2024 Mid-American Conference Baseball Week 6 Recap

Bowling Green is the surprise of the season so far and after looking under the hood, it shouldn’t have been. MAC baseball for as long as I’ve been paying attention has been dominated by the same three teams. Not Bowling Green.

They’ve got a long way to go to bring it home and the top seed and host have been cursed to not win the MAC Tournament the last couple of seasons. Play the season one series at a time and see where it shakes out.

How did Week 6 play out? Let’s go!

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Week 6 Conference Standings

Bowling Green heads into their non-conference week of the MAC schedule perfect at 9-0. The three sweeps have come against Miami, Ball State and most recently Akron. Those three teams are a combined 7-11 against the other MAC teams, so it’s safe to say that the Falcons still have to play the teeth of their schedule. Ball State was supposed to be one of the toughest weekends of the season but the Cardinals are languishing in tenth.

The lead they’ve built themselves, even if the competition wasn’t the other teams at the top of the standings, would allow them to lose every conference weekend with a 1-2 record and still finish 16-14. That record has been good enough to be in the top half of the MAC in recent seasons. Couple that with the fact they’ve averaged 14.8 runs per game and their starting pitcher’s ERA is better than the league average by a full run, it’s hard to imagine that they would suddenly struggle to win games.

After the incredibly surprising start by the Falcons, everything is up for grabs. Six teams are within a game of the current cut line for the MAC Tournament with many important series still on the calendar. Kent State, Eastern Michigan and Western Michigan have played their non-conference weekends and have a series in hand as a result.

Miami and Ohio are each a half-game behind Western Michigan and all three have yet to play each other. Northern Illinois is a half game up on the threesome but only has Western Michigan yet to play. The battle for the fourth spot is going to be tight down to the wire.

Central Michigan and Ball State are struggling to find ways to win. Central Michigan had their first series win this weekend, showing a sign of life over Ohio. They’re only a game and a half away from a post-season position and 21 games left on the schedule. They could be fine, but their offense has scored just under four runs a game in MAC competitions.

Ball State is in a slightly worse spot. They are one more game behind Central Michigan and have the opposite problem. They cannot keep their opponents from scoring, allowing 92 runs in nine games. Their unearned runs are occurring at the MAC average rate, so their defense is making mistakes. Using errors alone to assess defense is a poor way to evaluate a team, but sadly I don’t have outs above average for the MAC.

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Get to know the Bowling Green Falcons

If you follow MAC baseball like I do, you might know some of the teams that are traditionally at the top. Kent State is usually loaded with arm talent and applies pressure with runners constantly taking extra bases. Ball State scours the JUCO ranks to reload every year. They’ve got big arms and big bats up and down their roster. Central Michigan is a pitching-first organization and has lately been an on-base machine at the plate.

Bowling Green has a commanding lead on the field through three weeks of conference play. Who are the Falcons?

Non-conference play is so unbalanced that looking at the entire season’s numbers can be misleading at times. No one else played Tennessee, a team that expects to go to the College World Series and they’re right to have that expectation. The problem with limiting the numbers to MAC games is always going to be the sample size.

Surprisingly, the splits have ranked the same relative to the other MAC teams. They have the #1 offense by runs per game in all games and in MAC play, and they lead in on-base percentage, slugging percentage, and weighted on-base percentage in their nine MAC games.

Second baseman Tyler Ross has led the way on offense, providing pop from a position typically focused on defense. Ross has five home runs, six doubles and three triples in 67 at-bats. He’s hardly alone, he’s one of five qualified hitters who have an on-base plus slugging percentage over 0.800 so far this season. Right fielder Jack Krause has an on-base percentage over 0.500 and pitcher/designated hitter DJ Newman leads the team with six home runs. Gavin Ganun has 47 at-bats, not quite enough to be a “qualified hitter,” but has an OPS over one. They’ve got a stacked lineup that’s causing the other MAC teams major problems.

One of the most interesting players is DJ Newman. Not only is he leading the team in home runs with a 1.167 OPS, he leads the Falcons with 32.1 innings pitched and a 3.06 ERA. He’s their Friday starter and is the designated hitter on days when he’s not on the mound. Two-way players aren’t uncommon in college, but rarely do they do it as well as Newman.

The Falcons starting pitchers as a unit are the second-best in the MAC in ERA and fourth-best in walks plus hits per inning pitched no matter how it’s sliced. Their second-best starter, Nic Good, is closer to the MAC average in ERA but he’s a high strikeout, low walk pitcher that’s a nice compliment to Newman.

The only thing that might be missing is consistency from the bullpen, but about five other MAC teams are in the same boat. Jacob Turner and Perry Miller have been their best options out of the bullpen by ERA, but they might be stranding a high volume of base runners. That’s not a sustainable strategy.

Relief pitcher Landon Willeman has been excellent in his last three outings, but his numbers are hurt by two bad outings. One against Tennessee and one against Miami, they have his ERA sitting at 10.33. His last five innings have produced a 1.80 ERA, 1.00 WHIP, 12.6 strikeouts per nine innings and 3.6 walks per nine innings. The ERA will work itself out if he keeps that up.

They’ve got it all working right now, especially if the starting pitching can limit the workload for the bullpen. Bowling Green is attempting to get back to the MAC Tournament for the first time since 2015 when eight teams made it every year. So far, so good.

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Quick Notes:

• Akron at Bowling Green: The Falcons steamrolled Akron in game one, came back late in game two and ended the finale in the bottom of the seventh with a seven-run inning. They scored more than ten runs in each game DJ Newman was rolling on the mound in game one. Can anyone stop the Falcons?
• Ball State at Toledo: Nate Blain gets a rare complete game loss for the Cardinals in game one. The Rockets scored early and held on in, and in game two they made a comeback from down 5-0 to a 7-5 win in 11 innings. Toledo’s Caden Konczak took over a game as much as a hitter can in baseball. He drove in runs in the sixth, eighth and the game-winning runs in the 11th inning. Ball State needed a huge effort from starting pitcher Keegan Johnson in game three to avoid the sweep.
• Ohio at Central Michigan: Central Michigan gets its first series win in the 2024 season. They leaned on their starting pitchers to go deep into their wins, Adam Mrakitsch turned in another great start and Evan Waters gave up one run in six innings in game three. Ohio wins the series by run differential after an 18-3 win in game two.
• Western Michigan at Eastern Michigan: The Broncos and Eagles split the doubleheader on Saturday and Eastern Michigan scratches out three runs in a Sunday win. When Eastern Michigan’s starter wasn’t pushed off the mound, they won the game. Bobby Jones pitched eight innings in the game one win, and Nick Chittum completes the rare complete game shutout in game three. This series was very even between two good teams that might see each other later with more on the line.
• Miami at Northern Illinois: Pitching dominated the series in every game. Miami’s bullpen pitched 13 innings and allowed five hits, five walks, struck out 21 hitters and didn’t allow a run. That impressive performance earned the RedHawks the series win. NIU avoided the sweep with their own impressive outing from Adam Brouwer and Dominic Hann. They shut out the RedHawks in a 1-0 win.
• Kent State: The Flashes won the weekend series with two very tight wins, but the bats didn’t show up in the finale. One bad inning and only four hits led to the 5-0 loss. They also dropped a midweek game to a down Pitt squad after taking a lead in the seventh inning. The Kent State starting pitching was good and they need that to continue next week.

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Notable Performances

Gideon Antle has been a menace at the plate this season and had another monster week for Ohio. He added another home run to his total for the season and another eight runs batted in. He leads the MAC in doubles, batting average, slugging percentage, OPS, weighted on-base percentage and is second in home runs and runs batted in. If he keeps it up this season, he’s going to have a strong case for Player of the Year.

Jack Krause, the on-base machine for Bowling Green, added five walks to his season total. Kyle Schroedle and CJ Richmond traded home runs in their series against each other. Schroedle hit three, two versus WMU and Richmond hit two himself. Both came against EMU. Every hit Tyler Ross had went for extra bases and he reached base on three other plate appearances this week.

The three starting pitchers highlighted had incredible weeks. Adam Mrakitsch has had two incredible starts in a row and got the win for this one. Central Michigan is going to need more of his starts down the stretch. Nic Chittum shut out the Broncos in a complete-game shutout. That game three start won the series for the Eagles.

Keegan Johnson pitched three innings in a midweek start and pitched seven innings in the series finale. In all he had 17 strikeouts in ten innings of work, allowing a single run.

Relief pitching is all situational and this week Camryn Szynski entered in the seventh inning for Toledo down by three runs. He strands both inherited runners and doesn’t allow a base runner until the tenth inning. He gets a no-decision, but the Rockets don’t get the win without Szynski shutting down the Cardinals.

Bowling Green’s Calvin Mitchell jumped into game three early trailing Akron by one run in the second inning. He inherited a one-out, runners on second and third situation and pitched out of it without giving up a hit. A run did score on a sacrifice fly, but Mitchell retired eight hitters in a row while the Falcons built a lead.

Miami’s Lukas Galdoni entered the Northern Illinois series twice in high-leverage situations. He converted the save in game two and maintained the one-run deficit in game three.

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A look ahead to Week 7:

The coming week has two matchups between teams in the top half and two series between teams in the bottom half. Bowling Green plays Xavier from the Big East and is going to remain perfect in the MAC at least one more week as a result.

Northern Illinois and Toledo could be the lowest scoring series of the season. The Huskies have been in games due to their pitching, only two teams have allowed fewer runs in MAC games. Toledo’s pitching hasn’t been quite as good and their offense is a bit better, but the bats sometimes disappear. When an offense is built on extra base hits, it can turn off quickly.

Kent State and Western Michigan is the other headliner of the weekend. Kent State is getting the freight train on the tracks again, like they usually do, but they seem more vulnerable than most years. Western Michigan can’t get swept and stay in the early post-season picture. The Bronco offense is second best in the conference and their bullpen is able to give them a chance late. That could be all they need to take the series from the Flashes.

Eastern Michigan is at home against Central Michigan and could either open the door for the Chippewas or bury them. The starting pitchers from both teams will be the determining factor for the series, but the Eagles hitters have been more consistent than CMU’s.

Miami at Akron and Ohio at Ball State are chances for the teams outside of the postseason picture to separate themselves. I have to say how wild it is that Ball State is 2-7 in conference. They have a winning record overall, a rare feat for a MAC team, and are five games under in conference.

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Series Scores: