OU @ MU

■ The Sooners' bats have been booming lately:

• Team batting average: .350; Slugging %: .596; on-base %: .439; Averaging 10.24 runs per game this season; Averaging 14.5 runs per game in 6 Big 12 matchups.

Compare this, if you are brave of heart, to MU's team batting average of .256, average 5.96 runs per game (2.44 rpg in 9 Big 12 matchups)

• Sooners pound Huskers (3/30/09): Oklahoma had made its point already. The Sooners can score some runs. Maybe they thought Nebraska wasn’t buying it.The
Sooners banged out 16 hits, including seven home runs in a 16-6 series-clinching victory over Nebraska. Aaron Baker led the way with five RBIs and two home runs.

• OU bats are popping (3/27/09): OU ranks in the top 17 nationally in just about every offensive category and has been the best in the two most important — hits (No. 3 with 309) and runs (No. 3 with 248).

“We’ve got some hitters in the lineup that can do a lot of things,” OU coach Sunny Golloway said. The reasons for the offensive explosion are like a multiple-choice test where all of the above is very applicable.

• No. 13 Oklahoma pounds K-State 29-4 (3/23/09): Just moments into the game, when Oklahoma belted the first pitch of the game over the fence for the first of 11 home runs, it ignited a 13-run first inning that sent Kansas State reeling.
OU put on a hitting clinic on Sunday at Tointon Family Stadium, routing the Wildcats 29-4 in seven innings.

• CollegeBaseballToday listed a few particulars about the OU-KSU slaughter:
- The 1st inning took 55 minutes to complete.
- OU sent 17 hitters to the plate in the 1st.
- The wind was gusting up to 35mph out to left field.
- Oklahoma batted around twice in the first five innings.
- The Sooners parked 11 homers on the day, easily a school record.
- The 11 home runs also tied a Big 12 record.
- Casey Johnson hit two home runs in the 5th inning.
- J.T. Wise drove in seven runs and scored four himself.
- 29 runs is the most runs in a game since 1986 for the Sooners.
- The Sooners have hit 40 home runs already this season after hitting 54 in 63 games last season.
- Jamie Johnson hit his fourth lead off home run for OU.

■ Tim Jamieson expects the Tiger pitching to be able to handle the Sooner hitters. During an interview on KFRU's The Closers, he said that "if our pitchers do what they're best at, which is pump strikes in there and get ahead on the count, they'll do fine; we know they're going to be swinging early and often."

The Coach also commented on the success of Johnny Wholestaff:

We've got several pitchers who have proved they can be effective for one inning. Some of them have also proved they're not so effective for 2 or 3 innings. But one inning is what we need.

■ The Columbia Missourian profiles Kyle Gibson: Missouri baseball team's ace shows a heart of service:

A jumble of eight letters and a date line the left edge of Kyle Gibson's baseball cap in careful penmanship.

The letters - WWNFYTML - stand for "We will never forget you, Todd Michael Lewis." The date, 10-24-06, signifies when Lewis, a close friend of Gibson's since they were in fourth grade, died of lymphatic cancer and pneumonia.

■ An optimist on Tigerboard.com:

mizzoucobra: We're gonna take 2 of 3. either tep or gibson gets the win AND the sooners will buckle when they see the baseball equivalent of the option offense in football

■ MU's game with OU on Saturday will broadcast live on Fox Sports Midwest. Familiar Mizzou voices will be at the mikes: Chris Gervino for play-by-play, with former Coach Gene McArtor doing color commentary.

■ For anyone who is down in the dumps about Missouri's struggles this year, Kendall Rogers at Rivals.com posted this list of normally competitive teams whose RPIs (based on the Pseudo-RPIs at Boyd's World) are low enough to be ranked in the 100s:

Tulane -- 102
Houston -- 104
Wichita State -- 105
South Florida -- 107
Notre Dame -- 108
Kent State - 111
New Orleans - 122
Charlotte -- 147
St. John's -- 150
Michigan -- 155
Pepperdine -- 173
Fresno State (2008 CWS champs)-- 176
Santa Clara -- 187

By comparison, Mizzou is currently ranked 68th. In 2006, the year MU went to a Super Regional, the Tigers' Pseudo-RPI was 67th as late as the lst week in April. In 2005, they were at 69th on April 12th; In 2004, they were 93rd on April 27th. MU was in the Regionals all those years.

■ The Columbia Tribune chimes in on the MU-SLU game at Busch, with MU loves taste of big time:

Shortstop Michael Liberto said he felt the excitement from the moment he woke
up.

“Woke up this morning, realized I was playing at Busch Stadium, I was like, ‘Man, this is cool,’ ” Liberto said. “While we were taking” batting practice, “I was taking grounders, and I was like, ‘Man, this is awesome. Albert Pujols stands right there, Khalil Greene, everybody.”

■ Switch to seven-inning baseball games? The way to make baseball more attractive is NOT to provide less of it. That's like saying dinner will draw more people if we shorten it by doing away with dessert.