University of Houston Athletics
Baseball Starts Fall Practice on Tuesday
9/25/2006 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
Sept. 25, 2006
HOUSTON - The University of Houston baseball team takes its first steps toward the 2007 season with the start of fall practice Tuesday at Cougar Field.
Head coach Rayner Noble, who enters his 13th season at the helm of the program in 2007, and his coaching staff will hold walk-on tryouts before breaking into their regular practice schedule around 2:30 p.m., Tuesday.
The rest of the first week of practice features a steady dose of intrasquad scrimmages through Saturday before the team enjoys a day off Sunday.
Practice begins around 2:30 p.m., each weekday at Cougar Field with weekend workouts scheduled to start around 1:30 p.m. Times and sites for each day's practice are tentative and subject to change depending on weather. All Cougar Baseball practices are open to the public, which is invited to attend.
The regular schedule of scrimmages gives Noble and his staff multiple opportunities to see all players competing in a variety of situations.
"I would like to see each guy 4-6 times through the fall," Noble said. "We just need to find out who can recover, who are the candidates to throw in the bullpen, the closer."
The Cougars have been working out in individual drills and small-group sessions since the beginning of the school year. The start of fall practice is the first chance that the entire team can work out together.
While this will be the first team session, the individual and group workouts have given Noble and the assistant coaches a good idea of the team's abilities at such an early date.
"We have a good grasp on where we are at," Noble said. "We have done enough at this point going into the fall to have an idea about who is going to play where.
"The biggest thing is finding out who can do what. We will have some players at different positions, finding out in which areas we have depth," Noble said. "Across the board, I feel pretty good about our team. I don't think we are going to be surprised by anything."
Fifteen letterwinners and eight starters return from last season's squad, which finished 39-22 and was ranked among the Top 25 in all four final national polls.
"With our returning players and the newcomers that we will add, we will be pretty solid offensively and defensively," Noble said.
Junior outfielder Bryan Tully returns in 2007 as the team's leading hitter after finishing with a .322 batting average, six home runs and 28 RBIs. Senior outfielder Jake Stewart batted .321 with seven home runs, 33 RBIs and 13 stolen bases from the leadoff spot, while senior infielder Josh Stirneman added a .315 average with seven home runs and 25 RBIs.
Senior infielder Dustin Kingsbury has been a constant in the Cougar lineup since 2004 and enters this season having started each of the last 120 games.
Noble's biggest concern - and the area upon which he will be focusing his most attention - will come from the bump in the middle of the infield.
"The one thing that we have to find out this fall is who is going to step up and take over the starting pitching spots," Noble said. "The pitching staff is probably going to be the No. 1 thing that we are going to try and figure out through the fall schedule."
Junior righthander Ricky Hargrove compiled an 8-6 record with 82 strikeouts and a 3.31 ERA in 100.2 innings. The Katy, Texas, native also enjoyed a productive summer season, being named to the Cape Cod League All-Star Game.
Sophomore righthander/catcher Luis Flores came on strong down the stretch for the Cougars, pitching to a 6-3 record with 67 strikeouts and a 3.00 ERA in 87.0 innings. The Corpus Christi, Texas, native also batted .288 with eight home runs and 30 RBIs.
Senior righthander and Northwestern State transfer Dereck Cloeren and junior righthander Aaron Brown are expected to contend for the other two starter spots. The Cougar pitching staff also could be bolstered by the addition of redshirt freshman southpaw Wes Musick, who sat out the entire 2006 campaign following Tommy John surgery.
UH opens its 2007 season when it plays host to Stephen F. Austin at 2 p.m., Feb. 6 at Cougar Field.
