Tennessee head coach Tony Vitello made managing his inconsistent bullpen sound so simple after the Vols dropped a three-game series at LSU this weekend.
“It’s kind of that time of year to ride your best guys,” Vitello said.
That’s been Tennessee’s calling card under Vitello. The Vols’ head coach rarely pushes his pitchers on the march to May. But once May rolls around and the game’s intensify, Vitello rides his best guys. There’s one important question with Vitello’s eighth Tennessee squad, however.
Who exactly are those best guys?
If you’re looking at the pitching staff as a whole, top two starters in Liam Doyle and Marcus Phillips fall under that category. And even with a shaky Tegan Kuhns, who started in the Vols’ first six SEC series before coming in out of relief against LSU Sunday, Tennessee’s starting pitchers have 3.59 ERA in 100.1 innings pitched in conference play.
The problem and where Tennessee is searching for answers is in a bullpen that allowed 13 earned runs in 10.1 innings pitched at LSU over the weekend.
Over the course of conference play, Tennessee’s bullpen has posted a 6.08 ERA in 80 innings pitched. Expanding those stats a bit, Tennessee’s starting pitchers have gotten 61 more outs while allowing 14 less earned runs in SEC play.
Nate Snead is undoubtedly one of the Vols’ best guys. But he has been just good and not lockdown, posting a 4.70 ERA in 23 innings pitched in SEC Play. A key arm on Tennessee’s national championship team a season ago, Snead has “some stock in the company” but hasn’t been a fix all guy.
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Most recently, Snead was unable to overcome bad defense in the ninth inning of the Vols’ series opening loss at LSU. Two Dean Curley errors led to six unearned runs and a 6-3 Tigers win that proved to be the difference in the weekend series.
After Snead, left-handed reliever Dylan Loy and right-handed flamethrower Tanner Franklin seem to be the next two most trustworthy arms. Both had strong weekends at LSU. Over the course of the SEC season, Loy has posted a 4.05 ERA in 13.1 innings while Franklin has posted a 5.63 ERA in 16 innings pitched.
Franklin’s numbers are a bit inflated by some bad outings early in SEC play, and he’s steadied himself over the last month. But that’s part of the issue for Tennessee. Even amongst its best bullpen arms, there’s a lack of consistency.
“I think we have a decent understanding of what guys can and can’t do, but everyone just kind of needs to do their job,” Vitello said. “We’ve put full weekends together … we kind of know what a good weekend looks like, and each guy just needs to do their job. Those will be the guys we go with.”
AJ Russell remains a bit of an unknown as he’s made just two appearances in SEC play. But it doesn’t appear that he’s going to be the pitching savior some hoped. His fastball velocity is down compared to what it was last season and there’s not as much run on it.
The junior right hander can still undoubtedly help Tennessee’s pitching staff. But he hasn’t looked like a top 20 pick in the MLB Draft that changes the outlook of the staff to this point.
Freshmen Tegan Kuhns and Brayden Krenzel has both been really good at times. Kuhns has tailed off a bit in recent weeks while Krenzel has been great besides one bad outing against Texas A&M. Krenzel has missed the last two weekends due to illness and his return will be a boost.
But as we enter the home stretch of the regular season, Tennessee is looking for consistency from its top guys and also need a few more to ascend.
