Diamond Notes: Despite late season struggles Aggies could make a run

Click on the play button above for my interview with former Texas A&M player John Scheschuk from the Monday edition of TexAgs Radio and continue watching our segment with Justin Seely plus reactions from the Aggies after Monday's NCAA field was announced.

A little Memorial Day Monday afternoon post-season scatter-shooting from my back-studio office…

• The Aggies are back in the Field of 64 for the 11th straight year. A&M was squarely on the bubble for the NCAA Tournament after closing the season with a 2-8 record and with so many surprise conference tournament champions. That shrunk the bubble so much that D1Baseball.com projected that the Aggies were going to be left out of the NCAAs.

But when the bracket was unveiled, the Aggies received about as advantageous of a draw as they could possibly have hoped. A&M is making the short drive down to Houston to play in the Regional hosted by the UH Cougars. The Ags are the #3 seed in the Bayou City and will take on Baylor in a #2 vs. #3 game Friday at 2:00. Iowa is the Big Ten champion and received a #4 seed in Houston. We’ll dive much deeper into the opponents as the week rolls along, and David Sandhop will have a preview coming out as we inch closer to first pitch on Friday. But just looking at first glance, you could make the case that A&M has an easier path to a super regional than several hosts, including #6 overall seed TCU. The Horned Frogs get #2 seeded Virginia, who most thought played well enough to be a host, and DBU as the #3 after a 40-win season. To think that after the poor close to the season, an A&M team in a rebuilding year gets to make the shortest drive possible to play in a very winnable regional is a tremendous situation and one filled with an opportunity to make some serious noise this weekend.

• The Houston Regional is very deep, with Big Ten Tournament winner Iowa getting a #4 seed, a slot usually reserved for a mid-major team that won its conference tournament. Though in baseball, an argument could be made that many southern mid-major leagues are better top to bottom than the Big Ten. Even still, the Hawkeyes are red hot right now and have a talented roster that is capable of making noise this weekend.

• Baylor is a solid #2 that a lot of people thought could play its way into the hosting discussion with a strong close to the season, thought that was before an 0-2 mark in the Big 12 Tournament in which they were outscored 15-2. The Bears built on their strong showing in the Shriners College Classic in Houston - including a walkoff win over the Aggies in grand (slam) fashion - and became one of the surprise teams in college baseball in ’17. They feature very good arms and a pesky lineup that is hard to put away.

• That brings us to the host team, the Houston Cougars. It’s been a wild season for UH, who enters Regional action at 40-19 and boasts an RPI of 17. The Cougars defeated Wake Forest - a Regional host team - twice on opening weekend and also have series wins over UConn and UC-Irvine. But UH lost series vs. UCF, South Florida and Rice and got swept in two games against Sam Houston State. Around April 1, it looked like UH was a surefire NCAA Tournament host team, but they sputtered throughout the month while dealing with several off-the-field incidents that led to a suspension, reinstatement and eventual dismissal of talented left-hander and possible first round MLB Draft pick Seth Romero. But once Romero, who had 85 strikeouts in 48.2 innings of work as a junior, was kicked off the team on May 10, the Cougars started playing much better ball again. UH rattled off 10 wins in its last 12 games and rolled through the American Athletic Conference Tournament to re-claim one of the 16 host spots. While the pitching has been solid - though unspectacular - in the absence of Romero, it’s the hitting that has carried the team in May. Houston is averaging 7.3 runs per game during that span and features a red hot lineup heading into its home Regional.

• As for A&M, this is a very dangerous team for Baylor or Houston or anyone to see in June. That’s primarily due to a stable of arms that can put away opposing hitters when they’re on. The key to a run in this Regional, as I’ve said the last several weeks, is Brigham Hill. The A&M junior must pitch like an ace. If he does that and goes out and wins game one, likely against Baylor ace and the suddenly volatile Nick Lewis, it sets the Aggies up quite well with Corbin Martin taking the ball in a winner’s bracket game, likely against the Cougars, with a chance to take a stranglehold on the Regional. But if Hill struggles and A&M drops the first game, Martin then gets the ball in a loser’s bracket game with the season on the line. That makes me nervous.

• It’ll be very interesting to see who Baylor starts in game one vs. A&M. The obvious choice prior to the last couple of weeks was Lewis, but he has been awful in his last two starts. The senior right-hander allowed nine earned runs in two innings two weeks ago at home against Kansas State … a 21-13 football game that Baylor won to open that series. He followed that up by giving up seven earned runs in one inning of work against West Virginia last week in game one of the Big 12 Tournament. The back-to-back poor outings have caused his ERA to balloon to 6.10 on the season. With Lewis limping into NCAA Tournament play, Steve Rodriguez could turn to Montana Parsons. The junior right-hander is 5-3 with a 2.81 ERA on the season and has typically been the Bears’ game two starter. Freshman lefty Cody Bradford is also an option, but he has hit a first-year wall of late and is 5-5 with a 4.91 ERA in 14 starts.

• It’s great to see the Aggies continue its streak of NCAA Tournament appearances - now at 11 consecutive seasons - but not for the sake of extending the streak. More so for this young core group of players to get a taste of the NCAA Tournament this year so that it’s not new to them if/when they make it back in 2018 with a roster capable of making a very deep run in June. You can’t manufacture experience, and whatever the 2017 Aggies are able to do this season will help lay the foundation to get back there and make even more noise next year. But while they’re here, they might as well stick around for a while. And Coastal Carolina will tell you that any team can ride the magic carpet as long as they play their best baseball at the right time. The time for A&M’s best baseball is this Friday at 2:00 in a battle of former longtime conference foes the Baylor Bears.

• Eight SEC teams received bids to the Tournament. Florida and LSU got national seeds. Arkansas and Kentucky got hosting bids. After that, Vanderbilt and Mississippi State received #2 seeds and A&M and Auburn got #3 seeds. According to the NCAA Tournament selection committee, A&M and Auburn were among the last four teams into the Field of 64. South Carolina was among the group of four in the "First Four Out" category.

• A look at the hosts and national seeds…

Top 8 National Seeds:
1. Oregon State
2. North Carolina
3. Florida
4. LSU
5. Texas Tech
6. TCU
7. Louisville
8. Stanford

Other Regional Hosts:
* Clemson (paired with Oregon State)
* Houston (paired with North Carolina)
* Wake Forest (paired with Florida)
* Southern Miss (paired with LSU)
* Florida State (paired with Texas Tech)
* Arkansas (paired with TCU)
* Kentucky (paired with Louisville)
* Long Beach State (paired with Stanford)

• Who are you picking to be the eight teams that make it to Omaha? Not picking with my heart but with my head, here are my CWS picks: Oregon State, North Carolina, South Florida, LSU, Arizona, Arkansas, Louisville, Stanford.