Might have to apologize to Sunny

[autigeremt 7,131]

You would be surprised at the number of calls the university gets from parents about their young adults and their grades. Our society is in trouble.

[AUcivE09 582]

It seems to me like we got rid of a "Chizick" type coach and brought in a "Saban" type coach and it has ruffled the feathers of a few people - on and off the team. To some extent I am fine with that simply because baseball is a VERY mental game and a team needs to be run with almost a military style effort. I do believe that CSG is one of the bigger hard @$$e$ around, but the guy obviously knows how to win. I blame the team as much as anyone for this past season. His worst season at Oklahoma wasnt near as bad as this past season.

[TigerEye24 0]

Last season is a testament to how poor the players attitudes had become under Palowski. I loved Palowski just like Chizik, but hey the alternative in football has been better.

[AU64 10,122]

Well....after 9 games in Omaha a player finally hit a home run...which won the game for Texas last night. First HR for the CWS. One other player hit the top of the wall in the same left field corner but other than that, don't think a ball has hit the outfield walls in the "power alleys" on the fly and some pretty big guys are hitting those 90+ mph fast balls.

What it appears is that as the CWS process winnows down from 64 to 1, the stadiums get larger and the power hitting teams (by today's standards) can't hit the ball past the warning tracks. And as Sunny predicted early-on.....3 runs should/would be enough to win most games. In the CWS to date, only one team has scored more than 3 runs and lost their game.....whereas 3 or fewer runs were scored by the winning team in 6 of the nine games played this year.

Analysis...Sunny is probably correct in his plan to win at Omaha though perhaps his approach was/is not the best way to win in the SEC with more hitter-friendly parks and where teams with the most power hitting (and pitching) had the best success.

For certain we did not have the pitching (or defense) needed even make the SEC tourney, much less advance beyond that. IMO, can't blame all that on Sunny. But he's signing players and recruiting for next season and has a chance to turn those liabilities around.

[Tigerbelle 5,299]

Sorry Belle but I don't owe JP anything because he had five years to develop a team philosophy and recruit players to make it work, etc. and we got to where we got when he was finally dismissed. Generally, his players were no better after 3 years at AU than when they arrived.

Sunny inherited the team he had this year and got their faults with them.

As for the "available talent" comment....I'm hoping that Sunny (or his successor) will find a way to actually teach our players the correct way to play the game...and overcome the lack of coaching they apparently got in high school. Like you, I'm not a small ball person and with the upcoming change in the baseball next season, I think....hope...pray...that the small ball stuff will be abandoned at AU.

CJP did recruit well. The main problem is the same one CSG will face. These great players most often take the money and run to MLB, especially during a recession when a baseball scholarship is not enough to pay for college. The bat changes also came at a time when AU did not have small ball players, and it was a tough adjustment.

The "bad attitude" that I keep hearing about is being blamed on CJP but it was actually caused by the new coach. CSG gave up on the team early in the season and did very little to help them win after a while. At least CJP never did that. CJP kept working at it...changing the batting order...doing anything he could to shake things up and getting the bats going again. At least the players knew he hadn't given up on them.

There are serious problems with this coach. I also have had access to some information during the season that is very reliable, and what tinman said is true. I chose not to share it here because I felt so bad for the kids on the team. But some of it is beginning to leak out anyway so I will discuss what has already become public knowledge. The bad attitude was not caused by a coach trying to instill discipline in a spoiled team. It was actually quite the opposite, and it showed in CSG's interviews and his own attitude about AU and the kids he was supposed to be coaching. He did not earn their respect or their trust because he did not deserve it. He made serious errors with this team right off the bat, and he has done things that caused the parents to have to get involved. This was not a case of helicopter parents and whining,entitled kids. The bad attitude came from the coach towards the kids. This talk about the team losing because they were spoiled needs to stop because that's not what actually happened.

CSG was a divisive,controversial figure at OK, and he is bringing the same problems to AU. He may have success on the field at AU but it will quite possibly come at a high price. He's a ticking time bomb. As I said before....he makes me very uneasy. I don't care about his win/loss record if he cannot represent Auburn well and control himself. So far, he has not exactly been a coach to be proud of...and he is making everyone argue about him.

I think the new hire will have to become a buffer between CSG and everyone else. I wouldn't take that job in a million years.

[autigeremt 7,131]

Well, if that's the case he will be gone at the end of next season.

BTW, I also spent time with parents two years ago and they were complaining about things with CJP. I hated to hear it, because I know John, but when 6-8 parents are telling you the same thing it's hard not to get suspicious. Then this happened, and I began to wonder if it's the parents. I think AU Baseball is in a funk and it needs to turn around or this funk will become an annual thing for years to come. If not for 2010 we'd be looking at an annual thing of late.

[Wareagletd 0]

Winning fixes everything.

[Tigerbelle 5,299]

I will just say this. The parents had legitimate reasons to be concerned .... they do not like the replacement, and the situation is now much worse than what it was previously with CJP. This whole thing has been mishandled.

[AU_Tiger_88 417]

I will just say this. The parents had legitimate reasons to be concerned .... they do not like the replacement, and the situation is now much worse than what it was previously with CJP. This whole thing has been mishandled.

There are two sides to every story and the truth lives somewhere in the middle. So unless there are specifics of what occurred I will not condemn either side but it should get fixed before next year. Also, either side has the choice to walk away if is so bad for either side.

[doc4aday 1,887]

I think things will get better and will be seen on the field next year. Give the man a chance. He will recruit players that he feels can win in his system. Every coach does this. I really think next season will be much better and things that happened this season will be less next season and so on. He has won at other schools, but not overnight. I think by 2016, we will be playing in the regionals and possibly beyond. If the problem gets worse next season, then let's deal with it then not now.