Around the Horn: Florida Gators baseball continues weekend hot streak
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — What’s a midweek game? The Florida Gators baseball team has lost four straight midweek affairs but has yet to lose a weekend series, which included a series win over No. 4 Texas A&M and a road series win over No. 5 LSU.
The Gators, at times, have been an enigma. Or have they just been a young team that needed to go through growing pains? We dig into that and more in this edition of Around The Horn.
Ty Evans is on fire
It started in Omaha at the 2023 College World Series and has extended into the 2024 campaign. Evans just went 8-15 (.533) against LSU. He scored five times, drove in four, and smacked two doubles and two home runs.
On the season, Evans is batting .389 — trailing only Jac Caglianone. He’s also torn up SEC pitching. In six SEC games, Evans is leading the Gators with a .429 average and a .729 slugging percentage.
The evolution of Jac Caglianone
Caglianone is coming off of a season in 2023 where he hit a Florida Gators baseball and NCAA (BBCOR bat era) record 33 home runs. He batted .323 and slugged .738. On the mound, he went 7-4 with a 4.34 ERA. Those are incredible offensive numbers and very respectable pitching numbers.
Caglianone is putting those pitching numbers to shame in 2024.
In five starts, Caglianone is 3-0 with a 1.65 ERA. He’s thrown 27.1 innings, allowed just 12 hits, walked 18 and struck out 39. There have been some mechanical changes to his delivery, but the biggest change has been between his ears. Caglianone has matured and grown up in the offseason. He’s always been a fierce competitor — and still is — but his ability to move on from a bat pitch or a bad at-bat and start fresh has changed his game.
“I think that’s one of the biggest changes he’s made from last year,” Kevin O’Sullivan said of Caglianone’s new mindset. “Mentally, we threw the ball away at first where there probably wasn’t a play. He kept his composure, made his pitches. We kicked the ball in left field but didn’t show any emotion, kind of kept it together. I can’t say enough about how he’s been pitching the entire year.”
Florida Gators baseball freshmen growing up
When will a freshman be ready? There’s no one answer or blueprint. Every person is different and every player will progress differently. Florida entered the season with 11 freshmen arms (out of 18 total pitchers on the roster). They were going to rely on young pitchers and would have to endure the growing pains that come with it.
However, the start that the freshmen had was perplexing to Kevin O’Sullivan. Luke McNeillie spent all fall throwing against the Florida lineup and didn’t allow an earned run. When the season started, McNeillie gave up 16 earned runs over his first 8.1 innings of work. Alex Philpott, Liam Peterson and the rest of the young arms Florida was rolling out also struggled, mostly just throwing strikes.
Now, 23 games into the campaign, it appears they’re turning the corner. Luke McNeillie hasn’t allowed a run in his last 5.2 innings of work. He closed out the series at home against Texas A&M, threw 2.1 innings against JU and struck out six, and threw a scoreless 2.1 on the road against LSU on Saturday. McNeillie rounding back into form will be huge for the Gators in conference play.
The final line from Saturday won’t indicate it, but Liam Peterson had his best start in a month on the road at LSU. Peterson allowed four runs but outside of three mistake pitches which LSU turned into home runs, he was much sharper. The Gators need him to continue to get comfortable and pitch to his capabilities.
Florida also got good contributions from Grayson Smith and Frank Menendez over the weekend. If the young pitchers can get going and keep it going Florida’s pitching staff is deep enough to make a run.
Pierce Coppola update
The 6-8 left-hander continues to work towards returning to the mound. Coppola last threw in a game on Feb. 20, 2022. Coppola’s last outing was also his first. Back surgery ended his freshman campaign and a shoulder injury kept him off the mound in 2023 for his second season.
Coppola has been working to get back on the mound and last week he took the next step in that endeavor. Coppola finished his bullpen throwing rehabilitation and took the mound last week to face live batters. Coppola was sharp throwing to live batters for the first time in more than a year.
Due to his injury history (back and shoulder), the plan for bringing him back would be as a starting pitcher. That would allow Coppola to know when he is pitching and get a normal warm-up in. Asking him to come out of the bullpen, when the situations and warm-up times can vary greatly depending on the game or situation isn’t something the coaching staff is interested in.
Kevin O’Sullivan has said that one option would be for Coppola to start a midweek game to ease his way back into the mix and that could be in the near future. Getting a healthy Coppola back will make the Florida pitching staff even stronger.
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