Junior pitcher Ryan Kellogg fires from the mound during Saturday's intrasquad scrimmage on Feb. 7, 2015, at Phoenix Municipal Stadium. (J. Bauer-Leffler/ The State Press)ASU baseball continued its preseason preparation with an intrasquad scrimmage at Phoenix Municipal Stadium Saturday, which gave a fair gauge to the team heading into opening day on Feb. 13 against Oklahoma State.
The scrimmage, which replaced the cancelled alumni game, pitted Maroon vs. Gold teams against each other. Maroon was composed of the starters and Gold was composed of the bench players.
Left-handed junior pitcher Ryan Kellogg was on the mound for Maroon against senior Darin Gillies.
Kellogg gave up home runs to catcher Zach Cerbo and RJ Ybarra, who played left field during the scrimmage despite starting 42 games as a designated hitter and eight at catcher last season.
Although Maroon won 12-5, the result is relatively meaningless because the squads were intermixed toward the end of the scrimmage due to a left-knee injury to freshman shortstop Ryan Peep and other substitutions.
Head coach Tracy Smith said Peep appeared to have dislocated the patella in his left knee, but will be further evaluated by the medical staff.
Along with Jordan Aboites' shift from shortstop to second base, junior Chris Beall is making the transition to first base after starting 23 games in left field last season.
Smith said the position battle at first base between Beall and Joey Bielek is setting up to be competitive, but still gives Beal the upper hand.
"Beall is playing very consistently so right now, he's got to be knocked off the pedestal," he said.
Andrew Snow, a freshman from Woodland, California, took over at second base when Aboites moved to the mound in the eighth inning. Smith said that swap may be the norm this year.
"Andrew has played the most consistently from a defensive and offensive standpoint, so that would probably be the move at this point," he said.
Smith also applauded freshman Coltin Gerhart, who is making the transition from football to baseball. Gerhart is trying to make waves in an outfield depth chart that appeared to be cemented.
"I'd say right now he's number four but pushing," he said. "Physically, he does some things really well, but he just needs to play more and get more reps--I wouldn't hesitate to put him out there."
He said Gerhart could potentially be part of a designated hitter rotation with Bielek and Ybarra, two others who most likely will not be starting in the field much, but can contribute elsewhere.
"It's fun to have some of those options because it keeps things competitive," Smith said.
Although he liked some of what he saw, he was a bit disappointed in the team's overall performance during the scrimmage, referencing Sun Devil alum Dustin Pedroia's pre-scrimmage talk to the team about making the most of each game.
"We played about 16 and a half innings of defensive baseball today and we gave up a ton of hits," Smith said. There's the good and the bad--offensively, we're doing some good things, but this game and particularly this league is won on pitching and defense."
Smith said the improvement upon the aforementioned faults will come naturally for this year's team.
"This is a great group of kids who want to learn," he said. "We're not going to judge yet because you judge people at the end of the season and you coach during the season so we're going to keep coaching."
ASU alumni
Although the alumni game was cancelled, these former Sun Devil baseball players were in attendance for today's scrimmage:
Tony Alesci, 1963-65 Jim Armstrong, 1965-66 Erik Averill, 2003-05 Terry Brenner, 1969-70 Ralph Carpenter, 1966-67 Kasey Coffman, 2011-13 Mike Colbern, 1974-76 Brooks Conrad, 1999-2001 Ron Davini, 1967-68 Travis Flowers, 1995 Bill Gorman, 1959, 61-62 Cory Hahn, 2011 Danny Ikeda, 1960-62 Jim Jefferson, 1981-83 Mike Kelly, 1989-91 Mitchell Lambson, 2009-11 Jim Mancuso, 1995 Bert Martinez, 1980-83 James McDonald, 2011-13 Louie Medina, 1984-85 Jim Merrick, 1963-65 Lemmie Miller, 1980-81 Daniel Milner, 2010-11 Blas Minor, 1987-88 Troy Neal, 1959-60 Fred Nelson, 1967-68 Jeff Osborn, 1968-70 Dustin Pedroia, 2002-04 Mike Rensmeyer, 1993 Larry Smith, 1961-63 Drew Stankiewicz, 2012-14 Jim Umbarger, 1972-74 Ralph Vasquez, 1968 Tim Vasquez, 1996-97
Reach the baseball beat writers:
smodrich@asu.edu or on Twitter @StefanJModrich
Justin.Toscano@asu.edu or on Twitter @justintoscano3.
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