FAYETTEVILLE — Since the second of his now approaching 16 full seasons head coaching Arkansas Razorbacks baseball, Dave Van Horn annually commences each preseason extolling his team’s depth.
Yet even the great seasons that include four trips to the College World Series, it seems his Razorbacks roster often plays from the shallow end of the pool. Other than the occasional super sub his teams tend by the end to rely on a basic nine.
Not this year. These Razorbacks wouldn’t have gone 14-8 leading the SEC West after Friday night’s 5-4 win at LSU without a strong bench.
During their 4-0 last week, a nonconference victory over then nationally No. 4 Texas Tech and a 3-game SEC series sweep over Alabama, Van Horn subbed without drop-off against Tech second baseman Hunter Wilson and first baseman/ third baseman Jared Gates at third for injured starters Carson Shaddy and Casey Martin. With Shaddy still injured for the Alabama series, Van Horn moved Martin to second and played reserve Jack Kenley at third. And he derived a 3 for 4 response Saturday from senior designated hitter Luke Bonfield after benching Bonfield Friday night for sophomore sub Evan Lee producing two RBI.
“It’s the deepest team that I’ve definitely had here at Arkansas,” Van Horn said before the Razorbacks departed Fayetteville for Baton Rouge, La. “As far as if somebody gets hurt, if it’s one of our top players, it’s not going to kill us. It’s a good feeling knowing that you have two position players down and you still feel good about your lineup.”
Even remorsefully good when all are healthy sitting some too long.
“Sometimes I write a lineup and I feel bad about not having somebody in there because I feel like they deserve to play or they can help us,” Van Horn said. “But we only have nine spots.”
Whatever the remorse, it’s way outweighed knowing the security in reserve. Like Kenley, last year’s late-inning good field-no hit defensive replacement, delivering last Saturday’s biggest at bat.
With the Hogs trailing Alabama, 3-2 in the sixth of their 7-4 victory, left-handed hitting Kenley, with two out and the bases loaded, fouled off five 1-2 pitches from lefty Brock Guffey then hit the go-ahead 2-run single in a 4-run inning.
“That was a big-time at bat,” senior Bonfield marveled.
Sophomore center fielder Dominic Fletcher knows his spectacular catches against Alabama would be in vain but for the bench.
“Obviously it’s huge if you look at our last week,” Fletcher said. “Those other guys stepped up and played a role that was really big.”
Just like Fletcher expected after the fall practices.
“I don’t think any of us are really surprised because we saw it the whole time in the fall that we pretty much had two starting lineups,” Fletcher said. “We knew how deep we were and if we had a couple of guys hurt that we’d be fine.”