Seminoles Destroy Stanford

Today is my wife's birthday. She is amazing and another FSU grad. She also runs a zoo blog with me and runs another blog by herself. Today she is doing a huge giveaway on her blog, so I invite you to check it out. Anyways, the Seminoles baseball team gave her an early birthday present last night and I am going to write about it here.

Florida State won last night 17-1. They absolutely crushed the Stanford Cardinal. Not just that, but they did it against Mark Appel. Appel lasted only 4 innings against the Noles. He walked 4(with the Orioles walk problems out of starters, I am glad we passed). The noise at Dick Howser noticeably got to him and he was unable to adjust. Those Seminole bats didn't help out much either. Despite only giving up 5 hits, Appel gave up 7 runs in those 4 innings of work.

Then the bullpen entered for Stanford and got hammered. They gave up 10 runs over 4. Stanford didn't even pitch 9 innings and gave up 17. That is a true testament to the Seminoles ability to hit the baseball.

That offense was paced by Devon Travis. All the Seminoles were mashing, but none better than Travis. He went 3-5, scored 3 times, drove in 6, and hit 2 home runs. The home runs were his 6th and 7th of the season. Even taking out the RBIs, Travis beat the Cardinal by himself with 2 home runs. Absolutely an incredible performance by the 2nd baseman for the Seminoles. Hope he can keep it up.

Brandon Leibrandt was again fantastic for the Noles on the mound picking up the victory. He was also named to the Freshman All-American team earlier in the day. These Noles are not playing around. Now, these Noles are one win away from a trip to Omaha.

-Noland

Orioles Select LSU Pitcher Kevin Gausman

The Orioles selected LSU right handed pitcher Kevin Gausman with the 4th pick in the draft which is still in its early stages on mlb.com. They made this pick after Stanford's Mark Appel, the expected #1 pick, fell to them at 4. Appel is still on the board currently. As I type this, we are currently at the #8 pick which belongs to the Pittsburgh Pirates and they just took Appel.

Gausman is the 3rd LSU player the Orioles selected in the first round. They selected Ben McDonald #1 overall in 1989 and Mike Fotenot in 2001. Both were solid, but unspectacular major league players. Although Fotenot wasn't with the Orioles. I hope Gausman is better than those because we need this pick to hit.

This season, Gausman is 11-1 with a 2.72 ERA in the extremely tough SEC. Gausman helped LSU advance to the Super Regional. Be sure to check out the future Oriole in the Baton Rouge Super Regional. Gausman has a mid to upper 90s and a plus changeup. Another thing that Gausman has is a coach with Oriole ties. Alan Dunn is Gausman's pitching coach at LSU. Small world.

Welcome to the Orioles organization, Kevin Gausman. Good luck as the college baseball playoffs continue.

-Noland