All the trend lines are sliding in the wrong direction, and there is no one answer why.
South Carolina baseball is staying afloat right now, 23-10 overall and 6-6 in SEC play heading into a pivotal three-game series at Florida starting Friday at 6:30 p.m. But the root of the struggles and cause for concern heading into another three-week gauntlet against top-10 opponents is still situational hitting, particularly with runners in scoring position.
Even in Tuesday’s 2-1 win over No. 13 North Carolina, the Gamecocks went 1-of-10 with runners in scoring position and 4-of-18 with runners on base. Even going back to last weekend’s series against No. 3 Texas A&M, South Carolina’s offense finished 7-of-43 (.163) with runners on base and 6-of-27 (.222) with runners in scoring position.
For the entire month of April, those clips are a ghastly 11-of-71 (.155) and 7-of-43 (.163) respectively.
Now matter where you drop the scopes, the numbers are gruesome and showing no signs of turning around heading towards the halfway point of conference play.
“It just changes by guys being able to relax in those moments,” Mark Kingston said. “The guys that right now are struggling statistically in those areas have historically been very good. You can start with our two big guys [Ethan Petry and Cole Messina] there that get us all going, we know who those are. Last year they were tremendous with runners in scoring position, this year hasn’t quite been the same. Baseball is funny like that, sometimes you get in a rut and it takes a little longer to get out.”
On the subject of trends, play away from Founders Park will have to pick up soon. Scraping past North Carolina in Charlotte was a good start, but the reality remains, and is cold: The Gamecocks have lost five straight SEC road series dating back to last season and are just 4-11 in those 15 games. The first two forays away from Founders Park in conference play followed very similar scripts this year.
Kingston’s squad lost a one-run game in the series opener on the road at both Ole Miss and Alabama before a close score in game two got away late with a rough eighth inning from the bullpen. A 4-3 deficit ballooned into a 12-3 loss in Oxford, and a 6-6 tie in the eighth in Tuscaloosa before a disastrous seven-run frame let a chance to win the series slip away.
Both cases ended in a series-finale salvage, but any opportunity this team has of eventually hosting a regional will require road fortunes to turn around. At least for the moment, though, there is no panic about the play away from Founders Park.
“Consistency I think is the key generally,” Kingston said. “We’re talking about what, two road trips? I don’t think you change everything you do based on two road trips. You’ve just got to be fairly consistent. You look for little things maybe along the way that might spark something, but all in all, the way we do things is the way things have been done for a long, long time.”
As good a place to start as any would be Friday, where South Carolina still has not won an SEC game yet. Part of that was due to a rainout against Vanderbilt in the lone conference series win to date, but the Gamecocks are 0-3 on SEC Fridays so far this season.
Eli Jones knows that particular burden is on him as much as anyone, and is coming off his worst start of the season. The defense did not help — a misplayed pop-up in foul territory led to three extra Texas A&M first inning runs — but Jones is coming off his worst outing of the season last Friday against the Aggies.
Like everyone else, he understands the causes for concern. And like everyone else, there is no panic yet.
“I kind of felt a little off,” Jones said. “I’ve watched a lot of video and talked a lot with Coach [Matt] Williams, but at the end of the day it’s the game of baseball, right? It’s really hard to go out there week after week and try to be lights out every outing. It’s one of those things where it’s like, put it behind me, learn from it and do better this week.”
Nobody is sounding alarms, but the search for that long-awaited consistency presses on.
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