Tennessee baseball blew a late game lead Friday night, dropping its series opener against LSU 7-5 on Friday night in Knoxville.
Following the game, Tennessee head coach Josh Elander discussed the inability to get clutch hits, last game pitching decisions and much more. Here’s everything Elander said.
More From RTI: Tennessee Baseball Blows Late Lead In Series Opener Against LSU
On Tennessee redshirt junior LHP Brandon Arvidson allowing three straight walks to lead off the eighth
“Just spraying the ball a little bit. I mean, credit to LSU. They did a good job of kind of squeezing him there, but at that point you got to come in and attack the strike zone. We have 100% confidence in Arv to be able to do that, and for whatever reason he wasn’t able to get it over the plate. (The) idea was to be able to get him through Jake Brown. That’s a guy that can change the game in one swing, and he gets us out of there, and then we were going to go to (Bo) Rhudy and let it roll from there. Clearly, the wrong decision, looking back now, but the theme of the deal needs to be, you got a lead late in the game, you got to attack the strike zone, dominate the average play. Same things we’ve been talking about for weeks around here, and starts with me. I got to put them in a better position to get that thing done right there.”
On why he elected to pull Landon Mack after the seventh; if he considered pulling Arvidson in the midst of his three straight walks
“No, not really on Arv. Again, got confidence in him. I want to give him a leash and let him run. You know, he’s been phenomenal for us at points throughout the course of the year.
“And you know, Mack was rolling through his deal where he’s got his deal with diabetes. He’s in and out, he’s got 94 pitches, seven innings, gives us a chance to win. I thought — I mean, again, one walk, 10 punch outs. That’s as good as we’ve seen him throw. And we challenged him, ‘Hey, Friday night, you’re a guy that has handled this in the past.’ Gives us a chance to win right there.
“And you know, again, you’re going into eighth (and) ninth (inning), you got a chance to get six outs with the lead on your home field, we should be able to pick five or six different guys out of our bullpen and throw them out there and get it done. But when you don’t throw strikes at times, good teams are going to get you. That’s what happened to us tonight.”
On his comment about the eighth inning “clearly, the wrong decision,” if he was referencing the decision to leave Arvidson in or the one to go to Bo Rhudy
“Well, both, because we didn’t win the game, right? You can look at it and guess one way or the other. Ultimately, it’s my fault. Whatever the decision is, have conviction in the moment, we’re going to give Arv some trust and some leash right there. Walks the first couple guys and again, ‘hey, you can get through this,’ and he was trying to shoo me away from coming to get him right there. But we liked the matchup with (Omar) Serna (Jr.) and then (Derek) Curiel is a good hitter, and Bo (Rhudy) has been throwing the ball well. I think that’s the first homer he’s given up all year. So again, it’s the wrong decision if it doesn’t put us in a position to win the game, and that was the case again tonight.”
On if Tennessee was always going to go to Brandon Arvidson in the eighth inning, if the length of the bottom of the seventh factored into his decision
“No, that was always the plan. I thought (he) got us through seven innings, we were in a good spot where he’s been grinding through the last few weeks, and 100% confidence, that we talked about earlier in the week was, have a chance for Bo or Arv to have the ball in their hand with the game on the line. Didn’t get it done tonight, but we’ll get it back to them again, and they will in the future.”
On Tennessee leaving runners on base late in the game
“I think it’s just, again, some guys chase it down out of the zone and some big stuff that LSU is rolling out. It’s, you know, mid-90’s with good sliders, and some angle, and some deception, some different things. But, you know, again, there’s a couple at-bats there in the big moments where, hey (Blake Grimmer) does a good job of walking, or if we see the ball up a little bit better off (Casan) Evans, it’s kind of a conflicting deal. He’s throwing pitches with ride, but the ball is at the bottom of the zone. They’re not getting hits. You’re having to look for pitches up in the zone.
“But same deal. Left too many guys on base. You know, get a chance at one more big hit to blow it open, and Friday night in this league is unforgiving if you don’t get that done.”
On if there are any common denominators in the last four SEC losses
“Yeah, they haven’t been good. That’s the simple way to look at it. And we’re right there. We could talk about if or that, or hey, can we do this better? My challenge to the team was, including myself included, is we all got to do our job a little bit better. Whatever your job is, whatever your task is, there’s no word for almost in this league.
And we can talk about this or that, but, again, this is another game we had a lead late in the game. We got a chance to get it down and we haven’t done that. So we need to make the adjustments to do so.”
On if the close losses is affecting the team mentally late in close games
“I think that’s a fair question, but no, I thought our guys’ mentality was good. I thought they’ve been attacking and Arv right there, again, I went out to get him. He’s trying to shoo me and say, hey, I got this right there. But it was time to move on right there. But no, our guys, when they wear this jersey, they show up and they want to compete. And they’ve been doing that for a long time around here.
And again, baseball, the door swings both ways. We can go over any cliché that we want, but we’re right in these games. We just got to finish and we all got to do our jobs better.”
On if he’s worried about how they’ll respond to another gut punch of a loss
“No, I think scars are good in this league and we’ll figure out how tough we are real quick because this league can knock you down. It’s about getting back off the mat. This is baseball. It’s a three-game series. We still got a chance to win a series on our home field. So looking forward to a good response. And Tegan Kuhns will lead us out of the gate tomorrow. We got Appy ready to rock and roll. So, the crowd was amazing tonight. Gave us a chance to win with the environment here. Our guys expect when they hook up to have a chance to get it done and we need to do that tomorrow.”
On what he liked about Landon Mack’s outing
“I just thought it was poise for the most part, which is kind of different because he’s a little fiery and he’ll have those moments. But I just thought about how he went through the day. Like, it was just a little bit like, hey, I’ve been there, done this before. It’s his fourth SEC start or whatever it is now. So, we expect him to continue to get better, but it’s real stuff. And I thought he was just pitching instead of just trying to drive heaters or miss with the breaking ball down. This was one that meant a little bit more to him and he competed very well. So, that’s another thing that stinks because he was good tonight.”
On why they decided to go with Mack in the Friday night role
“Just competitiveness. And we haven’t won on Friday night in a couple of weeks. We’ve got to keep mixing and matching. There’s some lefties there that, again, Landon struggled with. But I think with the adjustments that he’s made, he’s continued to get better-and-better week-to-week. And that’s what you want. And you want poise and competitiveness and stuff on Friday night in this league. I think he checks all those boxes. So he was really good for us there tonight.”
