Probably the best part about interviewing Terrapin baseball associate head coach Jim Farr for a short story about the coaching search is that the coach will ramble on…in a good way.
My favorite part is when I ask him whether or not he thinks the program is on the rise and he breaks down each position and what he is looking at.
Read on for some interesting tidbits he gave me.
- The Terps had expected that sophomore Matt Quinn was going to play a huge role in the bullpen this season. But it was discovered during the fall that Quinn was having lingering elbow problems. Quinn tried to come back in the early parts of the season, but only made it four innings before Farr and former coach Terry Rupp shut him down for the season. Well now it seems Quinn, who Farr said just had surgery on his elbow, will miss all of next season as well. This is a big blow to the Terps’ pen because, when healthy, Quinn is one of the most talented pitchers on the team, not to mention the hardest thrower.
-For the past four years, the Terps haven’t needed to worry about third base, mainly because Mike Murphy had been capably manning the position since he arrived on campus. Now, with Murphy graduating, the Terps need someone to fill the gap. The problem isn’t that bad though, especially with the rise down the end of the stretch of freshman second baseman Matt Murakami. According to Farr, Murakami’s emergence should open the door for this year’s regular second baseman, junior David Poutier, to move to third base which Farr said the Virginia native should be able to handle no problem.
- Where the Terps were really hit hard was in the outfield, where all three regular starters could be gone. Center fielder Dan Benick and Left fielder Gerry Spessard are both graduating, and Right fielder A.J. Casario is most likely going to sign with the team who drafts him according to Farr, and their departures leave a dearth of talent and experience patrolling the outfield.
Farr is really high on two of his outfield recruits (although he refrained from naming them) and think they could be plugged into an impact role alongside rising senior Mike Rozak who should only get better as he shakes off the lingering wrist injury. But probably the most interesting idea that Farr brought up was dabbling with the idea of moving pitchers Adam Kolarek or Scott Swinson (if he returns as Farr expects him to do) into the outfield.
“You haven’t seen them but Kolarek and Swinson both can really swing the bat,” Farr said. “I think both those guys are athletic enough that they can probably play pretty well in the outfield. We are obviously open to all ideas with the lack of returnees back there.”
Swinson made an appearance in the outfield as a defensive sub this season in a game in March against UMES, but he didn’t have any balls hit to him. When I asked him whether he would have wanted a ball hit his way, the answer was quick. “No way,” Swinson said. “That would not have been fun, but I did like it out there.”
- The place where Farr has the highest hopes for is on the mound. If Swinson returns, he joins rising junior Brett Harman to form a solid one-two punch at the top of the rotation. Then Farr is also really high on a JUCO pitcher (again, no names) who he said was “a real bulldog and could crack the top three as a starter”. Throw the mystery pitcher in with a mix of rising sophomores Matt Fullerton and Sander Beck as well as the talented but inconsistent Eric Potter and you are talking about a deep rotation that should be at least deeper than in years past.
In the bullpen is where Farr feels the most confident though, especially the back end where the Terps return their best closer since Brett Cecil graduated in rising senior Dan Gentzler. According to Farr left-handed setup man Adam Kolarek has been lights out in the Coastal Plains League and he should give the team match-up options late. The other two players that Farr thinks could make the leap from weekday pitchers to regular contributors are red-shirt junior Blair Delean and red-shirt sophomore Kyle Blackwell. Both guys had success this year, but most of that came against the weaker teams on the Terps schedule. But down the stretch both players showed flashes.
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[...] six innings in his entire Terrapin career, but did so in his only appearance this summer. Farr mentioned to me he hopes for big things from Delean next season. Delean has been a midweek stud for the Terps [...]