A lot of baseball fans in Louisiana knew little about Coastal Carolina but learned a lot after they beat LSU in two straight games to advance to the College World Series. It will be their first appearance in Omaha. The two game defeat for LSU was a continuation of their regular season failure of leaving too many men on base in scoring position. Timely hitting was lacking.
Coach Paul Mainieri wore the look of "no confidence" in the dug out and on the field, especially when he changed pitchers. This writer's commentary dated 6/21/15 titled LSU baseball and the college world series attempted to explain the short comings of the LSU team and this season indicates the same apply. LSU has never replaced the talent they lost a few years ago who were so productive at the plate.
Paul Mainieri is no Skip Bertman and no one expects him to be but Mainieri's team lacks the basics of the game. This writer believes one reason the LSU talent level has fallen off is because of the SEC expansion a few years ago. Expansion dilutes the available talent as I explained in my previous commentary. LSU's two loses came in their own ball park, a place where they should enjoy at least some advantage over their opponents.
Mainieri talks as if LSU's talent is there but this writer disagrees and saw no improvement over last years team and very little in this years team as the season played out.
This commentary written by Joe Lorio
