NU will rely on Dorn, young arms
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By CURT McKEEVER / Lincoln Journal Star
Everywhere he turns, someone is reminding Nebraska pitching coach Eric Newman about the fact that he’s got 12 first-year Huskers out of 17 available, and only one player with any real starting experience.
It’s a mighty task to have to manage such youth, but Newman, himself in his first year at NU, has come up with an attention-grabbing first commandment of the mound:
Thou shall not issue free passes.
Break this rule and, well, you’d better have those running shoes packed in your gear bag.
Under Newman law, every walk, in practice or in a game, equals a mile.
For throwing 240 feet worth of pitches outside the strike zone to a batter, it’s 5,280 more feet around Haymarket Park.
“It’s not that they’ve been walking guys,” Newman said last week. “It’s something I want to keep re-instituting, ‘Hey, we’re going to throw strikes, we’re going to throw strikes. We’re going to work fast. We’re going to get ahead.’”
Newman’s sense of urgency may stem from the fact that Nebraska opens its season at perennial national power Stanford on Friday. And after that four-game series, the Huskers have 13 more contests scheduled against legitimate NCAA Tournament contenders. And that’s just the nonconference portion of the schedule.
“He’s been awesome so far,” Matt Freeman, a right-handed freshman from Elkhorn, said of Newman. “He makes you work hard, but he’s a fair guy. We’re all getting a lot better.”
Newman, who spent the previous three seasons as head coach at Dallas Baptist, is quick to return the compliments.
“I wouldn’t say (I’m) uncomfortable, because the work these guys have put in has shown they’re trustworthy and willing to adapt,” Newman said. “It’s been very refreshing. We’re doing OK. I’m not worried about them.
“Ask me (again) after Stanford, but no matter what happens out there, I’m not going to worry about it too much.”
Newman is expecting 31-game winner Johnny Dorn to embody the attitude with which he’d like Nebraska to pitch this season.
Dorn, and fellow right-handed senior Thad Weber, have locked up two of the four starting spots for this weekend. Vying for the other positions are:
n Left-handed junior Dan Jennings, who was starting to blossom at the tail end of 2007.
n Freeman.
n Aaron Pribanic, a 6-foot-4 right-hander who had a big year at Hutchinson (Kan.) Community College.
n 5-10 lefty Joe Hatasaki, a transfer from Arizona State.
Newman is hopeful that all of the candidates are taking a close look at how Dorn goes about his business.
“He’s not going to be a Friday guy, stuff-wise. In the Big 12, you think of that guy being 92 to 94 (mph) and dominating, pumping in strike after strike,” Newman said. “Johnny doesn’t have that part of it. He throws strikes, but Johnny’s won a lot of games and you look at that and go ‘Maybe he is a Friday guy?’
“There’s lots of guys who did it on guts and had just enough stuff. I think Johnny’s better than that.”
Of course, Dorn can win another 10 games and it won’t mean as much if the rest of the staff doesn’t follow his lead.
But, apparently, many of the pitchers are doing just that.
Newman noted how right-handed redshirt freshman Mike Nesseth has gone from throwing 84 mph over the top last season to a lower arm slot that has increased his velocity to above 90.
“You’re like ‘Where’d this guy come from?’ ” Newman said. “Last year, he was a guy that guys like hitting off.”
Newman also has watched Pribanic, who was 6-1 with 64 strikeouts in 671/3 innings at Hutchinson, throw mid-90s heat in early workouts.
“That’s one of those things where you go ‘We’ve got a chance to be pretty deep,’ ” Newman said. “That’s exciting.”
Another newcomer who’s grabbed the pitching coach’s attention is right-handed sophomore Erik Anderson, who arrived at NU this semester. Last season at Barton County (Kan.) Community College he fanned 76 batters in 492/3 innings, and recorded seven saves and a 2.17 earned-run average while appearing in a school-record 27 games.
Newman also believes left-handed junior Zach Herr and right-handed junior Erik Bird, who’s changed his delivery, can get back to the form that made them a nasty 1-2 punch out of the bullpen in 2006.
“I think that we are going to need to have nine or 10 guys pitching well for us to be successful as a staff,” he said. “But I see that as a very legitimate possibility.”
Reach Curt McKeever at 473-7441 or cmckeever@journalstar.com.
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