Baseball Begins 2015 Season Friday With First Practice

January 23, 2015 | Baseball

First pitch of the 2015 season is just three weeks away!

By: by Scott Swegan, BGSU Athletic Communications

The Bowling Green State University baseball team will begin their 2015 season at Southeast Missouri on Feb. 13. With just three weeks until first pitch, the team partook in their first practice of the 2015 season inside of Perry Field House on Friday afternoon. Head coach Danny Schmitz sat down with BGSUFalcons.com to preview the season and talk about the importance of these practices leading up to the first game in Cape Girardeau, Mo. against the Redhawks.

BGSUFalcons.com: Coach, you lost 12 players to graduation off last year's team and will be breaking in a lot of newcomers this season. What early season challenges does this pose?

Danny Schmitz: There is no doubt about it, we are the new-look Falcons this year. With all the seniors we lost last year, we had to bring is 12 or 13 newcomers to replace them. It's basically a brand new squad with half of the team being new this season. But the guys are working hard, and I think our three captains are doing a great job. The upperclassmen have done a great job helping the first-year guys through the adjustment phase.

BG: What are some of the positives for a team that has so many newcomers?

DS: One nice thing about first-year players is that they are like sponges—they're taking in everything. That's why I felt it was important to get them acclimated to what Falcon baseball is all about during our fall schedule. There will be challenges along the way—I'm sure we'll go through some growing pains. We expect to get better every day; this is a talented group that we brought in.

BG: How important are the captains to your program and what role do they fill within the program?

DS: I believe that if you want to be a successful program, you need to be strong right up the middle. We have Jason Link to lead our pitching staff. He's been a key to our pitching staff since he stepped foot on campus three years ago, and now we need him to step up and lead that staff. In the middle of the diamond, Brian Bien has been a two-time All-Conference player for us and was first team All-MAC at shortstop last year. I've always said that the shortstop and second baseman are the leaders on the field, so we need Brian to run the show not only on the field, but off the field as well. Kory Brown is a newcomer, who came from Muskegon Community College. From day one he has impressed the coaches' and the team and was voted a captain. He not only has won the respect of the coaching staff, but also his teammates.

BG: Can you talk about the pitching staff and how that is shaping up for the 2015 season?

DS: There is no doubt that we have some important pieces to replace, but I felt that Andrew Lacinak was our best pitcher down the stretch last year. We expect him to come back and be our Friday starter. The other two spots are open and we think competition is going to be extremely high for those spots. Our winter games that we will be playing when practice officially begins will be important. There are several guys—both returners and newcomers—who are going to compete for those spots.

BG: With the loss of several starters from last year's team, can you discuss the competition for those spots?

DS: Out of the nine positions, Brian Bien is probably the only guy that we would be comfortable penciling in at this point. We lost our top two catchers from last season, so there is definitely going to be a great battle there. At first base we have a great hole to fill after losing both Jeremy Shay and T.J. Losby. We have holes to fill at second base and third base, and there is great competition at both spots for the starting role. In the outfield, we are going to give Brandon Howard a chance to compete for a spot because we want to keep his athleticism in the outfield. There will be a lot of competition out there as we lost Patrick Lancaster, Andrew Kubuski, and Jake Thomas from last year's team.

BG: What things does this team need to do to be successful in 2015?

DS: Any successful team must have great leadership. That falls on the shoulders of our captains, but also our other upperclassmen. We also will look for our freshmen to step up and lead—we are all in this together. Team chemistry is another factor that is extremely important. The early games will be extremely important as we get a lot of looks and use a lot of different lineups to see what lineup we want to use out there when we start conference play in March.