Cal Baseball Week in Review (April 12, 2013)

About a week ago, I wrote how Cal freshman righty Ryan Mason can be the stopper to end not just the then one game losing streak but the more general 3-6 stretch. Sadly, the same is even more true this week as the Bears got swept down in Arizona by the defending national champions who were looking to bounce back from a bad conference start and get back to 0.500 in conference play themselves.

The one saving grace again is that the Bears were in two of those three losses,

Here is a brief summary of what happened:

Friday April 5, 2013: Cal 1, Arizona 10

Ryan Mason had the worse start of his young career down in Tucson as the high scoring Wildcats got runs in 4 of the first 5 innings, including the 5 run 2nd, all against Mason who still went 6 innings (giving up 8 runs on 12 hits but no walks and only 2 K's). Bears did play a clean game defensively, with the exception of Mason's 3 wild pitches.

Saturday April 6, 2013: Cal 4, Arizona 6

Cal senior starter Justin Jones gave up 4 runs on 6 hits in the first to put the Bears in a hole that they were never able to recover from. Bears clawed back with two runs a piece in two different innings and got slugger Devon Rodriguez up with two runners on in the 9th. Rodriguez K'ed to end the game.

Sunday April 7, 2013: Cal 4, Arizona 5

You can catch the replay of this game on WatchESPN.

In the most competitive game of the series, the Bears fell just short in their 9th inning comeback attempt.

he Golden Bears (16-16, 5-7) had gotten within a run in the top of the ninth inning on Brenden Farney'sRBI single, and Devon Rodriguez drove in a run but had hit into a double play with the bases loaded and no outs. Finally, the Wildcats got out of the jam by forcing Andrew Knapp to ground out to first base with the tying run on third base.

From the official game recap. So the Bears end the week with a tying run just 90 feet away. Maybe that is a sliver of something positive that they can carry over to this week.

The lack of the clutch hit aside, the Bears got through the game with 3 pitchers throwing multiple innings (Keaton Siomkin started the game and gave up 1 run in two innings, Logan Scott went 1.2 and Dylan Nelson went 2.1 while both gave up a run a piece).

Hitter of the Week

Sophomore 2B Brenden Farney gets the award for being the most consistent hitter last weekend. Farney got 2 hits and a walk a day for all three days to go 6 for 10 with 3 walks.

Honorable mention: SS Mike Reuvekemp is the only player with a hit in all 3 games, going 5 for 10 with 1 walk.

Pitcher of the Week

No one particular pitcher stood out for the Bears as it is clear that Coach David Esquer has some decision to make as to who will start for the Bears on Saturdays and Sundays from now on (Cal Baseball can't pull a page from the Softball game plan and just use Jolene Henderson for pretty much every single inning).

Sophomore righty Keaton Siomkin wins the award for this past week. Siomkin pitched the scoreless last inning of the Saturday's game and then got the spot start to go 2 in the Sunday game (when he gave up 1 run in 2 innings).

Pac-12 Baseball Standings

Coming up this week:

The Bears are back home to host the No. 9 Oregon Ducks (and conference win leader) for three games (two more night games!). Can the Bears break through and win a series for the first time in almost a month (sweep at Utah, 4 weeks ago)? Will the Bears finally win a home night game behind another big home crowd?

The Bears will look to right the ship and get back to a winning conference record.

GO BEARS!