Cal Poly baseball faces toughest schedule in program history, coach says
For three straight years, Cal Poly’s baseball team has finished as the runner-up in the Big West Conference, coming just shy of a title that would earn the Mustangs an automatic berth in the NCAA tournament.
Last year got off to a bumpy 2-9 start thanks to a tough 2019 schedule that opened against Oklahoma and California, but Cal Poly rebounded with a strong finish, evening its record at 28-28 while going 17-7 in the Big West.
This year’s start looks to be no easier — in fact, it may be even more difficult — as the Mustangs open with another formidable non-conference schedule.
“This is the most challenging schedule that we’ve ever had,” Coach Larry Lee said in a statement released by Cal Poly. “I would imagine that this might be the most difficult non-conference schedule in the country.”
In its first weekend of NCAA play Feb. 14-16 in Arizona, the Mustangs will face last year’s national runner-up Michigan (Feb. 15) and national champion Vanderbilt (Feb. 16), after starting against NCAA regional qualifier Connecticut.
All three games will be livestreamed on ESPN Radio 1280 with Eric Burdick calling the play-by-play, according to Cal Poly. Each contest also will be video streamed on MLB.com. Links for audio and video streams as well as live stats are available on the baseball schedule page at www.GoPoly.com.
“We’ll need to be ready,” Lee told The Tribune. “We’ll have to limit errors in the infield and not beat ourselves. We don’t have a lot of power but will need to put the ball in play with two strikes and make some things happen.”
Lee said he likes to set the schedule up with some competitive adversity to gauge the team’s abilities and establish credibility with strength of schedule for a possible NCAA postseason selection.
The first weekend’s games will be held in Scottsdale, Arizona, at the spring training home of the Arizona Diamondbacks and Colorado Rockies.
The Mustangs return for their home opener on Feb. 18, before playing five consecutive weekends inside Baggett Stadium in San Luis Obispo, where the program is finishing a new $8 million clubhouse that is scheduled to open during the season and includes a weight room, study hall and coaches’ offices.
Besides the two national finalists, Cal Poly faces five other teams who qualified for the NCAA regionals, including a four-game series at Pac-12 member Oregon.
Baylor, Oklahoma and Stanford are also among this season’s opponents.
Cal Poly’s lineup includes some key returners
As the Mustangs get ready, Lee said that he’s still contemplating his lineup, which brings back 10 of the 11 position players who started at least 20 games in 2019 and eight of last year’s 13 pitchers, including junior right-hander Darren Nelson (13 starts) and southpaw Andrew Alvarez (six starts).
Already, the season threw him an early curve ball when his son, highly regarded prospect Brooks Lee, suffered a knee injury in an October preseason game and underwent surgery that will keep him out of action until around April.
The former San Luis Obispo High School star was projected as a first-round pick in the 2019 Major League Baseball draft, but he passed up the chance for a multi-million-dollar payday to play for his dad at Cal Poly instead.
That injury opened an unexpected hole in the infield and could cause some shuffling of positions.
“We still haven’t determined our lineup, and we have a group of about seven or eight incoming players,” Lee said in his statement. “... We’ll be trying to figure out our best positioning for offense and defense, and some of the younger guys will be competing for spots with returners. It’s one thing to practice and scrimmage, but it’s another to see how guys perform when the lights are on.”
First baseman Tate Samuelson and pitcher Taylor Dollard were among the team’s statistical leaders last season.
Samuelson, a junior, batted. 298 and led the Mustangs with five home runs and 39 runs batted in, starting 54 games as a sophomore.
“I’ve tried to improve in every area of the game the past two years,” Samuelson said. “Last year, I started out a little slow with my average. ... I’ve gotten stronger and worked hard in the summer and the fall. Hitting is never easy.”
He could end up playing some third base because incoming freshman Nick Marinconz, who is the brother of former Cal Poly infielder Kyle Marinconz, is slated to move from third to short to fill in for Lee. Marinconz hit .308 during an injury-shortened senior season at Valley Christian in San Jose.
Another option at third is Nick DiCarlo, who played 54 games at the position last year, posting a .255 average with 11 doubles and 22 RBIs as a sophomore.
Senior catcher Myles Emmerson will anchor the defense, after a 2019 campaign in which he started 50 games and threw out 13 would-be base stealers while posting a .256 batting average with a home run and 17 RBIs.
Cal Poly’s outfield will return Cole Cabrera (.229 average in 2019), Bradlee Beesley, who’s expected to play center field (.277 in 2019), and either newcomer Kyle Ashworth or Elijah Greene (.277 in 2019) in right field.
Ashworth was a career .416 hitter in three varsity seasons at Foothill High School in Santa Ana.
“We’re still considering what our infield will look like and trying guys out at different spots,” Lee said. “Our younger guys are in the mix to compete for playing time.”
Cal Poly will need to fill pitching holes
With the losses of two first-team All-Big West pitchers Bobby Ay (9-1, 3.27 ERA) and closer Michael Clark (6-3, 2.61 ERA, eight saves), the Mustangs will have some gaps to fill on the mound.
Dollard, a sophomore, served as closer last year with a 5-0 record, a 2.89 earned run average and four saves — but he’ll transition to the Friday night starter role this year.
The 6-foot-2-inch right-hander from Encino, with a 89 to 92 mph fastball, said transitioning to his new role “will be a different mentality.”
“You really have to be ready and then pace yourself, whereas being a closer you don’t have to be up for most of the game until it’s your turn to go at the end, and you’re exuding a lot of your energy,” Dollard said. “As a closer, it’s just like a light switch going on and off.”
Dollard said he uses four pitches — a fastball, slider, curve and change-up — and he’ll have to mix up his pitches to give batters a different look throughout the game.
“It will be fun facing off against the other team’s best pitchers to start out our series,” Dollard said. “It’s going to be their best stuff against my best stuff.”
Cal Poly will use a collection of other pitchers, including Nelson, a junior right-hander, and the southpaw Alvarez, along with freshmen Drew Thorpe (Desert Hills High School in St. George, Utah) and Derek True (Santa Barbara High School), both right-handers.
Alvarez was 1-3 last year with a 5.10 ERA in 22 appearances, recording his six starts all in the last six weeks.
“We’re trying to convert Dollard and Alvarez to starters and combine them with a couple of freshmen to make up our starting rotation,” Lee said. “If those four can continue to develop and remain healthy through the course of the year, they can give us some length before turning it over to our bullpen.”
Cal Poly will seek to improve on subpar hitting
Last year, the Mustangs posted their lowest-ever batting average (.260), on-base percentage (.341) and slugging percentage (.332), as well as fewest runs scored (247), RBIs (217), doubles (76), home runs (13) and steals (22) in Cal Poly’s 25-year Division I history.
“I tell our players to want to be up at the plate with the game on the line,” Lee said. “If Michael Jordan takes the last shot of the game and misses, who’s going to take the game-winning shot the next night? Jordan is. And he doesn’t care he missed the night before. You have to have that mentality.”
Lee said the team doesn’t have a lot of power again this year but should see fewer strikeouts with contact hitting and some “high-ceiling young players.”
By April, his son Brooks Lee is expected to return from knee surgery to play shortstop and help fuel the offense to start conference play.
Cal Poly is projected to finish in a second-place tie with Long Beach State, according to a Big West coaches’ poll.
The last time the Mustangs went to the NCAA postseason was 2014, when they earned their first conference title.
A large group of the 2014 team played against Cal Poly at a recent annual alumni game at Baggett Stadium. The current team beat the alumni 21-2.
This story was originally published February 12, 2020 at 5:00 AM.
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