3 Hogs named to All SEC Team

[jbell96]

http://www.secsports.com/article/19437619/2017-sec-baseball-awards-announced

Grant Koch: 1st team Catcher
Jax Biggers: 2nd team SS
Dominic Fletcher: All Freshman Team

Other awards of Note
Brent Rooker from Miss State was SEC POY
Nick Mingione from Kentucky was COY
Braden Schumake from A&M was SEC Freshman of the year

[A_R_K_A_N_S_A_S]

Congratulations to the three Hogs that made it.

Coach of the year probably came down to Mingione and DVH.

[dotnet]

http://www.secsports.com/article/19437619/2017-sec-baseball-awards-announced

Grant Koch: 1st team Catcher
Jax Biggers: 2nd team SS
Dominic Fletcher: All Freshman Team

Other awards of Note
Brent Rooker from Miss State was SEC POY
Nick Mingione from Kentucky was COY
Braden Schumake from A&M was SEC Freshman of the year

Those are all fair and hard to argue with.  I would, personally, take bonfield over the alabama OFs for second team... but whatever. 

Its pretty nice if you're returning the sort of odds on favorite for 1st team Catcher and Shortstop. 

Though I think Schumake will play short next year, and he'll probably be the preseason award winner.

[10yrsofhell]

I was pulling for Biggers to make 1st team shortstop. Gridley has comparable numbers but he batted in front of all world Brent Rooker, Biggers batted 9th most of the year.

Hitting
                                      AVG  GP-GS    AB   R   H   2B  3B  HR RBI   TB  SLG%  BB HBP  SO GDP   OB%  SF  SH  SB-ATT
Jax Biggers, AR............   .335  53-52   176  41  59  12   1   4    27   85   .483    24   3     27   1     .420   2     4     3-4   
Ryan Gridley, MS...........  .326  56-56   224  42  73  12   1   6    38  105  .469    16  11    31   4     .389   6     1     7-15 

Fielding
                                         C    PO   A    E    FLD%  DPs  SBA CSB   SBA%   PB  CI
Jax Biggers, AR............    209   68 135    6   .971     31     0     0    ---           0    0   
Ryan Gridley, MS...........   240   81 150   9   .963     28     0     0    ---            0    0                                 

[ucahogfan]

I was pulling for Biggers to make 1st team shortstop. Gridley has comparable numbers but he batted in front of all world Brent Rooker, Biggers batted 9th most of the year.

Hitting
                                      AVG  GP-GS    AB   R   H   2B  3B  HR RBI   TB  SLG%  BB HBP  SO GDP   OB%  SF  SH  SB-ATT
Jax Biggers, AR............   .335  53-52   176  41  59  12   1   4    27   85   .483    24   3     27   1     .420   2     4     3-4   
Ryan Gridley, MS...........  .326  56-56   224  42  73  12   1   6    38  105  .469    16  11    31   4     .389   6     1     7-15 

Fielding
                                         C    PO   A    E    FLD%  DPs  SBA CSB   SBA%   PB  CI
Jax Biggers, AR............    209   68 135    6   .971     31     0     0    ---           0    0   
Ryan Gridley, MS...........   240   81 150   9   .963     28     0     0    ---            0    0                                 

Looking at those numbers, it should be pretty clear that Biggers should have been 1st team SS.  Biggers leads in BA, SLG, OBP, and OPS which show he is a better hitter.  RBIs are primarily a function of those who get on in front of you.  He is also a better base runner being successful on 75% of SBAs (albeit in 4 attempts) while Gridley was thrown out more than he was successful.

I would also have to imagine that Biggers made a bigger impact defensively although he wasn't on the All-Defensive team.  The scary thing is that Biggers almost didn't make the All-SEC teams at all as he was tied in votes with Kramer Robertson at LSU although he has very similar metrics to both Gridley and Biggers.

[ucahogfan]

Those are all fair and hard to argue with.  I would, personally, take bonfield over the alabama OFs for second team... but whatever. 

Its pretty nice if you're returning the sort of odds on favorite for 1st team Catcher and Shortstop. 

Though I think Schumake will play short next year, and he'll probably be the preseason award winner.

I would also argue that Spanberger should have been 2nd team UTL/DH over Schwarz.  Heck, you could even argue 1st team at the same position over Michael Curry at Georgia.  He has more HRs and RBIs than either of them and had a similar BA.  Heck, he had more HRs in SEC play alone that either one of them have hit this year total.  If Spanberger hit HRs in non-con like he did against the elite pitching of the SEC, he would have over 20 this year, but he started extremely slow which hurt him big time.  He might have lead the conference in RBIs during SEC play only even only playing 29 games.

[dotnet]

Wow.  i was wrong.  here are the conference only stats:

Gridley:  295/370/434  939 fld%  0-3 SB

Biggers:  340/405/474  959 fld%  1-2 SB


That is pathetic.

[ucahogfan]

These awards speak very well of our team next year as all three will be back and play premium up the middle positions (C, SS, and CF) which is huge.  This is a big deal for all three of these players.

I also think DVH got snubbed as SEC Coach of the Year, but can understand why Mingione won as I talked about in another thread with it being his first year.

[ucahogfan]

Wow.  i was wrong.  here are the conference only stats:

Gridley:  295/370/434  939 fld%  0-3 SB

Biggers:  340/405/474  959 fld%  1-2 SB


That is pathetic.

It feels like some of these awards were lifetime achievement awards as well such as for JJ Schwarz who dominated as a freshman, but was only good this year as a junior.  Heck, there was a point this year where it was up in the air he would even be drafted after being viewed as a potential top 5 pick after his first season.

[dotnet]

I would also argue that Spanberger should have been 2nd team UTL/DH over Schwarz.  Heck, you could even argue 1st team at the same position over Michael Curry at Georgia.  He has more HRs and RBIs than either of them and had a similar BA.  Heck, he had more HRs in SEC play alone that either one of them have hit this year total.  If Spanberger hit HRs in non-con like he did against the elite pitching of the SEC, he would have over 20 this year, but he started extremely slow which hurt him big time.  He might have lead the conference in RBIs during SEC play only even only playing 29 games.

I'm okay with Schwarz because the numbers were similar and catching is a huge benefit. 

Curry is the crazy one.  Just compare the 950 SEC OPS for Spanberger to the 783 in conference. 

Curry wasn't close to the best hitter on his team in SEC play.   Maybe they felt bad for georgia since Spanberger had more SEC home runs than the top three georgia home run hitters combined.

[ucahogfan]

I'm okay with Schwarz because the numbers were similar and catching is a huge benefit. 

Curry is the crazy one.  Just compare the 950 SEC OPS for Spanberger to the 783 in conference. 

Curry wasn't close to the best hitter on his team in SEC play.   Maybe they felt bad for georgia since Spanberger had more SEC home runs than the top three georgia home run hitters combined.

Schwarz isn't a full time C with Mike Rivera on the team who is much better defensively.  Spanberger and Bonfield have to be the two biggest snubs on the team with Spanberger as the most obvious snub.  Someone needs to answer why one of the best hitters against conference opponents is no where to be found on the All Conference team.  They are putting a ton of value racking up big time stats against scrubs instead of the performance they showed against SEC teams.

[dotnet]

The problem with Spanberger though, is a lot of the coaches just look at the stats and the season total stats are the easiest to see on the internet.  And I don't think it is fully appreciated how bad Spanberger's season looked right before conference play started. 

At one point I remember looking and i think he had three more total bases than strike outs.  That is nuts. His Slugging percentage was worse than every regular on the team except for Cole (who was hitting about 170 then too).  He was the prime example of his hit tool was so awful that his power never showed up in games.

[ucahogfan]

The problem with Spanberger though, is a lot of the coaches just look at the stats and the season total stats are the easiest to see on the internet.  And I don't think it is fully appreciated how bad Spanberger's season looked right before conference play started. 

At one point I remember looking and i think he had three more total bases than strike outs.  That is nuts. His Slugging percentage was worse than every regular on the team except for Cole (who was hitting about 170 then too).  He was the prime example of his hit tool was so awful that his power never showed up in games.

His season total stats look every bit as good as either Curry or Schwarz which is incredible when you consider just how bad it was before SEC play.

[A_R_K_A_N_S_A_S]

Schwarz isn't a full time C with Mike Rivera on the team who is much better defensively.  Spanberger and Bonfield have to be the two biggest snubs on the team with Spanberger as the most obvious snub.  Someone needs to answer why one of the best hitters against conference opponents is no where to be found on the All Conference team.  They are putting a ton of value racking up big time stats against scrubs instead of the performance they showed against SEC teams.

Since it is the "All SEC Team" you would think they would put more emphasis on SEC play.

[Hogs49ers]

I was pulling for Biggers to make 1st team shortstop. Gridley has comparable numbers but he batted in front of all world Brent Rooker, Biggers batted 9th most of the year.

Hitting
                                      AVG  GP-GS    AB   R   H   2B  3B  HR RBI   TB  SLG%  BB HBP  SO GDP   OB%  SF  SH  SB-ATT
Jax Biggers, AR............   .335  53-52   176  41  59  12   1   4    27   85   .483    24   3     27   1     .420   2     4     3-4   
Ryan Gridley, MS...........  .326  56-56   224  42  73  12   1   6    38  105  .469    16  11    31   4     .389   6     1     7-15 

Fielding
                                         C    PO   A    E    FLD%  DPs  SBA CSB   SBA%   PB  CI
Jax Biggers, AR............    209   68 135    6   .971     31     0     0    ---           0    0   
Ryan Gridley, MS...........   240   81 150   9   .963     28     0     0    ---            0    0                                 

The stat that is the biggest eye opener to me is that Gridley has 48 more at bats than Biggers, which brings up the question - had Biggers been in the 1 or 2 hole, would he have had 40+ more ABs? 

If so, I find it hard to argue putting Biggers in the 9 hole whether it provides a spark at the back of the line up or not.  If you can put him in the 2 spot and move CSpan to the 3 spot and shift everyone else down, I would like to think we would had scored more runs on the year based on getting Biggers more opportunities and more at bats.  Thoughts?  It would be interesting to know just how many more ABs he would had have at the 2 spot vs the 9 spot, but I would have to assume that it would be at least 30.