Texas Tech baseball: Two coaching decisions turned tide of Arkansas game

In the Texas Tech baseball team’s 5-4 win over Arkansas on Monday, a critical decision by each head coach helped turn the tide of the game in the late innings.

Monday’s matchup between the Texas Tech baseball team and Arkansas at the College World Series saw two of the game’s most successful and highly-regarded head coaches square off.  Between Tech’s Tim Tadlock and Arkansas’ Dave Van Horn, there are 12 trips to Omaha and almost 1,300 career wins.

So as one might expect in a one-run game between teams led by legendary head coaches, the   game hinged on two critical decisions, one by each manager.  Fortunately for the Red Raiders, Tadlock’s decision paid off while Van Horn’s ultimately may have cost his team their season.

Let’s begin with the shrewd move Tadlock made in the bottom of the 8th.  With the game tied at 4-4, Cameron Warren drew a walk to put a man at first base with two outs.

Needing to get a runner in scoring position, many (myself included) were expecting Tadlock to pinch run for his lumbering 230-pound first baseman.  However, not only did Tadlock leave Warren in, he made an unexpected decision that changed the course of the game.

With Cody Masters at the plate facing 3-1 count, Tadlock put on a hit-and-run sending his slowest runner in motion.  This was a calculated gamble knowing that Warren would easily be thrown out at second should Masters fail to make contact on the pitch.  But Tadlock also knew that the left-handed Masters feasts on fastballs from right-handed pitchers, and that is what he got on the 3-1 offering.

Masters turned on the pitch and nearly sent it out of the park lining the ball off the top of the right field wall.  Because Warren had been sent in motion on the play, he scored early without a throw.  But had Tadlock played conservatively and not sent Warren with the pitch, there is reason to believe that third base coach J-Bob Thomas would have held the runner at third.  And eve if he had sent Warren home, there would have been a close play at the plate that could have gone either way.

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What makes this decision all the more interesting is that earlier in the game, Tadlock was burned on another hit-and-run attempt when Brian Klein was thrown out at second after Josh Jung was unable to make contact on the pitch.  Fortunately, that did not deter Tadlock from putting the same play in action on Master’s game-winning triple.

"“That’s the first time I’ve stolen in so long,” Warren said. “and I didn’t even look in, and it got so loud and I heard it off the bat, I was like, I think it’s gone but I was like I gotta run. Then I saw J-Bob at third base telling me to go, so I was like, come on, big boy, you’ve got to score.”"

But Arkansas had one last at-bat to work with and as is usual for the Red Raiders in Omaha, recording the final three outs proved to be more difficult than we would have liked.  After John McMillon beaned the leadoff hitter and Taylor Floyd gave up a looping base hit to shallow right, the Hogs had a golden opportunity to tie the game with runners at first and second and no outs.

According to this run expectancy chart from Fan Graphs, in that situation teams are expected to score on average 1.3 runs per inning.  But Arkansas came up empty after Floyd got out of the inning with an infield pop out, a strike out and a line out to right.

And Van Horn’s decision not to put down a bunt to move his runners to second and third with one out seemed rather strange.  In that scenario, teams are still expected to score on average 1.3 runs per inning but getting a man home from 90 feet away is much easier than doing so from 180 feet away.

Plus, Texas Tech has struggled with passed balls and wild pitches in recent games (Floyd alone threw three in one outing against Oklahoma State in the Super Regional) making it seem like the obvious move would be to put pressure on the Red Raider battery by moving the lead runner to third.  What’s more, Van Horn had his leadoff man, Trevor Ezell (who is certainly more than capable of putting down a bunt) at the plate with two on and no outs making it seem odd that no sacrifice was attempted.

Maybe Van Horn was looking for a big inning in hopes of taking the lead.  But it would have served his team better to have two at-bats with men on second and third because one base hit could have given Arkansas the lead..  They could have scored on a sac fly, error, balk or even a ground-out to at least tie the game but instead, the Hogs were unable to get their lead runner past second.

As we have seen every time Texas Tech has been to the College World Series, close games are the norm in Omaha.  Seven of the Red Raiders’ ten all-time CWS games have been decided by two runs or fewer, as was the case in Tech’s second ever showdown with Arkansas in Omaha.  In those situations, it is often a decision by the head coach that tips the scales and fortunately on Monday, Tadlock was able to play the right card in the game’s most critical moment.