Ryan Askew likes direction Mercer baseball team is headed
Even with the inconsistencies that can come with a young pitching staff, Ryan Askew likes what he has seen from his Mercer baseball team recently.
The Bears host Furman this weekend in a three-game series, starting at 6 p.m. on Friday. Mercer is 23-15 overall and 8-5 in Southern Conference play, having won six of its past eight games overall and five of its past six in conference play.
Furman is 15-22 and 4-5 in conference play.
“I think we’ve done good. Good games, bad games,” Askew said. “That kind of goes along with having a young pitching staff. The hitters have been pretty darn consistent for the most part.
“I think that we’re getting set up and ready for the tournament. That’s what’s important. We’ve started to play some of our better baseball.”
Two weeks ago, the Bears swept East Tennessee State, and last weekend, they took two of three from VMI with three solid performances from their starters.
“Last weekend was probably our most consistent starting pitching rotation that we’ve had as far as everybody went as least five innings, all that kind of stuff,” Askew said. “It was really nice to see because that’s going to be huge having three starters for the tournament. And if we can kind of lock that in for the rest of the SoCon season, I think that will be huge for the tournament to have that set, and I think our hitters are always going to do well.”
Askew is 3-2 with a 3.95 ERA and has won his past two starts. The junior has gone at least six innings in each of his past four starts.
Pitching coach Brent Shade praised Askew for his performance this season, both on and off the field, to lead the young staff. Shade said he challenged the staff after the 30th game of the season to improve in the second half of the season.
“He’s done great for us,” said Shade, whose staff lost seven seniors from last year. “In the offseason, we had a heart to heart, and I told him we needed him to be the guy and show these young pitchers how we do things at Mercer and what we expect. I let him teach a lot because I feel like if you can teach it and show the other guys how to do things, it can help you reach another level.
“This is what I expected out of him when we recruited him three years ago.”
This story was originally published April 21, 2016 at 2:08 PM with the headline "Ryan Askew likes direction Mercer baseball team is headed."