Texas-Nebraska Baseball: Game Two Open Thread

Parker French threw 6 and a third, Ty Marlow kept his ERA at 0.00 with the final two outs of the seventh inning, and Corey Knebel got another two-inning save as Texas took an 8-2 victory over the visiting Nebraska Cornhuskers last night to start the series off with a win. French was excellent aside from a four-hit, two-run second inning that gave Nebraska a 2-0 lead. Texas manufactured a run in the bottom of the fourth to cut the lead in half, and then took a lead of its own with a pair of runs in the sixth. JuCo transfer sophomore Codey McElroy plated both with a two-RBI single with the bases loaded and a full count.

Texas blew it open with a five spot in the bottom of the eighth. To be honest, the Nebraska pitching staff had as much to do with it as the Texas hitters--after two outs in the first three hitters, the Huskers had the come-aparts. A flurry of walks, hit batsmen, passed balls, and singles resulted in the crooked number. Unfortunately, both the first and last out of the inning were made by freshman shortstop CJ Hinojosa. But we're confident he'll shake it off today.

The one thing we think could be somewhat worrying is that Knebel keeps throwing two innings per outing. We're hoping this is just an early-season trend to get him loose and ready, and not a misguided strategy that will result in the kid's arm going limp before the season ends. Time will tell.

One more thing: Texas keeps releasing the "paid" attendance to these games. It's kind of embarrassing when they announce an attendance of 6,004 when anyone watching can see the vast rows of empty seats. We're not blaming fans--it wasn't exactly great baseball weather. But if your home games are going to be televised, don't embarrass yourself by fictionalizing the number of people at the game. It's pretty transparent, is all we're saying.

First pitch today is at 1:00 on the Longhorn Network as Texas tries to clinch the series and send Nebraska to an 0-6 record. This is your open thread. Hook 'em!