STARKVILLE — Mississippi State University baseball coach John Cohen is usually coy about his starting pitching situation when given the chance.
This consistent behavior is what makes his definitive answer Saturday even more surprising when asked if his ace right-hander Chris Stratton would pitch in the Southeastern Conference Tournament opener.
“Chris Stratton will not pitch in the game Tuesday,” Cohen said.
“There’s no chance of that happening.”
Cohen and the MSU staff are not interested in risking Stratton’s overall health and future problem associated with pitching a 20-year-old on short rest especially after asking him to take the mound one day earlier in the regular season finale against Kentucky.
A Thursday night start after a Friday outing is something MSU (34-21, 16-14 in SEC play) has been uncomfortable asking Stratton to do three times already this season.
“We’re not going to ask Chris to get out of that 6-7 day window of rest on our club,” MSU pitching coach Butch Thompson said. “We think that he’ll be asked to do that soon enough for another organization.”
Stratton (10-1), who became the SEC’s first 10-game winner in his ninth quality start of the 2012 season against the University of Kentucky, leads the SEC in wins, strikeouts and earned run average coming into postseason play.
Stratton is one of 35 semifinalists for the 2012 Dick Howser Trophy, the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association announced last week.
In what likely was his final start and appearance at Dudy Noble Field, the junior right-hander turned in another near perfect performance and left to a standing ovation Thursday night after he helped lead the Bulldogs to a 3-1 victory against No. 4 Kentucky. Stratton, a junior, will be eligible for the 2012 Major League Baseball First-Year Player Draft in June, and is expected to be selected in the middle of the first round.
Stratton now has 267 strikeouts, which is sixth all-time at MSU. He has recorded a strikeout in 79 of the 97 innings he has pitched this season, and 39 of those frames have been three up, three down. In the last 38 1/3 innings in the past six games, Stratton has only allowed four runs and has struck out 37. He has walked only three.
“I will be ready to pitch when my team calls me,” Stratton said. “If it’s that Wedesday game then so be it or if it’s on full rest on Thursday that’s fine too. I will be ready and the coaching staff’s job is to tell me when I’ll pitch.”
Arkansas head coach Dave Van Horn, whose Razorbacks draw MSU today in the second game of the SEC Tournament, fully admitted to being fortunate to have missed Stratton’s turn in their game today.
“I think the major difference of a Mississippi State since we played them last is that Stratton has been flat out unhitable in all of his starts down the stretch,” Van Horn said.
The Razorbacks will be pitching their best arm today as Van Horn and his staff sat sophomore left-hander Ryne Stanek. Stanek earned the call from Van Horn despite starting last Friday night at Tennessee.
The southpaw didn’t last long, leaving the game after being hit in the shoulder by a line drive in the first inning for precautionary reasons.
In a scheduling quirk for the 10-team format, if the University of Mississippi defeats Kentucky and MSU can knock off the 6-seed University of Arkansas then the Bulldogs will get a bye out of the Wednesday session. This potential rest would all but guarantees Stratton will take the mound for a Thursday contest.
“I’m not against Chris pitching that Wednesday game if we need him to do that but here’s the deal — he’s got to look me dead in the eye and tell me he really wants to do that,” Cohen said.
Clearly some of Cohen’s colleagues in the SEC do not share the same line of thinking as the opening game of the tournament will feature the University of Mississippi throwing sophomore star pitcher Bobby Wahl against Kentucky at 9:30 a.m. this morning.
It’s a strategy that Rebels coach Mike Bianco has been known for with other ace pitchers such as 2010 first round selection Drew Pomeranz defeating the eventual national champion in the University of South Carolina in the first round game two years ago.
“In the case of Bobby we asked him on the bus ride back from Vanderbilt on Saturday how he felt and he told us that he felt like it was a normal week and he was ready to go (Tuesday),” Bianco said.
“When your ace says he’s ready to go and you as a manager don’t run him out there then you’re doing a disservice to your team.”
Bianco feared during Monday’s SEC Tournament teleconference the perception of short rest, meaning less than six days in between starts
for a college pitcher, was being highly misunderstood.
“One of the things that bothers me is the longer you wait to throw
your ace in the SEC Tournament means the longer he’ll have to wait to
throw in next week’s NCAA Tournament,” Bianco said. “We’ve had an issue where guys have 10 days off before starts and that may be more of a problem.”
As a power arm, Stratton’s 93-94 mile-per-hour fastball could take a dip as would the movement on some of his pitches with shorter rest but the 6-foot-4 prospect out of Tupelo shook his head and laughed when asked about fears of pitching on shorter rest.
“It’s not something I think about because whenever I’m called then I feel like I need to figure out a way to get people out for nine innings,” Stratton said. “My schedule and work have been fine and the funny thing is I could have above average stuff on full rest too. Either way, I’ve got to figure it out on that mound — that’s my job.”
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