach on radio before. On the field, he got maximum talent out of his team and rode his solid defense to a 5-3 record.

That 1999 season was Decker’s only one as the head football coach. In the Bantams’ football media guide, his name is perched between Miller and Chuck Priore, who won three NESCAC titles and ran off an impressive 30-game winning streak of his own. Only his players and a few people around the program will appreciate what Decker did in that one season.

And now that he has added a national championship to his successful coaching career, I didn’t want to miss the opportunity to talk to him about this special run. Click here to listen to the Bill Decker interview.

Our friends at the Double-A Zone have asked the question, Who chooses Division III? It’s the NCAA’s official blog, so you have to take that into consideration, but unlike many ways in which the NCAA deals with Division III (can’t get its own playoff brackets right, doesn’t know how many Pool C bids there should be), the blog has a healthy knowledge of Division III, run by former Brandeis baseball player Josh Centor.

In light of the fact that Division II has spent a fair amount of time over the past few years trying to find its identity, there’s now apparently some sort of buzz. For me, I’m not sure what “I Chose Division II” actually means, while Division I’s identity is fairly clear and Division III has staked out the student-athlete high ground as the only purely amateur division (non-scholarship) in college athletics.

However, there seems to be some discussion from commenters, not much of it well-informed, as to what Division III’s identity is. Those people need a good dose of D3sports.com readers to fill them in. (I myself have a comment that is awaiting moderator approval.)

Meanwhile, the core question: Should Division III do more to brand itself? Speaking as someone who has done most of the branding of Division III over the past decade, absolutely. I look at what Division II has done in this area over the past few years, in terms of fancy promotional spots, games on CBS College Sports and football playoffs on ESPN, a full package of streaming video broadcasts of football and basketball, and I am definitely jealous. All Division III fans should be.

Division III should be branding itself. It should not be left to people like us here at D3sports.com or Steve Clay and D3Cast or Robb Modica and D3Scoreboard.

We just wasted a bunch of time and money figuring out Division IV was not the place we really wanted to be. So let’s spruce up our house a little bit while we’re here. Let’s show the rest of college fandom that this is not just glorified intramurals. Let’s get our games out there for people to see.

Why did you choose Division III? Go tell them.

And tell us below.

The MLB amateur draft is nearly upon us. Day one will bring the first rounds (last year in the new format that was rounds 1-5) and based on the last ten years, there is a 60% chance of a D-III player being drafted in the first five rounds. Nobody knows who the first player will be and it is likely that it will be latter than next year. No player has the same buzz that UW-Stevens Point Jordan Zimmermann had last year.

Last year there were 19 players drafted - spot on the average for the last ten years. What we can guess about the first player drafted is that it would be a pitcher as 60% of all D-III players drafted are pitchers. By position pitchers are followed by outfielders (12%), and catchers (8%), leaving 20% divided among the four infield positions.

Six schools have had five or more players drafted in the last ten years. The list starts with UW-Oshkosh with nine; Montclair State, Chapman, and Cal Lutheran with seven; and Cortland State and Carthage with five each. Looking at the list of schools with drafted players, it is interesting to find that Marietta has the same number of drafted players as Mass. College (2) but possessing a National Championship trophy. Talking about schools with a Walnut and Bronze in their hardware case - only Ithaca has not had a player drafted since 1998.

I hope to post updates through the day on Thursday and Friday as players names are called and at the end of each day post a summary of the day’s activity on the front page of D3baseball.com. Look for my preview article tomorrow as D3baseball kicks off its 2008 amateur draft coverage.

A little cool this morning but the skies are blue and although there is ample sunshine, it is mostly cloudy. It is Cape Cod weather. The field is getting a touch up now so the field logos will look good on the video. The white will be very white, the blue, very blue.

Today we crown a champion. Will it be Trinity or Johns Hopkins. Yesterday the UW-Whitewater Head Coach said he was already working on the movie script but he had his team coming in against all odds and winning the Walnut and Bronze trophy everyone has started out this season competing for.

Will Trinity meet the fate of the 1954 Cleveland Indians who won 111 game but fell 0-4 to the New York Giants or will Johns Hopkins be like the Red Sox in 2004, 3 games down too the Yankees.

Trinity will have to get their bats going unless they can shut down a Johns Hopkins offense that found their stoke yesterday. Trinity has trailed in only 12 games this year and none in this tournament as the Bantams put their runs up early and made the lead stand. This is what they have done in the regional and here in Appleton.

Never give up on the Blue Jays, they know what it takes to win and believe that they have the team that can end the dream of a perfect season.

Hey its a great day for baseball and why not - lets play two.

Elimination day. Two game, two more teams headed home. Adrian is still wearing that glass slipper and has yet to spend their bullpen. They will need all they have since they have to win four more to capture the Walnut and Bronze.

UW-Whitewater has the fan support and I have not seen the same crowds for them since their loss on Friday. The Warhawks seem content of feasting on the back end of the pitching staffs and are going to let their offense lead them into the playoffs.

Johns Hopkins still is looking for their best game of the tournament. They played well against Trinity

Trinity (Conn.) and Johns Hopkins had the first rain delay of the championships this evening, and although it was a brief one, the players on each side still found ways to entertain themselves.

One of them was by tossing a ball back and forth between dugouts, playing a long distance game of tic-tac-toe.

Photos below are by Larry Radloff, D3sports.com.

The game gets started, reportedly by Trinity first baseman Kent Graham

Trinity is impressing folks here. They play late again and Trinity is the one team who has escaped without the obligatory press conference due to the late hour. Johns Hopkins has yet to play their best game and still in the winners bracket. They will need those bats when they face the Bantams tonight.

With three errors each, the Liinfield/Trinity game was not the best played defensively. Linfield did played well offensively. They had a lot of runners on base but could not get the big hit. They threatened to pull off the upset and almost did, coming up just a run short.

The game is on and Kevin Zalnis just ties a WS record with assists in an inning (3)

Got to love this. Less than 8 hours ago I left the ballpark and here I am again. The sun is out and the music is great. Adrian is getting ready and Kean is here I am sure.

It was a great baseball yesterday. The most lobsided score was 5-1 and that was close until the end. I ecpected this. The best teams in the nation with their best pitching staffs and this is usually what you see.

I have less faith that one of the teams starting today in the losers bracket can make it out winners. Kean and Cortland State have the pitching. Adrian is new to the show and they have a big hurdle today with Kean. UW-Whitewater was just flat against Linfield and it gets tougher with a draw against Cortland State. Chpman and Trinity have to be the favorites but Johns Hopkins will find their hitting stroke and Linfield is disciplined with an experienced team that could just be the team to end Trinity’s winning streak.

With less than an hour to go to first pitch - Play Ball.