Hawaii baseball: Armed and ready
There are a lot of things to take away from last night’s 15-inning exhibition between the Hawaii and Air Force baseball teams. The Rainbow Warriors won, 12-7, in a pitchers’ showcase skewed by nine runs in the 13th inning — five by UH, five by AFA. Some thoughts:
> The ‘Bows have a lot of pitching depth. “We’ve been throwing strikes all fall,” head coach Mike Trapasso said. Of the scrimmage, “13 of our 15 guys threw well,” Trapasso said, “and 12 of the 15 threw very well.” Seven of the pitchers had perfect 1-2-3 innings.
> Logan Pouelsen, UH’s starting pitcher, threw strikes on 10 of 12 pitches. Four years after undergoing Tommy John surgery, Pouelsen’s fastball velocity is up to 92 mph. “By the end of last year, he put together probably two or three of our best starts of the year,” Trapasso said. “By the end of the year, he was throwing with some plus velocity. He’s carried that over.”
> Cade Halemanu, a sophomore, made an adjustment to his throwing motion. The result? “Better fastball command, spike in his velocity,” Trapasso said. Halemanu was clocking in the 90s last night to go along with a knee-buckling change-up.
> True freshmen Tai Atkins and Vince Reilly each pitched a hitless inning. “Those two guys will pitch a lot for us this year,” Trapasso said.
> Buddy Pindel, a JC transfer, struck out two in a 1-2-3 inning. “He’ll surprise you because he’s 90-91 with plus command,” Trapasso said. “And he doesn’t look that way because his delivery is so smooth. But the ball gets on you.”
> With the graduation of the infield’s left side, the ‘Bows have been able to experiment this fall. Dustin Demeter, who missed last season because of hip surgery, played third last night. He played shortstop and second base his first two UH seasons. Kole Kaler, a transfer from South Mountain Community College, has been reliable at shortstop. Stone Miyao, a freshman from Hilo, has shown range at second. Trapasso said Bubba Akana and Aaron Ujimori are in the infield mix.
> Matt Wong, a Saint Louis School graduate who transferred from College of Southern Nevada, started in center field and showed he can handle Les Murakami Stadium’s spacious alleys.
C’mon, Coach Trap. You’re not winning, but it’s great fun following all of your former players and recruits succeed in MLB. But winning is a good thing, too.
Thanks for doing a baseball report ST. Couldn’t find anything on the team after the HPU
scrimmage.
Oct 12 : HPU beat UH , 7-3 per HPU. Armed and unready ?
Maybe Matlin needs to set a “make or break” time frame where UH needs to get back to a regional or further. “Push the envelope” some. Get those attendance numbers back up. IDK. I keep believing Trap can do it. Lots of people have given up though. Can do?
Kev 1 (previous post)
I think the only way to get the volume back up is to “re-brand” to include the next/new generation of fans. The lurkers. Maybe invite “cross-posts” with the other sites and their regular people or something. IDK. All have their own style.
Mahalo Islandman!
At this point gotta hope that San Diego State stumbles at least once vs Nevada or Fresno State
Wow lots of negative stuff??
Guys, I know that there’s not really a lot to appreciate with Coach Trap still there, but be thankful that this could be the last time we’ll see him (Unless this team can get a winning season in 2020). You know, I spoke with Daylen Calicdan yesterday prior to the UC Davis WVB match, he said that Oregon’s bound to come back, And knowing that Vandy’s coming aboard to the schedule, this’ll be where it gets interesting, especially if this schedule will prove to be tough for them to be prepared once they start BWC play.
At this point, it’ll be a curious situation where the guys who sat out last year (Matt Campos and Ryder Kuhns due to redshirting by NCAA ruling) and the newcomers come aboard to play in this particular season. Fogel’s and Demeter’s return will make things a whole lot fun to watch. Kuhns and Baeza look like the ones fighting for the first base from the looks of it. Demeter, he mentioned to me that he could be vying for the shortstop spot, but seeing him play 3rd against Air Force is interesting, and especially this is where finding a way to replace Ethan Lopez becomes difficult. The only thing Coach Trap needs to do, if anything, is to keep his players healthy, without any sort of major setback.
Now, I know what you guys are thinking. ‘Why bother when he knows that it’ll end in a big letdown?’. I’ll tell you this, the depth that Coach Trap has brought in should be an interesting selection. It’s not just Bellevue College that he’s getting his transfers worth. He’s got a left-handed pitcher from Washington State, a left-handed pitcher from San Jose State, a left-handed pitcher from Saint Mary’s, two from the College of Southern Nevada, and an Arizona JC transfer. This’ll be an interesting scenario and can’t wait to see what the rest of the schedule will bring.
When is the schedule coming out? I would like to see the lineup of games.