Oct. 23, 2008

NEW ORLEANS--The Tulane fall baseball season is coming to a close and Sunday's (October 26) contest will be highlighted with the airing of the London-based New Orleans Saints game on the video board at Greer Field at Turchin Stadium. The Green Wave exhibition game begins at 11am and will serve as a prelude to the Tulane Fall Ball World Series, which begins October 29. In honor of both the baseball exhibition as well as the New Orleans Saints game in London, concession stands will be available to spectators and there is no charge for admission.

Tulane has been holding fall workouts leading up the ceremonial closing of the fall ball season and spectators have an opportunity to preview the Green Wave's 2008-09 squad with Sunday's exhibition.

With a veteran-laden squad which includes 10 seniors, Tulane is only carrying four freshmen, and have used the fall preseason to hone the veterans' abilities while acclimating the four rookies to the program.

"It's more about trying to fine tune what we've got with upperclassmen and take their game to another level," Tulane head coach Rick Jones said of fall ball.

"Freshmen have to make the adjustment, not only in fall ball, but when the lights get turned on in the springtime for real. I've been impressed with our freshmen. Jamie Bruno has really been impressive offensively, Ryan Doiron [RHP] has showed some ability on the mound. Jeremy Schaffer, our catcher has looked really well defensively and been swinging the bat. We think he will be a solid asset to our program. Evan Mistich is still transitioning between infield and outfield but has been swinging the bat well so we think that those guys are going to give us a core group of young guys. But we are going to be relying on the experience and leadership of the veteran team," Jones added.

With so many returning skill sets of which is he already familiar, Jones was able to experiment with positions, which will help to increase depth of the Green Wave's roster.

"Fall Ball is an opportunity to evaluate players not only in their traditional roles but maybe experiment with different positions just so that it increases your depth and versatility," Jones said.

Also key during the fall season is the amount of repetition the players see. "From a team standpoint and an individual technique standpoint, we can spend a lot of time on repetition because you're not playing another team and we can be repetitive in whatever area we think we need to emphasize," Jones said.

After losing many players to the Major League Baseball 2008 Draft near the signing deadline, the Green Wave is carrying a smaller-than-usual fall roster and have modified the intrasquad scrimmages to include three rotating groups of four players, giving the offense more swings than they would have received in a traditional nine-on-nine setup.

Playing with a condensed roster has also presented players with an opportunity to step up and fill the shoes of their teammates gone to the professional ranks. Sam Honeck, a senior for the Green Wave, has been hitting well during fall intrasquad scrimmages and the coaching staff is looking to him to be an offensive threat during the regular season, along with fellow seniors Seth Henry, Andrew Rodgers and junior Josh Prince. Senior Scott Powell is also expected to shake things up on the base paths. Sophomore Conrad Flynn, a 6'3" right-handed pitcher out of Midland, Texas (Grayson Community College) has thrown well during the preseason and continues to hit spots and work around the plate.

"[Flynn] is someone who's going to give us a lot of help on the mound, inning-wise and we expected that," Jones said.

Capping off the fall ball season is the Tulane Fall Ball World Series, which will also be played using the revised format of three teams of four players. Players will see six defensive outs, allowing the coaches to rotate them in between infield and outfield positions, so as to be able to observe who could potentially transition in an injury or pitching change situation. Different in-game competitions will also take place, with points awarded to either team for various scenarios such as quality at-bats on the offensive side, or stranding a runner in scoring position on the defensive side. Public address announcers will be on hand to setup and call the various plays for spectators.

The Tulane Fall Ball World Series will be a five-game series, with first pitch at 2:15pm on October 29 at Greer Field at Turchin Stadium.

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