Inside WVU Baseball’s Pitching Decisions as Mountaineers Empty the Tank

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – With 36 innings of NCAA Tournament baseball under their belts, 18 of those innings the day prior, WVU’s pitching staff was running on fumes before they even faced their first batter in their Morgantown Regional Final against Kentucky on Monday, June 1. The Mountaineers (43-15) managed to win regardless, qualifying for their first-ever home Super Regional with a 6-5 walk-off win.

Head coach Steve Sabins described how the Mountaineers’ coaching staff uses biometric data each morning to evaluate how healthy, rested and strong their pitchers’ arms are, how ready they are to perform. They don’t discount self-evaluation, though, sitting down with each member of the pitching staff to decide who’s ready for the green light.

“You’re having conversations with each kid. So like [Ben] McDougal threw less [yesterday], but it was the most he’d ever thrown. So you go talk to McDougal and those kids, they’re warriors, and they want the ball, and literally every single kid on the team said, ‘I’m good to go,’” Sabins said. 

“But then there’s judgment involved. McDougal is, like, ‘I don’t know if I would be quite as good,’ and so any sense of hesitation, like, okay, ‘McDougal’s out, he can’t do it.’ And then you talk to [David] Hagen, who hasn’t thrown twice in the weekend this entire season. And he’s like, ‘I’ll be able to do it for the team.’ Like ‘okay, too team oriented.’ It’s just about your health, you know what I mean?…You’re just really trying to understand where bodies are at.”

Bouncing Back

Maxx Yehl, WVU Baseball’s staff ace and the Big 12 Pitcher of the Year, got the nod as starter. Yehl didn’t make it out of the first inning against Kentucky on Saturday, exiting after four runs (none earned), two outs and 36 pitches with shoulder tightness. Despite the injury, Yehl made it back in time for the series finale. Like the rest of West Virginia’s pitching staff, Yehl began to lobby for the ball immediately.

“I texted Sabes last night, told him I wanted the ball. And he made sure I was healthy. He wasn’t gonna throw me out there if I wasn’t. Told him I wanted it. They let me know last night I was getting the ball, so just going into it, I knew that I had to do whatever I needed to do to help the team win. Luckily, the adrenaline took over, felt good, and was able to do my thing,” Yehl said.

“I’m just grateful the coaches believed in me. Giving me the ball, [I was] very excited to get back out there today and help the team.”

Yehl earned redemption with five innings, six strikeouts and one run allowed on 67 pitches. From there, the Mountaineers turned to Ian Korn, their hybrid starter-reliever and go-to innings eater in a pinch. Korn cruised through 2.2 innings with a 5-1 lead, then gave up a pair of home runs as Kentucky tied the game in the eighth.

No Time to Waste

Cole, Friday’s starter, got WVU out of the jam with a three-pitch strikeout, but he also began to labor in the tenth inning against Kentucky second baseman Hudson Brown. Brown hit a three-run homer in the eighth and started to make hard contact on Cole, adapting to his three-pitch mix and fouling off the breaking balls. Sabins knew it was time for a pitching change. He also knew he couldn’t wait for the at-bat with Brown to finish.

“We might be standing here, watching the next pitch as a Wildcat crosses home plate,” Sabins said. “So we rushed Montesa, get him going.”

Montesa threw 122 pitches against Wake Forest the previous day. He also possesses a completely different pitch mix than Cole does, relying on high heat and a wipeout breaking ball instead of a sinker, slider and changeup. Once again, self-evaluation convinced Sabins to give Montesa the nod.

“You go to Dawson, he’s like, ‘I feel better today than I felt yesterday,’” Sabins said. “I’m like, ‘I don’t think that’s possible,’ but he’s like ‘no, I’m ready to go, like for real, coach.’”

Montesa walked Brown before escaping the inning, setting the table for Armani Guzman’s walk-off single. After the win, Sabins praised his team, pitchers and position players alike, for the way they stayed accountable and dug deep.

“I think in general, when things go bad, it’s very easy to point fingers. And so when things are going bad, [you] start hearing a lot about umpire calls. And if you’re weak minded or you’re not strong mentally as players, you can start to think that somebody’s actually screwing you, and nobody was screwing us,” Sabins said. “We needed to make better pitches, and we needed to perform better. We needed to keep our cool.”

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