Pack Homer Pod Ep.11 - WE BACK!

What is Pack Homer Podcast?

A Podcast Dedicated Entirely to NC State Baseball #Pack9

Cal Parker (00:06)
Good evening and welcome to episode 11 of the Pat Homer podcast, brought to you by Waters and Mathis CPAs. If you ain't filed your taxes yet, you're probably screwed. But if you got a last second emergency and you're catching this on a Monday morning, visit wmcpas .com. Maybe you can find a phone number, but boys, it might be too late. We're actually recording, we're recording. It ain't too late. Yeah, you can file an extension.

Wesley Wilson (00:17)
You

Adam Lytch (00:29)
It ain't too late. It ain't too late. You got, you got, you got till 12 a .m. tomorrow or 11 59 p .m.

Wesley Wilson (00:32)
Hehehehe

Cal Parker (00:40)
Uh, we're actually recording this one on time this week. We've had a busy, busy little schedule lately. Um, so last week, uh, we said that we felt like we needed to win two games and we were just hoping to get to, and we were really kind of thinking that the UNCW game maybe was going to be one of those. And if we got one out of three from Clemson, uh, that that would be a win for us. And then I also remember last week we said,

We would trade a loss to UNCW to get two from Clemson. And well, that's what we got. We went.

Adam Lytch (01:19)
I thought we said, I thought we said trade a loss to get a, oh yeah, you're right. Cause we, we did, we did decide on two out of two or two out of four. So I was thinking we said we trade a loss to get a sweep, but you're right. It was, it was still to get to cut two and two for the week.

Cal Parker (01:34)
So we did go two and two for the week, lost a midweek game at UNCW, won the first two games down at Clemson, and then today got shut out in game three. But in a game that was competitive, it was a zero -zero game to the seventh in, and we shut Clemson out for 19 straight innings, which is pretty dang impressive, and especially the way we kind of...

We've talked at Nozium about some of our pitching struggles, so I thought our guys did a ball really good this week. Wesley, you were at UNCW game. I know we got jumped on early, and then that ended up being a game that we lost five to four, anything there that stood out. You kind of want to give us a rundown of that, since you were actually in the house down there in what we think.

Wesley Wilson (02:23)
Yeah, it was a fun night. AMAC pulverized two balls. But, I mean, unfortunately from an offensive standpoint, if it wasn't for AMAC or Pennington, there really wasn't a whole lot going on in that game. Winscott threw some really, really good innings for us. And, of course, I don't want to take cows thunder away, but it seemed to be Derek Smith's coming out party.

you know, in Wilmington and, you know, even though we lost, I didn't think, you know, I didn't walk away from Brooks Field, you know, necessarily too disappointed. We played okay. It was, you know, from an offensive standpoint, we left a lot to be desired. But from a midweek game, I thought we saw a lot of positives from our pitching staff.

Cal Parker (03:16)
Yeah, just a long and short that night. Yeah, five fours a close game we got jumped on early. They put up four in the first three frames scored all five of their runs in the first five innings. Hollis Fanning gave up three wins when Scott gave up two but in four and two thirds, you know, actually really, really good in and then as Wesley said, six out of our eight hits in that ballgame came from a Mac and in Pennington.

AMAC actually had four hits and two home runs in that one. And Derek Smith, that was a coming out party for him. He came in and faced six guys and struck out five. So gave him a little bit of confidence going into the weekend. I think we were all watching the Friday night game against Clemson, one that we won 11 to eight. Clemson.

carried a 2 -1 lead into the fourth, but then we scored four in the fourth, four in the fifth. Again, we out hit Clemson 10 to seven. Again, when Sam Highfield did show back up for us in the rotation, we went to Louisville last week and didn't have Sam Orr with, still didn't see with this weekend, but Sam started for us, went three and a third, kind of ran into some trouble and...

you know, had a short night, you know, gave up six earned runs and three and a third. And then we turned it over to Shane Van Dam and Adam, you want to talk about that out and from Shane Van Dam a little bit, four and two thirds of it. I mean, he just dominated.

Adam Lytch (04:57)
Yeah, four and three, four and two thirds, um, eight strikeouts, uh, obviously came, came in and got the win. Uh, we were all texting and watching. I think, you know, I think he gave up four walks all total two of them were, um, I think they're late, uh, hit two guys also, but man, he was real, real dominant. I thought, um, how many Clemson scored?

two on him and then a couple of those that that we gave up there in the bottom of the fourth were on where I guess we're on highfield but but after that he just absolutely shut him down I thought real impressive outing I mean we we've obviously been you know Wes was big on Van Damme last time we recorded and and we when we talked about you know

getting him the ball for extended periods and you know, obviously the hate the, you know, hate to see the short outing, unfortunately from Sam, but, uh, but man, it was nice to have an option like Van Dam to beat all those innings against, uh, a big team on a Friday night on the road at the hold on long enough that we could, that we could score enough runs and, um, can really put it away. I thought it was.

Good that we added a couple late there. You know, we all kept saying, we got to have more runs. We got to have more runs. Um, you know how, you know, talking about how much longer van Dam can go. Did he get to, did he get to 90 pitches? I can't remember his pitch count. Um, was it okay? Yeah.

Cal Parker (06:37)
I know he was in the 80s. It's not in the box score, but I know he got at least into the 80s, which was, I'm assuming probably the most pitches he's thrown in outing in his NC State career. But.

Adam Lytch (06:44)
Yeah.

Yeah, you know, we were talking about how long, just how long can he go and, and, um, but, you know, obviously we added, added one of the top of the eighth and top of the ninth, which was awesome. Um, you know, kind of insurance runs that we felt like we were going to need and, you know, and obviously, you know, um, you know, we had, you know, several walks and hit, but hit, but hit batters that we put on the base path. So.

You know, one thing, another thing in that game that really stood out to me was, you know, uh, it was good to see Serrano, um, you know, kind of come back around a little bit, you know, had been struggling for us as of late. Obviously he's my guy falling pretty tight, but, uh, he was three for four had four RBI's and drew a walk, uh, scored two times and really had some timely hits too. So, um, that was, that was good to see from him.

Um, obviously, uh, a Mac, you know, a couple more hits, uh, man, guys just been absolutely huge for us. I'd say the same thing with hoax. Hoax scored three times was two for four. Um, God had been, you know, kind of on and off and, um, but it was good. I really, really liked the lineup to Friday night. Um, that was good to see us change things around a little bit, even though, you know, Luke kind of uncharacteristic.

uncharacteristically struck out a couple of times. He had a real time we hit as well there and I did like him in that position leading off.

Cal Parker (08:32)
So is that where we're at? I kind of feel like that's probably the consensus, Wesley. I think we all like Luke in the leadoff. Would you guys agree? I think Adam says he does, Wesley.

Wesley Wilson (08:41)
Yes, absolutely.

Cal Parker (08:44)
Yeah, I think we've been kind of, it's been one of the things we've been poking the bear for is breaking up all these lefties and we kind of had that left, right, left, right, left, right look on Friday night. I liked that lineup. And then, and then Derek Smith, my guy again, he came in and shut the door in the ninth. And I'll tell you what Van Dam and Smith, I know they're both from the right side.

Which you remember when we had Evan Justice and Villamond, they were both on the left side, but man, they both throw that you just wipe out. When the breaking ball's over the plate and then they just got 95 behind it, man, when they're in the zone, they're just so tough to hit. And Van Damme, he struggles with it a little bit, I guess more than Smith. I think the announcer said that probably some of Smith's early season troubles is he's in the zone almost too much. Just doesn't walk anybody.

And you know, if you're facing aggressive teams and they're trying to jump on your early and counts that you know, you can't get yourself in a little bit of trouble when you when you throw too many strikes, but that was a huge win. Just a absolutely huge win to get game one. I think probably if you look at every ACC series throughout the year, a lot of time, I would think more often than not, the team that wins game one wins the series. But we were facing, you know,

28 and four Clemson team going in and you know, there was certainly no guarantees. Clemson more than capable of coming back and winning the series. And then we go into last night or last night's game and Dom Fritton rolls out as the starter last night. And Wesley, I'll let you talk about that one a little bit and rest my vocal cords here a little bit. But man, Dom was really good.

Wesley Wilson (10:43)
Yeah. I mean, you know, we've been, it's kind of, kind of what we've been waiting on all year. And I think that was definitely good, good for everybody to see and, and for, for nobody more, more so than Dom. You know, if you, if you're looking to turn it around and from a confident standpoint, if you can go into Clemson, South Carolina in front of, I don't know what eight, 10 ,000 people, whatever they had in that stadium and, and really shut down that offense for, for.

Almost six innings, that's a great turnaround game. So I don't think anybody's happier than Dom right now coming back to Raleigh tonight, getting ready for Carolina next weekend.

Cal Parker (11:29)
Yeah, six strikeouts. I thought the biggest thing was zero wild pitches, zero hit batters, one walk and five and two thirds. I mean, when he's in the zone, I mean, gosh, he's, I mean, he, you know, just absolutely just went out and dominated, gave up three hits. Um, I mean, just kind of the dumb, uh, that we were, we're, we're hoping to get, you know, when the season started and, you know, we, we've said before that if,

you know, if we leave Dom on the rotation, he turns around, we all love to be the ones to say we were wrong. You know, it might be a little too early to say that he's figured it out after just, you know, one really good start. But I think that, I think everybody is hoping that that's the case.

Wesley Wilson (12:18)
So if we said starting going into the weekend that Sam was going to give us less than four innings and Whitaker wasn't going to be available and we won the series at Clemson, what would you say? No chance. No chance.

Cal Parker (12:31)
No way, I would have said no way, no chance. I mean, you figure if you say Sam's gonna give you less than a four, I'd have figured we lost like 17 to seven or something. Like, you know, just got boat raced.

Adam Lytch (12:43)
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it was, I mean, it was fun. I mean, the, the, the Friday night game just, just getting our swagger back into the plate a little bit and finally scoring some runs, man, just felt good. I mean, we've been struggling with that. I mean, for a couple of weeks now and you know, to, to pitch good enough, uh, it gets obviously a very good Clemson team and, and, uh, just, you know,

Wesley Wilson (12:57)
Yeah.

Adam Lytch (13:12)
boat racing at the plate felt good. You know, I mean, that was, that was a fun game. Both games were fun. Uh, Friday and Saturday games.

Wesley Wilson (13:16)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. How about Van Damme? You know, 12 months ago, he's pitching in front of, I don't know what, 10 people.

Cal Parker (13:28)
in the freezing cold.

Wesley Wilson (13:29)
in the freezing cold now, you know, fast forward to April, you know, April 12th. And here he is shutting down Clemson in front of, again, I don't know how many, it looked capacity to me on Friday and Saturday night. So for him, that has to be an incredible feeling, you know, how much he's accomplished and how far he has progressed over the last 12 months.

Cal Parker (13:56)
Absolutely. Yeah, so in game two, after Don had a great start, then we brought Jacob Duden in. He had three walks and one and a third. Wesley called Duden wild thing. He's one of those effectively wild guys. What did you say, Wesley, about if you get in the box in the first one?

Wesley Wilson (14:16)
Yeah, I mean, I think for most players and I think I texted you guys during like first pitch strike, please first pick strike. I think Duden's first pitch was a chin music, you know, high and inside. And I think that's better. Like I think that was actually, I think that's what you want with him because he was really able to go from there. So maybe that's what we want from Duden.

Put a little fear in the eyes of the batters.

Cal Parker (14:47)
He has got, go ahead Adam. I just wanna say he's got so much room to get so much better. I mean, he's only a freshman and he's 97. He throws, I mean, he, yeah, 97, 98 and he's throwing breaking balls that seem like they break a foot and.

Adam Lytch (14:47)
my mate no no go ahead go ahead

Yeah.

98 last night or saturday

Cal Parker (15:13)
Like Wesley said, like if you're digging in and like you get 98 at the chin, and then if you can throw that breaking ball on, you know, on the outer half next bit, it's like, how do you hit that? Like you're sitting there like hoping that like he doesn't like hit you in the rib cage. And then he just, you know, breaks one off on the other side. Like, I don't know how you hit that. Um, so he's just got, he's so exciting just from the, how much he's, he's not even close.

So to what I think, you know, he can be, I mean, he's, you look at him, he's got 19 malks and 18 innings, 442 ERA. He struck out 19 and 18 innings as well, but he's a really, really good piece to our team now. I mean, very, very important piece for us at the Penn with as limited as we've been at the Penn at times, but he can get so much better. And if he keeps getting better, you know, Wesley keeps saying that, you know, the good part about throwing all these freshmen so early is,

they're getting in and setting it under a belt. I mean, if he's a guy that's pounding the zone, I, gosh, that guy's tough to hit. I think most of the hits he gives up are just because he gets behind in counts and then the guy's sit on something and run into it. I don't think that if he gets to where he's locating and throwing it where he wants to, man, he's gonna be, he's gonna be trouble.

Adam Lytch (16:34)
Remember how many batters it was in a row he started behind in the count on, but I know at one point like five of nine that he had faced had gone to full count. And, and to your, and to your point, you know, a guy who's, you know, definitely, you know, this got our worst walk to innings ratio. The guys, you know, trying to throw strikes and not walk on.

Cal Parker (16:46)
Yeah, but yeah.

Adam Lytch (17:03)
especially on something like a full counter, you know, once he gets three balls and obviously making it a little more predictable to hit. So yeah, I think that's a good point, but man, I mean, and you're talking about his 97, 98, he makes it look easy to, um, you know, from the stretch and man, very smooth with it. So, you know, nothing, nothing, uh, force about it. So, um,

Yeah, very exciting to see, hopefully see him progress. You know, we're I think to y 'all's point, you know, the, seeing these young arms and getting this much work is hopefully going to pay off for us.

Cal Parker (17:46)
So the end of that game, Derek Smith comes in again. And I'm a little bit nervous because he threw two innings on Tuesday night. He closed the game on Friday night. You know, like all of a sudden he's our shiny toy that we want to use, which, you know, I've been asking for it. So I was glad to see it. But anyway, we bring Derek Smith in. He comes in with, was it runners on first and second that he came in in the eighth and he struck out three guys in a row. Is that right?

Wesley Wilson (17:52)
Ha ha ha.

I think so.

Cal Parker (18:16)
This is the sound.

Adam Lytch (18:17)
Yeah, sounds right. Uh, was that, or was it in the eight that we had the tag out that, um, Pennington reached in back and got the guy, you know, Butterworth pulled him off when Taylor hit the ball to short. Was that an eight? I felt like that, that wasn't the.

Cal Parker (18:34)
That was a huge play in the game. Was that in the seventh or the eighth?

Adam Lytch (18:38)
Okay, maybe.

I don't remember.

Cal Parker (18:42)
I want to go look because I'm interested now. But yes.

Adam Lytch (18:47)
Yeah, no, that was in the seventh. You're right. Cause Taylor says Taylor grounded out to short the end the seventh. And so that was, that was the, I was thinking that was Smith in then, but, uh,

Cal Parker (18:59)
That was, I guess, Newton.

Adam Lytch (19:01)
Yeah, I guess it was. Yeah. That was a huge play though. And then I guess dude came in the eighth and walked the first two guys, right?

Cal Parker (19:03)
Yes, so in the A...

In the eighth, he gave up a single at the middle and then he walked. So we had runners first and second. Smith came in, strike out, swing in, strike out, swing in. And then strikes out swinging. And the last strike out, he hit him. He throws a breaking ball and hits him. The guy swings through it. And like at first everyone thought it was just a wild pitch, you know, that Cozart's unable to block on strike three and we're like, oh God.

Adam Lytch (19:14)
Okay, yeah.

Yeah, that was insane.

Cal Parker (19:39)
Here we go again, we've been put one on and given up a run because he had thrown a run score and then they go to the replay. I've never seen that where I didn't know the rule. It makes sense.

Adam Lytch (19:44)
And a run, and a run, and a run scored, yeah.

Well, cause, cause early, early earlier in that, yeah, earlier in that bat one did get by. And so the runners advanced from, from second to third, I mean, from first to second to second, third. And, uh, yeah, but I will say, I obviously, I didn't know the rule either. Um, but Cozart clearly did. That's what I was going to say. You know, he, cause he was immediately saying it hit him, it hit him, it hit him. And, uh, you know, he was walking back towards the dugout. So he definitely knew the rule. So.

Cal Parker (19:58)
Yes.

Yes.

Adam Lytch (20:21)
Yeah, we had two huge reviews there, uh, bait to end both innings to end the seventh and eighth.

Cal Parker (20:29)
Yeah, the situation there was Smith comes in runners on first and second strikes out the first two throws a wild pitch. You got second and third with two outs and Smith does just a nasty breaking pitch hits the guy in the shin and the guy, I mean, got full swings through it. And so strike three, he takes off running the first, but he was hit. So it was a dead ball, strike three then and then Smith do a scoreless.

But I mean, Derek Smith again, four strikeouts and two innings, a two innings save to clinch the series. Just a huge win. I mean, we were all on cloud nine last night after the end of that one, knowing that we've gone to Clemson and taking care of business, regardless of what happened today, which didn't go the way we wanted to. Before we talk about game three a little bit, and you guys, it's okay if you disagree with me.

probably if you've heard this, and probably like when we disagree. But does it annoy the heck out of anyone else that like, Clemson's like a middle school softball team. Like it's almost too much for me, man. They're like over there, they got like choreographed dances. They got like, I'm like waiting for them to say, like sing some songs or something. Like it's a little too much for me.

Adam Lytch (21:44)
God. Oh God. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, I agree. I don't like it either. It, I mean, it, it, it looked like, you know, it looked like in all fairness, it looked like the clips and softball team, you know, like, seriously, I mean, that's the kind of the thing that, uh,

Wesley Wilson (22:05)
Yeah.

If that wasn't bad enough, the announcers were just as bad. I mean, you would think they would be, I mean, I get it, they're Clemson announcers, but it was just sickening listening to that. I ended up putting it on mute just so I didn't have to hear that.

Adam Lytch (22:13)
Oh gosh. Yeah.

And I get it like, you know, on the, you know, the ESPN plus coverages and stuff like that. And I know we have the same guys, our guy since in his own, the, uh, when they had the network ACC network games as well. Uh, I think, uh, at least he has been a couple of times, but.

But that was bad. I mean, the coverage was just bad. I remember. And I kind of felt like it was the same way in the Louisville game. You know, like, I just don't get that sense. And maybe it's because I'm a pack homer. Uh, I don't get that sense listening to our broadcast, but man, I felt the same way during the Louisville coverage, honestly, but.

Cal Parker (23:11)
And I'm not like the president of the no fun club. I'm not like, you know, I played baseball a long time. I think that there's a lot of people that, that they, they, they want to take too much of the fun out of baseball. Baseball is a fun game to play. And you know, I don't get offended when guys hit one to the moon and flip the bat. That doesn't bother me. I don't get mad when they hit a home run and go put their hockey helmet on like our team does or whatever it is, or, you know, slam dunk in the batter's circle, whatever. I, none of that bothers me. But.

Adam Lytch (23:14)
Yeah.

Wesley Wilson (23:15)
You

Yeah.

Adam Lytch (23:39)
Well, what was the go ahead? What was so weird? What? What? What was so weird about it too is like at least on the camera angle is it was like there was two rows of them. It wasn't like they were all on the, you know, on the, on the dugout fence. It was like, they were like staggered behind one another. Yeah. It was terrible. I, I don't know. Like I said, you know,

Cal Parker (23:40)
But man, the choreographed dance, and that was a little much.

Wesley Wilson (23:44)
I don't want to see any grown man doing anything core graphed, I can tell you that.

Cal Parker (23:57)
Yeah.

Adam Lytch (24:09)
the girls softball games, you get that and it's awesome, right? Like it's a part of the game, a part of the sport, but you're just not used to seeing that in a baseball game. And, uh, yeah, it was a little bit much for me as well.

Cal Parker (24:23)
I was just thinking about, you know, I played high school baseball for, and the other thing was they were getting their, they're getting their butts whooped. I mean, they were, they were losing both times that, you know, they were doing this at the time. They hadn't won a game in the series and then they went 19 in and straight without scoring a run. And I was just saying about my high school baseball coach, uh, battle, I played for, for battle Holly. Probably some of the folks listening, if they don't know battle, they know his, his father, uh, Jack Holly, who's the.

the winningest football coach in North Carolina history, just old school, hard -nosed family, I mean, just a great athletic family, really good people too. But I was just thinking, man, if we were in high school and we just lost last night and now we're losing four to nothing tonight and we were doing choreographed dancing in the dugout, like.

I would not want to go to practice the next day, but I guess that's part of the culture. I don't know. Maybe it helps for recruiting, but yeah, it's not, not my thing. No, and I'm not the president of no fun club. I'm saying that again, but too much for me. If you like it, that's okay. Um, so today I came back in, uh, in there, there were some positive, I don't want to talk a whole lot about the game today. Cause.

Wesley Wilson (25:24)
As for...

I hate it.

Cal Parker (25:43)
We lost seven and nothing, we get shut out today. But I do want to talk about a couple of the positives from today. One, Cooper Consiglia threw the ball really good today. Threw six innings, gave up two earned. He actually left a scoreless game and then we were unable to kind of get out of a jam. They scored five and seven, two and eight. But he did a really good job today scattering some hits because we gave up 11 hits today. We saw Heath Andrews, Winscott, Schaffner.

Siglio and again those staff and you know I think and was that a freshman Clemson through today? Gosh he's good he's really good. What how do you say his name? Kinnack? Anyway the dude throws 94 and his change -ups his best pitch so man I mean we just got they just they just kind of

Wesley Wilson (26:21)
Yes.

Adam Lytch (26:29)
Good night.

Cal Parker (26:40)
It was one of those baseball games today. We had two hits, struck out 10 times. Just couldn't ever get it going. But still a huge series win. I think we jumped in the RPI up to where do we say we were at, Wesley? I know you were talking.

Wesley Wilson (26:58)
I think it was 27, but I don't know if that's been updated for today, but it's 27 when I look.

Cal Parker (27:05)
27 in the RPI give you a little interest in RPI statistic and at I get let's see after today I guess that makes us five and three versus the top 25, but we were 11 and three versus the RPI top 50 and We're two and nine versus 51 through a hundred So it's hard not to look back at the you know Louisville series and the Georgia Tech series where you feel like you should have at least got something

But nonetheless, very, very encouraging to see us not only win a series against the number one RPI team in the country. And by the way, Clemson is and still is having such a good year that even after losing to us twice in back -to -back nights at home, they were still number one in the country in RPI. So I mean, that was a really, really good ball club that we beat in Clemson.

up in North Carolina this weekend. And, you know, got another opportunity this week against the number six RPI, North Carolina Tar Heels. But before we talk about that, I've got a few questions I want to mix in. We're going to do a little housekeeping here, okay? Before we transition to talking about our neighbors down the road. Do I have anything I wanted to add from this series before we do that?

Wesley Wilson (28:33)
I don't think so.

Adam Lytch (28:33)
And I think we put, uh, the only thing I was gonna say is, uh, you know, I know we played pretty clean defense today. You know, we, we, we did have the three errors on, on Friday night and one yesterday, obviously Clemson ended up, I think with seven errors to our four, but, uh, I did look earlier. It had dropped our fielding percentage for the year down to nine 69.

Our opponents are fielding 978 or 974. Excuse me. So, um, not, not that any of them were real concerning it. And, and, and, uh, I would say both, uh, Butterworth and Pennington made some really nice plays. Um, uh, Pennington and, and a Mac and Butterworth also, but all made some really nice plays to.

that possibly could have, you know, there would have been hits, uh, otherwise this weekend. So not to really harp on it, but it was just, uh, you know, I would like to see us continue to clean it up on D a little bit.

Cal Parker (29:42)
Yeah, I think one of my complaints about our defense is has been that we don't take away enough hits. We actually did that a few times this weekend. We took away some hits and got some guys off the pass with some pretty timely double plays. But yeah, we definitely could be a little better defensively.

Adam Lytch (29:48)
We did. Yeah.

Cal Parker (30:03)
All right, so two more little housekeeping questions. I got three. By the way, if you're not following us on Instagram, yeah, we got 100 followers. So we would really appreciate if you would follow us on pack home at pack home or pod on Instagram and eggs. That is where if we make a bold prediction that comes true, that we repost it like six times. So you can own how smart we are. If we make any predictions that do not come true.

Wesley Wilson (30:10)
Damn!

Adam Lytch (30:12)
Yes.

Cal Parker (30:31)
You will not see us retweet or...

Adam Lytch (30:34)
That content does not get reposted. That's right.

Cal Parker (30:37)
That's right, that content goes to the graveyard and never come out again. But yeah, please follow us on X in the Instagram. That's all we're working for at this point. But anyway, I got a few questions and please do also, if you got any questions for us, hit us up. You can DM us and we love to talk about it on the show. Sometimes it's a little easier to answer questions from you guys than to sit here and try to, I guess, create content if that's the word.

So one of the questions I got this week was basically we were celebrating last week if you tuned in that we have done 10 episodes now and Adam, what percentage of podcasts did you say made it to 10 episodes?

Adam Lytch (31:18)
Less than two, it's like one point something. Yeah, it was less than 2 % make it to 10.

Cal Parker (31:25)
So this is our 11th episode now, and the question was, what is the hardest part about doing the podcast every week? Who wants to start?

Adam Lytch (31:44)
I think it's just, we all obviously got busy schedules. You know, trying to just trying to find the time, you know, we have to keep Wesley at past his bedtime. Just so I can have time with my girls when, when they're going to bed on, on, on Sunday night. So I just say the hardest part is finding the time. I think when we get on here, it's easy to talk. And it's a lot of fun. I like this. It's a,

It's one of my highlights of the week. I enjoy getting on here and sharing this time with you guys. It means a lot to me. So, uh, it's, it's fun, but, uh, I just say making the time, finding the time, you know, to sit down. We obviously, if you've been listening to it, us and you can't tell, we obviously don't think a whole lot about what we're going to say before we get on here. So that part's that part's not hard, but, uh, I think just finding the time, I would say, Cal.

Wesley Wilson (32:31)
You

Cal Parker (32:32)
You

Wesley, is it for you Wesley, like picking a new hat to wear every week? Cause you got a different one every week. But God, that one tonight is fresh. So if you're just listening tonight, maybe you follow, maybe watch on YouTube. Cause Wesley has a sick ad. I'm not even gonna tell you what it is. You're gonna have to, I'm gonna see how many, if we can get some clicks on the YouTubes.

Wesley Wilson (32:43)
Yeah.

Adam Lytch (32:46)
That was fresh. That one is so fresh.

Wesley Wilson (32:56)
Hey.

Adam Lytch (32:58)
Is that a new era hat?

Wesley Wilson (33:00)
And nobody loves sun drop more than I do Hey, but at 36 years old 36 years old is turning a dot sun drop though Not

Adam Lytch (33:05)
You might like it.

Cal Parker (33:11)
Hahahaha

Adam Lytch (33:12)
You might like it. You might like you might like it, but you ain't drink as many as your main Calhoun has. I know my man can just delete a whole foil pack of them things.

Cal Parker (33:18)
Hahaha!

Wesley Wilson (33:18)
I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I mean, I agree with Adam. I mean, I guess we're probably pretty unique from a standpoint of, I mean, all three of us, it feels like we're on a bird every week, you know? So we're traveling all over the country and all three of us are trying to do our part in keeping the country fed, you know? So, you know, it is tough on us.

Cal Parker (33:22)
Okay.

Wesley Wilson (33:46)
on a Sunday night and my wife is good as a woman as she is. She definitely does not understand my love with NC State University. So sometimes on Sunday night, she's like, wow, you got to get recorded podcast after you watched, you know, you went to the final four on all weekend and now you got home and you got to go to your building and record a podcast for an hour and a half. So.

You know, at times it's not easy, but she accepts it. And, you know, I think that's just, you know, we recorded 10 in a row and I have no doubts we'll be at 20 and then 30. So that's where we're at.

Cal Parker (34:31)
Yeah, I piggyback on what you guys said about our, you know, all three of us just having crazy travel schedules. When I started the career, I mean, now someone told me that the D in Diamond stands for divorced. And I think I've been at Diamond at Hilton for like, I don't, I don't remember the last time I wasn't. And we, I think all three probably have more airline miles, honestly, than we won't. I know that sounds crazy, but the way you earn them isn't always fun. So.

Wesley Wilson (34:44)
Heheheheh

Cal Parker (35:01)
We're all three on the road a lot. The other thing I would say that, on a different note is, one of the things that I didn't anticipate when we started doing this was that, we're fans of these guys. We like all the players. When I go to the ballpark, we walk up to these guys after the game and my kids are getting autographs and wanting to meet the players. We...

Coach Avian has been around Raleigh so long that we might run into him. Well, we're not journalists, but we have an audience, and so we kind of have to talk about the bad too. And that kind of sucked sometimes. It's like, gosh, what happens when someone like, we kind of almost feel like we know because we probably met them and we got to get on here and be like, man, they suck this week. Like that's.

The part that I didn't really think about when we started doing this, it's like, you know, like to say the hard things and I kind of realized after we got past like Townsend where we weren't just going to 10 -run rule everybody, I guess that, you know, our platform, if we're trying to give our listeners good content is that we have to, we have to say the truth or whatever we, our opinion of the truth is. So that part to me is.

is kind of something that was, I really didn't think about a whole lot before we started doing it. We've done a whole lot of it now. Before we started the podcast, if we were to ever publish the pack homer text threads, we wouldn't even be allowed at Doug Field. Just being completely transparent, honest. But now, even though it might only be 100, 200 listeners a week, whatever it is in a week,

Wesley Wilson (36:43)
Hahaha.

Adam Lytch (36:46)
Yeah.

Cal Parker (36:54)
I think we've got like over 2000 plays now. Like anything we say is like out there for the world. So, you know, and we have players' parents who follow us. We have a lot of players who follow us. So that was kind of the part maybe I didn't realize we were kind of getting into.

Adam Lytch (37:15)
I agree with that.

Cal Parker (37:17)
when we started because again, we're fans of the program. These guys are our guys. If you want to wear the red and white, you're special to us because the red and white is special to us.

Wesley Wilson (37:30)
Yeah, I mean, not only from an emotional standpoint, but we like give a little money to you, so.

Cal Parker (37:38)
Yeah, yeah.

Adam Lytch (37:39)
We have invested interest.

Cal Parker (37:43)
We're stakeholders.

Adam Lytch (37:45)
stakeholders here.

Cal Parker (37:48)
Alright, the next question is, I don't know if this is supposed to be like, accusatory or -

It's fine, you can ask whatever you want. The next question I got is, you guys have talked a lot about how good a lineup we have. Why can't we hit right now? Who wants to tackle that one first? See, now we got to talk about the thing I said I don't want to talk about.

Adam Lytch (38:09)
Oh man. Oh no.

Yeah. Um.

I mean obviously we knew that

the averages and the, you know, all base percentages and run score was going to go down when we hit, you know, a lot more stiffer competition, which, you know, we're right in the middle of, I think we, we didn't consider the stiff competition starting the, in Atlanta. We kind of figured it would be coming the next week when the boys from Durham rolled into town. But, um, um, but yeah, I mean, we're just facing.

You know, you mentioned Towson earlier, you know, Towson, VCU, Hawaii, those guys are, uh, Queens. They're off the, they're off the schedule and, uh, and we're facing, you know, I forgot the number that we said, but you know, it was like six of the top in a 15 RPI teams in the country. So the pitching has certainly changed. Um, you know, obviously we're over halfway through the season. A lot of these guys now started 30.

33 games, I guess it is. And, um, you know, I think, you know, you know, it's, it's, you know, a lot going on, you know, they're guys busy with school, you know, especially for some of these freshmen guys, you know, you're adjusting to high school life and, and not, um, you know, a college course workload plus, you know, these midweek games, late games, and you know, long weekends.

travel schedules and all that sort of stuff. So, um, but as far as hitting specifically, I think, you know, you look at the experience that, that, uh, and the importance of, uh, the transfers that we brought in, you know, a Mac and Pennington and man, they have been the heart and soul of our offense and, and continue to, um, and I do think, you know, we talked about it before, you know, or earlier on like,

You know, hitting is contagious and, and when some other guys are struggling, you know, like, you know, I mean, it's no secret, like, you know, you know, once you get past a Mac and Pennington in the lineup, you know, we've, we've cooled off significantly. I think, you know, we've struggled to find the right, um, you know, we've.

switched around the lead off a little bit. You know, I think DH is something that we're still trying to find, you know, Sosa, you know, since coming back is a struggled and I don't know. I mean, we're just facing better competition. You know, we, I still believe in our lineup. I still believe in painting 10 AMAC, Cozart, uh, ho is a little like, it can be real special. I think Serrano is coming around. Hopefully, you know, Friday night's, uh, performance will get, you know, in the Clemson series, we'll get him.

you know on the right track so yeah i think it's just competition that we're facing now is the reality of it that's that's not going to get any less coming up so i like the little flirt that we had and glimpse in there on on friday and hoping we can uh start putting that together again asap this week we got tough week coming up too

Cal Parker (41:43)
I'll go to second because Wesley looks deep and dull. Some of them put that thought together. You know, I think, yeah, Adam hit the nail on the head about the competition being better. I think, you know, the other part of it that I am optimistic about it, like if you look, like we still don't strike out. Like when I say we don't strike out, we don't strike out at near the rate of our opponent. So if you look, or maybe not our...

our opponents necessarily, but as the rest of the ACC, like if you look, you know, Boston College and Duke have both struck out over 300 times. The Florida State is 13 out of 14 in the ACC in strikeouts. They struck out 239 times. We still have not struck out 200 times. We struck out 199 times. So we're putting the ball in play a lot. And I think that,

eventually like some of those good swings are gonna fall. But then at the same time too, I think that maybe we are, maybe our pitch selection, I mean, maybe we're not always hitting good pitches, pitches that we can handle, pitches that we can drive. And then I think too that if you look at where we're at right now as a team.

We felt like Eli Serrano was the guy that was, if you had asked me before the year, I'd have said he's gonna hit over 300 fours. If you asked me about Jacob Cozart, I'd have said he's gonna hit in the mid threes. So I think that those two guys are guys that we know can. And Eli seemed to maybe be coming out of it this weekend. I think that's something that we're all hoping for, but -

You know, I don't have a great answer for you. I mean, just, you know, need to see some balls get through the infield and need to, you know, barrel up some pitch. You know, we just got to do it. I mean, hitting is one of those things that kind of can be a little bit of a roller coaster up and down. For us, I still think this is a talented lineup. So, for us, I think it's pretty easy to say that we haven't had a weekend in quite a while where we just went out and barreled everything up.

Wesley Wilson (44:10)
Ahem.

Cal Parker (44:11)
So maybe we get hot at the right time, but I still do believe in the talent that we have in line up, but it doesn't really matter if it doesn't produce. So hoping to see some of that. Wes.

Wesley Wilson (44:28)
Yeah, I got a lot going on up there thinking about this.

Cal Parker (44:33)
Hahaha!

Wesley Wilson (44:35)
I mean, I think you, you know, we talked earlier about Eli, he played a lot better this weekend, but I mean, we definitely from a standpoint of for batting average, we think he's going to improve and then we won't, we won't Cozart to hit better. You know, I think about, you know, back to lead off, I really like Luke at lead off, you know, from an average standpoint, I think Butterworth is going to hit better as we get.

you know, further into conference play with, I think, I think SOS is the most intriguing part of the lineup now.

I don't know if it's over the last 30 or for the last 31. I'm not sure. When we went to the baseball celebration, we watched the team take BP. Sosa looks different. He's going to be a heck of a ballplayer. I mean, for his age, he's big, he's strong, he's athletic, he's fast. He's going to be a heck of a ballplayer.

You have to wonder, you know, from a standpoint of, you know, if you look back to last year when we lost people's, you know, maybe this is, you know, keeping him in the lineup is something that's just the nature of the beast now that you have to keep giving these guys that are, you know, athletically superior. You had to keep giving them chances because you don't, you wanted to be there next year. Um, and for me personally, you know, you know, I don't know, you know, I had mono when I was at NC State.

I thought I was going to die. It took me weeks to recover from that. And anybody who has an experienced mono, it is tough. I mean, it drains you. It could take a couple months just to feel like your normal cell. And I think that's something that he'll work through. But it's not a normal illness where you just bounce back.

It's rough.

Adam Lytch (46:48)
I'm not laughing about that, I'm laughing.

Cal Parker (46:50)
I know why you're laughing, because I...

Wesley Wilson (46:54)
I told y 'all the story about how I got mono. Oh.

Cal Parker (46:57)
No, no, no.

Adam Lytch (46:59)
No, he said you made, we talked about wit and Whitney and out.

Cal Parker (47:02)
We're talking about where we at, man. Yeah.

Wesley Wilson (47:05)
Oh yeah, he's too old to get mano. I don't know what Wit's got. I'm more worried about Wit than I am about Sosa. I don't know what he's got.

Adam Lytch (47:06)
Thanks.

Cal Parker (47:19)
Hahaha!

Adam Lytch (47:22)
It's too old to get minor. That was awesome.

Wesley Wilson (47:24)
But yeah, I think I think I think so should be okay, but it is I mean he just he just need to see one get through that He just need to see a base hit, you know, that's it. You see you see see the bad head

Cal Parker (47:36)
Yeah, I got one other little thing I have for the last, before I ask the last question is I do think, gosh, man, we've seen a lot of good left -handers and we're a very left -handed lineup. And I mean, you look at the dominant arms in the conference, you know, it seems like everybody that we faced has had at least one good lefty. And yeah.

not just Jonathan Santucci, but some other guys too. So yeah, hoping we get it turned around. The last question kind of parlay's off of your comment about Sosa and people. The question is, and I don't think we can answer this question, so we're just gonna give our best guess. It says that you guys talk a lot about NIL money. Do you have any idea of how much?

NIO money it takes in baseball to be competitive. I don't know that I don't know I can put a dollar figure on it. I mean, what do you guys think?

Adam Lytch (48:43)
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I think there's just so much misinformation out there. I mean about, you know, the guys that are.

You know, paying for play per se. Um, obviously we're really not in that position. I don't think, I think, you know, part of coach events goal, obviously he mentioned was to get all the guys on scholarship and have their, you know, their tuition and the room and board paid for basically. But, uh, you know, I think it's a good question, but.

At the same time, I don't know that, I mean, I think even to a lesser extent than like basketball, you look at like the NL, NIL deals to get these, um, you know, one and done type kids to come to school. And then you look at the success the last few years that these more experienced teams have had, you know, even, I mean, look at our team, look at the NC state basketball team this year, you know, I mean, all the starters were transfer kids, you know,

not huge NIL deals. Um, we're, you know, but you know, we talk about the, you know, the growth from.

You know, high school to, to be in a freshman in college and what that takes. And, and then, you know, these guys, these, you know, these older guys have been around a long time, you know, not to say they got to be as old as wit, but, uh, you know, a Mac and in Pennington and what those guys mean to a team, you know, just from a leadership perspective and, you know, obviously they, they, they've stepped up and then the most, um,

solid part of our office. So I don't think it takes a lot of money. I think, you know, you look at somebody like LSU and how much money did they have in last year's team and that's different, you know, but.

I don't know how I still want to believe in the, um, that, you know, experience beats, having a bunch of just young studs, you know, kind of like is the case in basketball.

Cal Parker (50:56)
Wesson.

Wesley Wilson (50:58)
Yeah, I mean, you're going to have your Arkansas, Tennessee, LSU, your top four or five that's going to be hard to compete with. But when it gets to the second tier, I think we could definitely compete in that. And I noticed a lot of Clemson's lineup, pictures coming in, were transfers in from smaller South Carolina colleges.

Adam Lytch (51:09)
Vandy. Yeah.

Wesley Wilson (51:27)
Um, you know, during our series and I think, you know, as I've told you guys about, there's a lot of talent in North Carolina that, that I have no idea. I don't even know the process for coach Avent and his staff for how you evaluate these transfers coming in. I don't, I don't know if they contact you, you contact them. I have no idea.

But I do know that we do not have to go very far to find some extremely high caliber players and you know, you know what Christopher Nakas is doing. And I'm sure if you saw, if we could see what our budget has grown from, from last year, this year, you know, I think we have a lot to offer, especially coming out of this season for playing time, you know, not much different than our basketball team. We have a lot to offer and, you know, hopefully.

our fan base can get behind, you know, not just football and not just basketball. And you should give a little bit of money to basketball. But you should give a great, you should give some money to baseball too. But, you know, I think we can, we can be in that second tier when it comes to a baseball NIL. And I mean, baseball is such a finicky game and you can look at, you know, we, I think we talked last week about Ken and Peebles. I think he's, you know, performing pretty poorly.

Cal Parker (52:34)
Ha ha!

Wesley Wilson (52:55)
And when you get out of your comfort zone, you know, if you're in a groove and you know, you got a good group of guys around you and you say, Hey, I'm going to take this money and I'm going to go to a whole nother state, a whole nother program. You know, that, that could be detrimental to, to, to your performance. And, you know, you know, hopefully for us, when we have good players, because coach Avent has proven that he has the ability to recruit, you know, elite, you know, elite high school players that we can keep them around. And of course we lost.

the guy that's up in LSU and then we lost Peebles last year. So as a fan base, we really don't want to lose high caliber players. And I think that's not a big ask for us to keep, you know, hold on to these guys.

Cal Parker (53:42)
Yeah, I think that, yeah, I think, you know, like Wesley was saying, I mean, we lost to UNC Greensboro and UNCW in the midweek this year and we're playing Campbell, who we'll talk about here in just a bit, that, you know, another mid -major that you feel like they got good enough players on their roster to beat you. They obviously are able, there's talent at those levels. I think that competitive is,

a relative term on me. NC State is very competitive. I mean, we've been to Omaha recently. So we're, you know, one of the, you know, what I'd say one of the premier programs in the country and what I think right now is probably the best conference in the country. And, you know, we're fighting to win a conference championship year in and year out, it seems like. So I think that's a relative term. I did walk into the office this week and some folks were...

like shocked that Calipari had left Kentucky and went to Arkansas and they're like, why would you go to Arkansas? Like, I don't know if you guys that are listening know, but Arkansas has Walmart money, Tyson money, and then they got this guy named Jerry Jones that owns the Dallas Cowboy money. JV Hunt, yeah. So if they want to pay guys, we, I'm sorry for all our listeners, we're not going to, we're not going to spend Arkansas if they want to spend it. So.

Wesley Wilson (54:54)
JB Hunt too, JB Hunt.

Adam Lytch (54:56)
JB Hunt? JB Hunt? Huge!

Cal Parker (55:08)
And that's just not realistic. I don't know that you take, I mean, you're talking about some heavy, heavy hitters. You go look at the Forbes 400 or whatever it is. It's like half the top 100. It feels like it's Walton's when you read the list and that's just a sliver of their huge donor base. So yeah, I think that it's more about being strategic in who you go out and target in the portals. I think that I...

Adam Lytch (55:08)
No chance.

Cal Parker (55:36)
I hate it for high school kids, but it's really hard to me to not give a longer look at the guy who's dominated at a mid -major or, I mean, you look at Shane Van Dam, a guy come from a division three school who has, you know, incredible measurables. I don't think it's easy to go to, and there's some schools like Boston college does a really good job of that. They go and get all these D3 guys. I don't know how you go scout guys. You can't scout them stat wise alone.

at that level, right? Like you got to be looking more, you know, at, at measurables. You know, you throw 95 and you're six foot five and you throw some crazy breaking stuff. Maybe that plays in the ACC, but you can't just go look at stats when you're, you know, looking at division two and three guys, it's a little bit tougher. But, uh, you know, these mid -major guys, they have a lot of, uh, a lot of games against, you know, the SEC, ACC big 12 teams during the midweek. You can, you can learn a lot.

about how guys can compete against that level. So I think you gotta be strategic with your money. But I do think, I don't want anyone listening to think that it's just $100 ,000 a year is what gets you the talent. It's gonna take a lot more than that. We've talked about it before that you got 20 plus guys who aren't on the roster, aren't even getting any money. And you're trying to compete against schools that are fully funded as far as tuition and room and board from an NIL perspective. So.

For us to do that. It's gonna take a lot more than you know, a hundred thousand I don't know what the number is. I don't I know the NC State is not paying I got anybody six or seven hundred thousand dollars, but there are schools that you know, I've heard of have paid those, you know, huge six -figure numbers even even in college baseball, so I don't know hard to put an exact number on it, but Definitely still needs to be something at the front of

in front of all our fans' minds. If you're fans of college athletics, that's just where we are now and need to keep giving when we can and when it makes sense for you financially. All right, moving on this week. Real quick, I'm not gonna even dig into much of the stats. Got Campbell in the midweek, played him at the doke. The guy there, I think his name's Lawson Harrell, just hit 14 home runs.

Campbell is, you know, I think all of us on the pod have talked about how much we respect them as a mid -major program. I think anyone who went to the South Carolina Regional last year,

They eliminated us, but I mean, they're doing a phenomenal job there with the talent that they bring in. And I think that for them, especially to beat us, and they're 30 minutes away in our backyard, they're going to be ready to play Tuesday night. I also, guys, and you can chime in here, but I think it's a midweek game. We kind of need to win a midweek game against a quality opponent. You guys got to feel a little bit of that, I mean.

You know that win total at the end of the year, you got to win some of the midweeks for that add up a little bit. You kind of count on winning some of those. And I think it's one we're going to have great weather hope that we packed the doke. But they're not going to be a pushover. I can promise you. I mean, they those guys get after it and they play the game. They play the game hard.

Wesley Wilson (59:08)
Yeah.

Cal Parker (59:10)
Wesley's a big meat wagon fan.

Wesley Wilson (59:13)
Big, big meat wagon fan. I mean, I remember watching the game last year at South Carolina and Columbia. They're huge. I don't know what they're doing in Buies Creek. I don't know if there's any correlation to meal days going on there and Benson. Those guys are huge. I mean, I really don't understand, but they are, they're good.

from an ego standpoint, again, we got beaten by UNCG 18 to one, East Carolina, it wasn't competitive. UNCW beat us. So we sit here and we talk about how good North Carolina baseball is from an ego standpoint. Now, will this affect us when it comes to regional, super regional or just regional, I guess, selection? Maybe, maybe not, but you do want to win some of these.

in state games. There's no doubt about that.

Cal Parker (1:00:15)
And I mentioned Lawson Harold, do you guys know what happened to, I think his last name pronounced Neil Grant? He's actually hit, he had 15 home runs in 22 games and I don't know how now. I don't know how to miss this. He's only played 22 games now and he didn't play this with you. But you know, Harold has hit 14 home runs and it's hitting.

Wesley Wilson (1:00:25)
Nap. Snap. Nap.

He's, you see, first baseman catcher.

Cal Parker (1:00:40)
I think he catches doesn't he? And he closes games, but he said 20, he said 15 home runs and only 22 starts and has a 159 ERA in five and two thirds, but he did not play this weekend. And it's hitting 455 and only 22 games. So maybe he got hurt a little while back. I miss that, but I know that, you know, if you followed D1 baseball, he was, he was like all over the front page there.

Wesley Wilson (1:00:41)
I think it's catcher.

Adam Lytch (1:00:54)
Wow.

Cal Parker (1:01:10)
for a couple of weeks. I don't know what's going on.

Wesley Wilson (1:01:10)
I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if the NCAA is just not showing up at Bowie's Creek or what, but they got some big boys.

Cal Parker (1:01:21)
He hasn't played since March 23rd against Delaware. So not sure what's going on with him, but and I don't know if he's out for the season or like I said.

Wesley Wilson (1:01:32)
He probably tore a peck muscle bits in 380.

Adam Lytch (1:01:33)
Probably back to zinna

Cal Parker (1:01:37)
Yeah.

No...

All right, so big, big, we all agree big, big mid week wet matchup with Campbell. I mean, I, you know, I think we should beat those guys. But they definitely have a program I respect. So expect them to give us everything they got Tuesday night. And then this series is a Thursday, Friday, Saturday series.

Wesley Wilson (1:02:04)
Why? Why?

Cal Parker (1:02:06)
28 and 7 tar heels are coming to the doke and if you look at the ACC

Adam Lytch (1:02:15)
Thursday night, Thursday night it's on the network.

Cal Parker (1:02:19)
If you look at the ACC baseball standings, Coastal now in the Coastal Division, Carolina leads that division at 14 and four. And then you look over on our side, Clemson leads the Atlantic at 11 and four, right behind them Florida State at 10 and five, and the Packs 10 and eight, with Wake Forest right behind us at 99. I mean, both sides are really good. I mean, Carolina is 14 and four, Virginia is 11 and seven, Duke's 11 and seven. So, UNC's got a really good baseball team.

They're cookin' Oh man I gotta take a swallow or something I'm gonna have to hiccups here but

Adam Lytch (1:02:56)
What was that? I was going to give you, I was going to give you a breather. I was, I was just going to say that last week we talked about, uh, what would make us feel good. Um, you know, I think we kind of all said two and two, um, this week, I think what would make me feel good is, is three in one. I want to beat Campbell and I really want to win the series against you and see, I think it's, um,

Cal Parker (1:02:56)
They're coming in. What'd you say, Adam? Yeah, go ahead, please do.

Adam Lytch (1:03:27)
And we got what nine conference games left. Um, no, I'm sorry. We'll have 12 conference games left that we, we really feel like we strongly feel like we need to win five of those 12, um, to get the 500 in the conference. I mean, obviously huge getting that, um, series win gets the number one RPI team, but, uh, this, this past weekend in Clemson, but, um, I really want to beat the heels. So I'd say, uh,

Cal Parker (1:03:32)
Toy of Game.

Adam Lytch (1:03:57)
To follow up on what we did last week, we were successful at two and saying two and two last week. So I'm going to stretch it to three and one this week.

Cal Parker (1:04:06)
Yeah, this is one guys, if you know, UNC only they've lost four conference games. They've all been on the road. They're four and five on the road in conference play, but it's a series that if we win, even at we're 20 and 13 overall now, if we win this series, we're like back in the host discussion. It sounds crazy to say, but at 12 and eight,

If you have a series win over Clemson Duke and UNC, now we're not, I don't think we're a host yet, but you still got it all in front of you because you got Florida State, Wake and Virginia, who are all also RPI top 25 teams. If you win this series, you really kind of control your destiny down the stretch on whether or not you're going to be playing a regional in Raleigh or, you know, heaven forbid you get swept if you're fighting to make a regional still. But.

a lot in front of this, this weekend. And I know, gosh, we, we all hate Carolina. So.

Wesley Wilson (1:05:10)
Did they shoot us last year, right?

Cal Parker (1:05:13)
Is that right? I think you're right.

Adam Lytch (1:05:14)
I think you're right.

Wesley Wilson (1:05:16)
No damn way, no damn way they say this word.

Cal Parker (1:05:16)
I don't.

So a little bit about that Carolina team. They've hit 63 home runs. They got a 418 ERA, not quite as good as what Clemson had. They're aggressive on the base paths. I think everybody probably remembers, you know, Vance Honeycutt, he's still there. He's a junior now, but he swiped 20 bags. They've stolen 60 bases as a team, 60 in 64 attempts. That's...

pretty aggressive base running and they're obviously pretty good at it. They do tend to strike out a lot. I've always thought that's the weakness in Honeycutt's game is he just seems to strike out in large numbers. He struck out 49 times already in 35 games. I mean, that's a huge number. He struck out a quarter as much our team. So he strikes out a lot. I think it's going to be really important. You can't walk that guy. Like...

Adam Lytch (1:06:10)
Wow.

No.

Cal Parker (1:06:19)
just throw it over the play. I mean, he swings through enough that I mean, if he hits a double, then he can only steal third. So I guess he can steal home too. But like that, you know, a guy, you just can't put that guy on via the free pass. You know, you're gonna have to throw it over the plate to him. But you know, they got some pieces in that lineup. Is...

Wesley Wilson (1:06:41)
So you think there's a piece that maybe, you know, maybe Whit, and of course we have no inside information, maybe Whit was potentially able to go this weekend, but we say we're going to hold him off. So he's helped the 100 % against Chapman.

Cal Parker (1:07:00)
I don't know.

Adam Lytch (1:07:01)
I don't know. I wouldn't have thought so.

Cal Parker (1:07:03)
I mean, I think it, I think, I mean, but maybe after you win the first two against Clemson and you've got the series win secure maybe.

Adam Lytch (1:07:08)
Yeah.

Yeah, I would think that would be the only scenario.

Cal Parker (1:07:14)
I think that we all want to see him back in a hurry.

Adam Lytch (1:07:17)
Yeah, absolutely.

Cal Parker (1:07:20)
It just makes us a whole different team. If you get, especially if we can go out and Dom gets you five or five and two thirds like he did last night. And then you get five or six from Whit and you get five or six from Sam. Then you got some pieces on the back end with, I think.

Adam Lytch (1:07:36)
I'd say if we get, if we get to where we're getting, if we get, um, if we could get five plus innings out of all three starters, you know, just coming a weekend, um, I would feel good about winning that series. I think, you know, what we've seen in the, in the pen as of late has, uh,

I feel really good about if our starters can eat up that many innings and keep us in it. Um, I would feel really good about those guys being able to close it out, which is kind of weird to say, uh, given just a couple of weeks ago, we were talking about what, what, what, what did we say, Cal? We talked about it afterwards. There was only, uh, we didn't have any returning pitcher.

non -starter any returning pitcher out of the pen that had under a 10era so um you know if we can get if we can get good performances by hopefully sam and dom and hopefully wit man um and and get us five plus man that would be just absolutely huge

Cal Parker (1:08:52)
Yeah, in the series you feel like you're gonna have to score some runs. They're scoring almost nine runs a game. I mean, they kind of homeworked to death in their ballpark. I think their freshman hit like three against them. So, and you know, they got a pretty solidified lineup. They don't turn it over a whole lot. They've played 36 games and they got one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, nine guys that have started over 30 games. So.

They're not, you know, you kind of got an idea who they're going to run out there. You know, they got some names that we've heard for a while. Alberto Asuna, Honeycutt, like I've already mentioned. But not a whole lot of easy outs in that lineup and a big series. I think at home, you know, I hope that we have a really good crowd. I was looking at the weather. The only good thing about playing Thursday, Friday, Saturday is that the weather is a lot better.

It starts to get a little chilly next week. Looks like Thursday we got a high 86, Friday 82, Saturday 85. And now then we got 68 coming behind that. But I mean three days of mid 80 baseball in April against a rival at home.

Wesley Wilson (1:10:07)
Oh.

Cal Parker (1:10:09)
What can you ask for?

Wesley Wilson (1:10:11)
Might get some golfing this week too.

Cal Parker (1:10:15)
I wish I got to travel again this week. Wesley, I'm hoping you get something in.

Wesley Wilson (1:10:21)
I probably will.

Cal Parker (1:10:23)
So anything you guys want to add for a wrap it up?

Adam Lytch (1:10:26)
to go to bed. So.

Cal Parker (1:10:28)
All right, we're at hour and seven. We've talked enough. Beat the hills. Beat the hills. All right, we'll see you guys next week.

Adam Lytch (1:10:36)
I like it.

Wesley Wilson (1:10:41)
Heheheheh

Cal Parker (1:10:43)
You