GLENN GUILBEAU, Tiger Rag Editor
In this age of the short-sighted NCAA Transfer Portal, one would think pinch hitting would be a lost art. Because the best non-starters would be gone, about to get in the portal, or in the on-deck circle next to it.
But not this LSU baseball team. It is one that Manny Mota would love.
Mota retired from the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1982 as the greatest pinch-hitter in Major League Baseball history with a record 149 pinch-hits and the highest career pinch-hitting average at the time of .299 with 115 RBIs. The record 149 pinch-hits stood for two decades.
LSU’s team pinch-hitting average on the season is an uncanny .291 (30 for 103) entering NCAA postseason play this weekend.
LSU TO PLAY ARKANSAS-LITTLE ROCK AT 2 P.M. FRIDAY ON THE SEC NETWORK
The No. 6 national seed Tigers (43-14) open one of 16 NCAA Regionals across the country at 2 p.m. Friday in Alex Box Stadium on the SEC Network against Arkansas-Little Rock (24-32), which won the Ohio Valley Conference Tournament championship to qualify.
The winner will play on Saturday at a time to be determined against the winner of Friday’s 6:30 p.m. game between Dallas Baptist (40-16) and Rhode Island (38-20) at 6:30 p.m. Friday. The Regional winner advances to the best-of-three Super Regional the following weekend with the winner reaching the College World Series in Omaha, Nebraska. If LSU advances, it will host the Super round.
LSU, which is blessed with an extremely deep and versatile team, is the only SEC member to pinch-hit 100 or more times this season. The next closest was South Carolina with 65 pinch-hitting at-bats, but only 14 hits for a .215 average. Arkansas is the best pinch-hitting team in the SEC at .500, but that is through only 22 at-bats.
Of the national record 13 SEC teams that reached the NCAA postseason, Arkansas’ pinch-hitting is at .500 (11-for-22), followed by Mississippi State at .393 (22-for-56), Tennessee at .314 (17-for-54), LSU at .291 (30-for-103), Florida at .273 (6-for-22), Georgia at .265 (13-for-49), Ole Miss at .250 (12-for-48), Auburn at .222 (4-for-18), Alabama at .217 (5-for-23), Kentucky at .188 (6-for-32), Oklahoma at .104 (5-for-48), Vanderbilt at .194 (6-for-31), and Texas at .097 (3-for-31).
So, a lack of pinch-hitting did not hurt the top two seeds of the NCAA postseason – Vanderbilt and Texas. But LSU coach Jay Johnson likes the versatility he has to choose from, and he has chosen well.
“It’s a good credit to the players because those guys are all starters in my mind, and we brought them here for a reason,” he said.
Four non-regular starters are pinch-hitting over .400 with at least seven at-bats. Jake Brown leads the way at .545 (6-for-11), followed by Josh Pearson at .444 (4-for-9), Dalton Beck at .429 (3-for-7) and Ethan Frey at .400 (4-for-10).
ETHAN FREY: THE PRIDE OF ROSEPINE
In addition, John Pearson (Josh’s younger brother) is pinch-hitting at .333 (5-for-15).
“Their ability to stay connected to the mission and to the team and stay prepared when their number’s called upon and then deliver – like, that’s a real special quality,” Johnson said. “Those guys have done a really good job.”
Ashton Larson is only pinch-hitting .200 (4-for-20) and has played in only 30 of LSU’s 55 games with five starts and in just 10 of 30 SEC games. He has struggled with a quadriceps injury and is hitting just .237 overall (9-for-38) and .182 in the SEC (2-for-11). That after starting 22 of 26 SEC games last year as a freshman and hitting .337 before Johnson improved his roster dramatically through his freshmen class and the portal.
But Larson had his moment in the night at Alex Box as he launched a pinch-hit, three-run home run on April 17 against Alabama to trim a 5-1 deficit to 5-4 in the sixth. LSU went on to win 11-6.
“Most pivotal at-bat in the game. Awesome for Ashton,” Johnson said.
One batter before pinch-hitting the lefty-hitting Larson against right-handed Bama pitcher Austin Morris, Johnson pinch-hit left-hander Josh Pearson against Morris, and Pearson singled to put two on for Larson.
“That’s why you play college baseball – moments like that,” Larson said. “It’s really cool. This season has not been how I pictured it going into the year. But that was special.”
Johnson had first announced right-handed hitting John Pearson to pinch-hit for righty-hitting Michael Braswell III against lefty Bama pitcher Matthew Heiberger, but then Morris replaced Heiberger. So, Johnson flipped again. He just keeps rolling winners.
“We’re lucky to have the depth to be able to do that,” Johnson said. “I have more options this year from a hitting and impacting the game late standpoint.”
Johnson almost has a whole other team of reinforcements. Brown, the Pearson Brothers, Frey, Larson, Beck, they call themselves the “Goon Squad,” and even had T-Shirts made.
Asked who the best member of the Goon Squad is on Monday, Frey said, “I think, we’re all good.”
Frey has a strong argument to be squad leader, though he’s being modest. The junior from Rosepine leads LSU in hitting with a .358 average and is second in home runs with 12 and is fifth in RBIs with 43. Not bad for someone who doesn’t regularly start. Frey has started 35 of the 51 games in which he has played.
Brown is hitting .319 with seven home runs and 39 RBIs through 53 games and 38 starts. Josh Pearson is hitting .305 with six home runs and 28 RBIs in 48 games and 37 starts.
Beck, a senior transfer at his fourth school in four years, is just 3-of-8 on the season for a .375 average through 15 games and no starts, but he has had his moment, like Larson. He he came off the bench for a pinch-hit, bases-loaded, two-RBI single in the bottom of the ninth on April 25 to cut Tennessee’s lead to 3-2. LSU went on to win 6-3.
“It’s like what you dream of when you come here,” said Beck, who played at Incarnate Word last year, Kansas State in 2023 and Grayson College in 2022. “Who wouldn’t want to come here?”
Beck was 1-for-2 in three SEC games.
“I mean we have such a great team,” he said. “That’s pretty obvious for anybody to see. We’re so greatly deep with players. Just to get that opportunity against Tennessee was awesome.”
Johnson admires his Goonies’ unselfishness, though he had nothing to do with the T-Shirts.
“They’re just a true team, and we’ve had success with the pinch-hitting thing and matching guys up, and how they’ve approached their attitude about what their role is on that day has been really awesome,” Johnson said.
Josh Pearson, a senior from West Monroe, started 52 of 60 games last year and 36 of 55 the previous year. In the 2023 national win over Florida, he hit a two-run home run.
“You’re talking about a guy who was a hero in a national championship game in Josh,” Johnson said. “Dalton was an 18-homer guy at a mid-major. Larson started last year. They’re doing what this team needs them to do with a great attitude about it, which is awesome.”
And Johnson just tries to plug them in when he can, which is what he’ll be doing this weekend and the rest of the season – looking for that promising pinch moment. He watches film of opposing pitchers constantly and knows what each of his potential pinch-hitters does best against a right or lefty.
“I’ll lean over to one of the three assistants and say, ‘Hey, get so-and-so ready to do this,’” Johnson said. “So, we can prep them and get their body moving.”
JAY JOHNSON CALLS PINCH-HITTERS LIKE AN OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR CALLS PLAYS
Johnson sees himself as an offensive coordinator, only he calls hits, not plays.
“It’s like a football coach has a play that would work against a certain defense, and all week, he goes, ‘Ok, the crossing route after checking off a receiver will be there, because the linebacker’s going to move a certain way,’” Johnson said. “And that opens it up. We try to get to know our hitters in a way that this is where they’re going to be slotted and most successful.”
In other words, Johnson is calling first downs and touchdowns at about a .300 clip.
“We’ve had some very significant at-bats by our pinch-hitters in really critical situations,” he said.
And more critical play calls are coming up quickly as LSU is driving … for Omaha.
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