Softball pitching recruiting thoughts...
Posted on: July 4, 2019 at 21:45:17 CT
bluetiger_ MU
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Since Chelsea Thomas was a freshman in 2009, Mizzou softball recruited exactly 7 high school pitchers in the next 10 seasons, from 2010-2019. Thats pretty astonishing in and of itself. Even more astonishing:
1. Not a single one of those 7 high school pitchers pitched all 4 years here. Not one.
2. 6 of those 7 high school pitchers transferred out. 4 of the 6 transferred after just one season here: Erwin, Stangel, Conrad, Rice. Lowary lasted 2 years. Finucane lasted 3 years. And Baumgartner would have lasted all 4 years if she had been able to follow team rules just a little bit longer, but she couldn’t manage to do that and got kicked off the team before her senior season.
If there is any one thing Coach Anderson needs to turn around, it is that disturbing trend. You just can’t consistently have an elite program unless you regularly bring in top high school pitching talent AND keep them in your program for 4 years. And in her first real recruiting year, she has already started to turn this around, with 3 quality freshmen pitchers coming in: Schumacher, Nichols, and Weber. Weber had been a verbal commit for several years, but the first two were all Coach Anderson. If 1-2 of these kids become quality starters here that will be an excellent start.
Because of the anemic recruiting of quality high school pitchers from 2010-2019, and the lack of ability in keeping them here their entire careers, we have had to resort to the transfer market just to keep the program competitive enough to make the NCAA tournament the last 3 years. Here are the transfers we have gotten in the last 10 years:
2014: Marble
2016: Baxter
2017: Norman
2018: Daniel, Scates
2019: Gasper, Schockley, Koester
I’m counting the year they were eligible to pitch here, so not including Judge. And Marble was here in 2013, but had to sit out that year when SEMO wouldn’t give her a release. Transfers though are usually a crapshoot, and while we still need them now because of the precarious situation Coach LA inherited (hopefully Dandola will be a quality starter here in her last 2 years of eligibility, and maybe Judge too), it is building a staff with a core of talented HS pitchers who stay all 4 years that is the key to Coach Anderson’s long term success here.
Good start for 2020.