This is not a difficult game to sum up what went wrong for the Cardinal: Five of Fullerton's seven runs were unearned and a young lineup couldn't respond.
Adam Crampton will get a lot of attention in the box score because his two errors led to the five unearned runs for the Titans. The freshman shortstop got stuck inside his head and couldn't make two relatively routine plays on grounders. Crampton has a reputation as a fantastic fielder and has lived up to it since he got to Stanford.
In his first game as a college player against a real opponent he seemed to forget how to play that part of the game.
Cal State Fullerton did not hit the ball hard. Their offensive performance was a classic small ball approach: sac fly, a double that rolled slowly down the first base line, and then three singles in the fifth. The Titans contested every pitch and the first two innings took an hour because Brenden Beck had to fight every batter seemingly covering the plate as if they were swinging metal tennis rackets.
Beck was solid through 4.1 innings and then somewhat surprisingly was pulled -- probably to protect his arm from throwing too much in the first game. Then Crampton's second error undid Carson Rudd's chance to escape the frame with the score stil 2-0 and in a few minutes Stanford trailed 6-0.
Stanford's lineup needs the pitching and defense to give it as much time as possible to get worked out. There was good contact by multiple hitters but some tough luck on the night. Brock Jones may have had the worst of it with three rockets that resulted in nothing. (He would have had a home run if it was a day game.)
Christian Robinson was the best Cardinal on the field. He had a solid double and RBI single. He hit a liner to right field that was ruled a fielding error that allowed him to get to third. That was another example of very good contact.
The Cardinal struck out 13 times and no one was probably more frustrated with himself than Nick Bellafronto. He looked at two of those strikeouts, which is exactly the problem he said he wanted to correct for this season.
Head coach David Esquer said after the game he was glad that Fullerton is the type of team that won't let Stanford win despite youthful mistakes. The kids have to grow up fast and this is the type of opponent that will force them to do it, or else get swept.
Quinn Matthews is starting Saturday because Jacob Palisch is out a couple weeks due to injury. What was unexpected for me is that Esquer said they'd hoped Alex Williams would be the closer but they need him to start for now.
Adam Crampton will get a lot of attention in the box score because his two errors led to the five unearned runs for the Titans. The freshman shortstop got stuck inside his head and couldn't make two relatively routine plays on grounders. Crampton has a reputation as a fantastic fielder and has lived up to it since he got to Stanford.
In his first game as a college player against a real opponent he seemed to forget how to play that part of the game.
Cal State Fullerton did not hit the ball hard. Their offensive performance was a classic small ball approach: sac fly, a double that rolled slowly down the first base line, and then three singles in the fifth. The Titans contested every pitch and the first two innings took an hour because Brenden Beck had to fight every batter seemingly covering the plate as if they were swinging metal tennis rackets.
Beck was solid through 4.1 innings and then somewhat surprisingly was pulled -- probably to protect his arm from throwing too much in the first game. Then Crampton's second error undid Carson Rudd's chance to escape the frame with the score stil 2-0 and in a few minutes Stanford trailed 6-0.
Stanford's lineup needs the pitching and defense to give it as much time as possible to get worked out. There was good contact by multiple hitters but some tough luck on the night. Brock Jones may have had the worst of it with three rockets that resulted in nothing. (He would have had a home run if it was a day game.)
Christian Robinson was the best Cardinal on the field. He had a solid double and RBI single. He hit a liner to right field that was ruled a fielding error that allowed him to get to third. That was another example of very good contact.
The Cardinal struck out 13 times and no one was probably more frustrated with himself than Nick Bellafronto. He looked at two of those strikeouts, which is exactly the problem he said he wanted to correct for this season.
Head coach David Esquer said after the game he was glad that Fullerton is the type of team that won't let Stanford win despite youthful mistakes. The kids have to grow up fast and this is the type of opponent that will force them to do it, or else get swept.
Quinn Matthews is starting Saturday because Jacob Palisch is out a couple weeks due to injury. What was unexpected for me is that Esquer said they'd hoped Alex Williams would be the closer but they need him to start for now.
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