Missed this back in baseball season. Also, do send along links for new hype videos if you find them.
Paul Mainieri confirmed to The Times-Pic that The Chalmation Sensation Matty Ott has agreed in principle to terms with the Red Sox and does intend to sign. The 13th round pick leaves LSU with a national championship and both the single season (16) and career (33) saves records. Mainieri also talked with Rosetta at The Advoc TigerSportsDigest after the draft a few weeks ago discussing the situation with all of the drafted players, including lingering hope that Mahtook might return and the complicated situation with the Nola brothers. Tyler Hanover and Raph Rhymes have both said they will be returning, despite being drafted.
Mikie Mahtook was one of 3 SEC players named to the Baseball America All-American team.
Tennessee has named Cal St. Fullerton's Dave Serrano their new head baseball coach. Que the Major League references.
ESPN featured a look back at Warren Morris' Home Run and got interviews from everybody, along with a way to download a copy of Hawthorne's call of the play.
There was much hash made last week about potential Tiger Stadium expansion last week, but the plans are the same things we've heard for nearly a year: more club seating, probably in the South Endzone. Realistically, I don't see the point of adding non-club seats because as I chronicled last year, Death Valley may be sold out, but is hardly ever filled.
Basketball's Garrett Green is working for the SID this summer and filled an extensive report on the team's trip to Italy.
LSU released an update on some football related happenings over the coming months. Les Miles will be all over ESPN tomorrow, June 21, and will be forced to identify famous hat-wearing people. LSU's spot at SEC Media Days is the Friday lunch period from 10:50 to 1:30pm and the 3 players being brought are Jordan Jefferson, WR Russell Shepard, LB Ryan Baker. Fan Day will be Aug. 13th and the radio show returns on Aug. 24th.
SBNation continues it's 2011 team previews, last week hitting up Ole Miss and Houston Nutt's need for a turn around. At the same time, Football Outsiders brings up '59 Ole Miss as the greatest college football team ever and then brings up Billy Cannon to balance the universe.
Speaking of rankings, the charts for NCAA 2012 are out, and although LSU is ranked 4th overall, we've got the worst offense in the top 15. So yeah, pretty accurate.
To me, ESPN ranking the 2-to-3 headed monster of a QB we will have next year as 3rd in the SEC says more about the lack of skill at the position in the conference more than it does about LSU.
Baseball America talked with the guy who runs the NCAA's bat testing lab for the CWS and he revealed one way some teams are cheating with the bats: popping off the end cap on the barrel, removing a metal ring that stiffens the barrel, and replacing the cap. The process makes the bat lighter and more pliable, giving it the same pop of last year's bats.
B1G Commish Jim Delany, when he's not being the major roadblock in dismantling the BCS or aiding in the coverup of one of the biggest scandals in his conference's history, spends his days thinking up ways to fundamentally alter sports that the B1G doesn't even rate in. His ideas for college baseball are all varying levels of pandering insanity, from going back to the old geographic regional format, to creating 2 extra seeds at the CWS reserved specifically for "cold weather teams." Luckily, no one from the NCAA is even listening to his hare-brained schemes.
The NCAA is sending it's investigative branch to South Florida for vacation this year to look into the recruiting practices of various schools that have made in-roads in the area, including LSU-Patrick Peterson. I'm not sure if anything big would come from it, other than more reasons for the NCAA to put a clamp down on the 7-on-7 travel teams which are becoming as much of a black eye for football as AAU teams have become form basketball.
A list of the top SEC OOC games next season that leaves out LSU @ WFV in favor of an innocuous AUB @ CLEM game has a fundamental misunderstanding of just how insane the Head Coaches of the two teams are going to be. Miles is a known quantity, while Holgorsen is moving quickly to become the viking warlord his mountain people demand. Which is more than you can say for an Auburn team that will have a severe championship hangover and a Clemson team who will no doubt fail to reach the lofty expectations placed on them yet again.
One day, possibly in 2014, the UNC football investigation and sentencing will conclude. Until then, we've just got more incriminating phone records and $13,000 in unpaid parking tickets.
As the lockout continues, Joe Barksdale is keeping himself in shape at home in his native Detroit.
Finally, our favorite troll from the town of Gannett, LA called Spurrier's idea to pay players "very socialist." ATVS rules thankfully prevent me from linking to it.