University of Southern Mississippi Athletics
Blogging the Plate with Kevin Coker
4/19/2006 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
April 18, 2006
12th blog entry with thoughts on hitting a two-out three run double in the bottom of the seventh inning to give Southern Miss a 9-6 lead against Houston in the final game of the weekend series on Sunday, visiting with the Thames Elementary special education class and the joy of signing autographs for kids at the end of games.
So I was facing an 0-2 count with two outs, three runners on base, and a chance to break open a 6-6 tie with Houston in the bottom of the seventh in the final game of the series on Sunday. The guy (Houston pitcher Barry Laird) was throwing some nasty stuff, and I was having trouble seeing it, and he throws a fastball right down the middle of the plate. I wanted to go out there and feel my way out to see what he had. So there I am down 0-1 and he throws a good breaking ball - I swing and I'm out in front of it by about a foot. It's now 0-2, so I locked in and gave it my two strike swing. He threw me a slider and it kind of spun, and wasn't as good as before, and I just hit it and it landed.
You don't get scared being in that type of situation; you get fired up. I had the luxury that we had already tied the game earlier in the inning with two runs to make it 6-6. It's like when you're in the backyard playing basketball where instead of being down a point, you make a tying score as the buzzer goes off. Then you hear, "It's 98-98 - Coker gets the ball and shoots it!" In this situation, if you make it, you make it. If you don't, then you go into overtime. I don't think I had any pressure on me because we had the eighth and the ninth innings if we needed them, and Daniel Best was on the mound. Because of that, I didn't have as much pressure on me as you might think. So with three runs and Daniel Best, you put that in the books.
I got a good pitch to hit and luckily hit it, but I would have never imagined driving in all three of those runs with one swing of the bat. I don't usually do that because I'm not a big RBI kind of guy. I score runs; not knock them in. The ball happened to find a gap and the wind held it up long enough to where it would split the defenders. It was a sure double for me, but I didn't know all three runs would score. Luke Adkins was on first, and as soon as I looked up I saw him trucking it, and I knew he would score. Once I saw the flight of the ball, I knew it was down. After I hit it, I looked over towards our dugout and my whole team was going crazy and yelling at me and that felt great. I know it was Easter Sunday, but there was still a decent crowd and they were all on their feet which added to it, and that feeling is like no other. I had a buddy of mine ask me if someone can ever find that feeling outside of baseball. I told him that I didn't know, but that I hoped so. I hope that one day when I'm playing a golf scramble that I'll hit a big shot and my teammates will look at me and tell me that that was a great shot and I'll feel the same way. However, right now baseball gives me that feeling, even when you get beat bad like we did on Friday (24-7) and Saturday (13-5), though baseball isn't that much fun when that happens. However, the beauty about this game, as you can see from Sunday, is that it can be fun again real fast.
Even after losing badly in two games, Coach Burroughs put a good perspective in our minds. He said that championships are won on Sundays. Everything is decided on Sunday in college baseball if you think about it. You either sweep somebody; you get swept; or you win two out of three in a rubber match on that day. In a regional, you've got to win on Sunday or you won't win the regional. So Coach Burroughs told us that we had our backs against the wall, and if we didn't win this game that we would be in bad shape. So with that, we wanted to come out swinging, regardless. So we went out there and gave it all we had, though we didn't show up, offensively, until the third inning. After things started rolling and we were able to get a win.
That would probably rank as the biggest hit of my career. Now, I've never batted in a situation in a regional-type game with that kind of importance. I've hit in regionals, but I've never hit with runners on second and third, down by a run and with two outs. That would be bigger, but this was a conference game and a game we had to have. We always try to say that the most important game of the year is the game that day. So anytime you can drive in runs that prove to be the winning runs can take the pressure off of all of us. Also, it was good to beat those guys on Sunday.
We weren't sure what was going to happen when Best came in the game on Sunday. You start the series out with a certain amount of hitters and pitchers, and since we threw a lot of our pitchers on Friday, we were running thin on them and were unsure about who was going to be available the rest of the series. Cliff Russum started out Sunday throwing the ball well, but three swings of the bat can change everything in a game with two solo home runs and a three-run shot. Coach Palmer did the best thing he knew how to do in putting Best in the game, though I don't think that he, or anyone else, thought that he would pitch seven innings (Daniel Best - career-high seven innings pitched, giving up two runs and struck out five). It was a momentary thing and at that moment, we needed Daniel to come in and stop them from scoring runs and allow us to start scoring some runs. He hasn't done that since he was throwing over the top as a sophomore. He said that was the longest outing of his career, and he used to be a starting pitcher! He didn't pitch all weekend and he kept saying how he wanted to get in the game any way he could. Well, he found a way in what you could say was emergency relief. It was probably designated for him to pitch a few innings and it turned when he was getting out of every inning throwing only 10 to 12 pitches. The coaches kept asking him how he felt, and he kept responding with, "I feel good Coach. Let me go again." At the same time, every pitcher on our whole staff would be the same way and would never take themselves out of the game if they know that they can help us win.
Winning the game turned the series for us, but we'll have to see if this is the game that turns the season around in the right direction. So many times this year we've had games that would boost us to win one after another, and then we would go and lose against a team that we shouldn't have lost to. The first thing we can't do is overlook this midweek game against Alcorn State (4/19 at 6:30 p.m. at "The Pete"). It's a baseball game and anything can happen. I would never think that we would lose 24-7 to any team, even if they were the No. 1 team in baseball right now, but things like that happen. We've had games this season, like Friday and Saturday's against Houston, that looked like could kill our season. The loss to Louisiana-Monroe hurt (2-1 on 3/22), as well as the back-to-back losses to Ole Miss (9-8 on 3/28) and Memphis (5-4 on 4/1). We've only had two times this season to have lost two games in a row, and both times we could have folded our tents easily, but we bounced back every time. Bouncing back against a good Houston team is another sign of how the character of this team continues to show. You could ask where the character is in a 24-7 shellacking, but this is the way of the game and we had to get those nine innings over with. Once those nine innings are done, it's time to go on to the next day. We played better than what showed as a 13-5 loss on Saturday, as we were tied with them, 5-5, at one point. One error led to another, then a walk here, and a hit there and things snow balled on us that day. I believe that our team has gotten to a point where we can put a few wins together in a row, even at Rice (April 21-23), which is not an insurmountable feat like some people may think.
Shifting away from baseball for a minute, today we hung out with the kids of Thames elementary. Each year I've been here we've done a community outreach with children where they either come here, or we'll go visit a school in Hattiesburg. We always try to stay in touch with the younger kids, and there were about a handful of about 10-12 kids in there today. It makes their today being in the Southern Miss locker room by being able to sit there and hang out with us, play ping-pong with us or simply listen to the radio with us. I'm sitting there watching two kids play ping-pong, and there haven't more fun than I've ever had, and it's great to see that. I like ping-pong, not thinking much of it more than being recreational fun, and they are loving every second of it! When you see that, you sit back and think about how incredible it is to watch the joy on people's faces for something like this. To be a part of something like this is very special to us. Coach Palmer tells us that it's voluntary to do this, and doesn't require us to do it. Looking into our locker room, I'm pretty sure that the whole team was there today. Nobody shies away from the chance to make someone's day. After all, what greater feeling is there than putting a smile on a child's face? I don't have kids yet, though that is something that I'm looking forward to now that I'm engaged and am going to get married. When you're a parent you don't get all of the presents, but you enjoy watching the faces of those around you during that time. This is something that we like here. It's like after games when kids come onto the field and want you to sign autographs. My parents have learned that I'm going to sign autographs even before I speak to them, and I'll stay out there for 20 more minutes to sign autographs if I need to.
Something I don't understand is how some professional players don't have time to sign autographs for kids. We're college kids and don't make a dime; we get some school paid for, but we don't get paid money. It thrills me to death when one of the kids walks straight up to me because they know that I've played in the game with my catching gear on and I'm all sweaty and nasty and they're yelling, "Kevin Coker! Kevin Coker! Can I get your autograph?" That is the greatest feeling in the world to me. When you know you can make a difference in someone's day, for instance holding open a door for a woman carrying a baby in her hands, it's good to know that you made her happy for that day. I know I like to do that, and I think I have a team of 30 guys in there that would do anything to make someone else's day better. I've always said that we're all like a family, and we all share the same feelings, and days like these are a lot of fun for us. After this, we'll go outside and practice and it will mean a little bit more to us because these kids probably wish they could play baseball, but can't because it wasn't in God's hands. However, it was for us and because of that we can enjoy the game more now knowing that it's a gift we have, and a gift that we don't need to take for granted.
