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Kansas baseball head coach Ritch Price has agreed to take questions from fans through Rock Chalk Talk for the rest of the season. I’m sure it goes without saying that his offer is very much appreciated and that we are lucky to have a head coach here at Kansas willing to do thing like this.
If you have a question you can either post it in the comment section below or e-mail it to me at jqku at hotmail . com. Each week I’ll send three or four questions to Price and post his answers here on the site. Please include a name and your location with your question, or, if you prefer to submit the question anonymously indicate so.
For example: "Dear Coach Price. Why don’t you play Donny more often at shortstop? I am sure he is the best shortstop on the team." (Donny’s Aunt, Topeka)
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Kansas (18-12) @ Iowa (11-15)
Kansas visits Iowa for Tuesday and Wednesday games. First pitch for both games is now 4PM. KU will provide a free audio web cast of the games. Just link here, go to schedule and log in from there.
Probable Starters
Tues 4PM: Cameron Selik (1-1, 5.47 ERA) vs. Phil Schreiber (1-0, 3.38 ERA)
Wed 4PM: Brett Bollman (3-0, 1.80) vs. Zach Robertson (2-1, 12.38)
Iowa is not having a good year. The Hawkeyes are 9-15 vs. D-I opponents and their RPI is at #215. They can’t blame their woes on a tough schedule. Iowa’s strength of schedule is ranked #176 and Kansas will be the best team they have faced so far. However, there are some cautionary factors at work here for KU fans. First off is that these games will be in Iowa City and the Jayhawks are only 1-7 on the road. Iowa is 2-3 at home vs. D-I teams. The second area of concern is Tuesday’s pitching match-up. Iowa sends freshman righty Phil Schreiber to the mound. Schreiber has good control (2 walks in 16 innings) a low ERA (3.38) and is controlling left handed hitters very well (.167 batting average against.)
Iowa is a fair offensive team. The Hawkeyes are slugging .443 as a team and they also have a lot of speed on the base pads (43 stolen bases in 26 games). All this adds up to an average of 6.8 runs scored per game on average. The Hawkeye pitching staff is somewhat below average but much better than KU’s last two mid-week opponents. The Hawkeyes give up 7.6 runs a game on average. They look to have a few decent arms in their bullpen - Patrick Schatz (2.01 ERA in 22.1 innings) and closer Mike Schurz (3.38 ERA in 10.2 innings).
Hopefully KU will not stumble this week and bring some momentum back to Hoglund where they will face Oklahoma State this weekend.
