Decline of OSU Baseball

In the old Big 8 conference, Oklahoma State used to dominate in college baseball every year under Gary Ward. They were a perennial top-25 team that regularly produced major league hitters (Pete Incaviglia and Robin Ventura come to mind) and threatened to go to the College World Series almost every season. They never really rebuilt, they just reloaded. And Gary Ward ran a program that most people respected.

Under Tom Holliday's leadership, the program continues to decline, and this year OSU won only half of its conference schedule. Part of that is no doubt because of the infusion of talented Texas baseball teams in the new Big 12, a far stronger baseball conference than the old Big 8. But Holliday no longer seems to produce those major league mashers that Gary Ward regularly turned out, and their pitching has never been strong. So under Holliday in recent years, OSU has been forced to schedule weak non-conference foes in the hope that a good record and past success will wow the NCAA tourney committee more than RPI.

Their luck in that regard may run out this year. They have the weakest RPI of any Big 12 team that can be said to be in tourney contention, and just lost 2 of 3 to an Oklahoma team that isn't terribly strong. If they don't win the Big 12 Tourney -- and I can't see them beating Texas or Nebraska -- then it's a tossup whether they get in the NCAA tourney. And then Tom Holliday's going to have to answer questions about the program's free fall under his direction.

And frankly, it couldn't happen to more of an a-hole. Holliday is a whiner. A few weeks ago when he made a clerical error and left a star player off his weekend roster, he whined that it was the Nebraska coach's fault (it wasn't). He regularly whines about not understanding why his team's RPI is so low when he loads his non-conference shedule with creampuffs. And he regularly singles out individual players (on his team and otherwise) and whines about them, which really has no business in college sports (in my opinion). And yesterday, after Oklahoma's pitcher shut down his team yet again, he had this to say:

Still, Holliday showed little respect for Greusel (gre-ZEL, not GREW-sel).

�I wasn�t overly impressed at all,� said Holliday, who wasn�t happy with the umpiring. �I�ve seen him throw for three years.

�He just lived on the border. He got a lot of help from behind the plate.�

What an a-hole. The kid didn't beat his team fair and square. Oh no, it would take too much class for Holliday to say that. Instead, the umpire conspired against him.

What a whiny ass. OSU needs a new baseball coach. Holliday is a loser, and he has no class. Whenever I read about the guy, it makes me appreciate what class acts Rayner Noble (UH) and Wayne Graham (Rice) are, and what a nice job they do with Houston's two college baseball powers.

[Posted at 08:59 CST on 05/19/02] [Link]