During a program check-in back in November, the Arizona State coaching staff met via Zoom with the media, discussing the myriad of ways this team would be different than recent Sun Devil squads. In particular, hitting coach Michael Earley singled out the name of redshirt freshman center fielder Joe Lampe as the most noticeable example of an ASU style change.
Earley didn’t mince words when complimenting Lampe then, comparing his speed to the likes of MLB speedster Billy Hamilton while noting the absence of his skillset in previous years rosters in Tempe.
“He’s one of the fastest players I’ve ever seen on a baseball field,” Earley claimed back on Nov. 3. “We’ve never had speed like that here. It’s elite top-end speed, and it really puts pressure on the defense. I mean, routine ground balls to second base, the umpire is gonna have to be ready to make a quick call.”
As Arizona State continued to welcome back a limited capacity crowd due to COVID; the smaller Sun Devil contingent saw an ASU offense get back to its home run hitting ways of old. A group effort from the pitching staff helped Arizona State cruise to a 10-0 victory on Friday night.
On Friday night, what appeared to be a routine fly ball off the bat of Drew Swift was anything but that. As Cal State Fullerton’s Carter White ranged into the right field corner for the grab, Lampe tagged up from second base. Within seconds, the Petaluma, Calif. native was being waved home by third base coach Ben Greenspan, making a Little-League-type play come to fruition on a Friday night at Phoenix Municipal Stadium.
“I’m preparing to not stop, especially when I see that right fielder drifting to the right field corner” explained Lampe of his second-to-home scamper, the second such play in his baseball career. “It’s on BG to stop me. Nine or 10 times out of 10, I’m going to take that chance.”
“We’ve done the little things,” noted head coach Tracy Smith. “When I saw him tagging up and his first 20 feet off of second base, I’m like, ‘Ben’s going to send him here.’ He was chugging. It’s that type of play and that type of attitude that this team – we’re going to have to do that for the entire year because that’s the formula for us to win.”
“We’re going to have to do it,” Smith said of the bullpen-heavy pitching approach in Arizona State’s ninth win of the season. “Just the circumstances that we’re dealing with right now, it’s not going to be conventional. We’ve got enough pieces to still throw together some really quality innings. It may not be from an extended period… but the pieces are still there as long as everybody is doing their job.”
Cal State Fullerton opted to start junior right-hander Tanner Bibee, who entered Friday night with a minuscule 0.43 ERA and a 2-1 record. Against the Titans ace, Tracy Smith called upon six Sun Devil arms for a bullpen-heavy Friday night. The moves come after Arizona State lost Cooper Benson and Boyd Vander Kooi to season-ending Tommy John surgery.
Redshirt freshman Seth Tomczak got the second start of his career and threw two and two thirds of scoreless baseball, leaving redshirt sophomore Will Levine with an inherited runner on second base. Levine stranded the Titan baserunner in the third and worked through another two innings of clean baseball for the Sun Devils. With a night full of strikes – Arizona State pitchers threw 79 strikes on 123 pitches – Cal State Fullerton’s offense rarely threatened at the plate in a night Levine would leave with his second win of the season.
“That’s going to be our formula,” said Smith on a night where his six Sun Devil pitchers combined for seven strikeouts and just two walks. The bullpen approach for the Sun Devils was as successful as anything the Sun Devil staff has done in years, as ASU recorded back-to-back shutouts for the first time since 2013 – and did so in both Sunday and Friday’s contests with a bullpen-oriented workload. “Whether it works or it doesn’t, that’s how we’re going to have to do it. We still feel like we can get it done doing it this way.”
A fifth-inning explosion for the ASU offense was the third of five straight innings in which the Sun Devils scored a run. Hunter Jump got the crooked inning going when he turned on a 2-0 pitch for a two-run home run, increasing the Sun Devil lead to 5-0 before Sean McClain belted a fastball into the left field corner to make it 6-0 Devils.
Adding to the long-ball success was Xavier transfer Allbry Major, who produced the first home run of his Sun Devil career on a two-run blast in the seventh inning.
“I love it,” said Major after his home run capped a 2-for-4 night with 3 RBI. “Hopefully, it’s the first of many. It felt really good off the bat. Knew it had the air. I realized a little late that the wind was blowing in, but it still got out nonetheless.”
In that November press conference, Earley mentioned the aggressiveness Arizona State would display this season but said days where the home runs were flying out of the ballpark could put them in a position to revert back to a conservative base-running approach. Instead, on Friday night it appeared as if the presence of power hitting only aided ASU in its aggressiveness on the basepaths.
Smith told reporters following the contest that an update on the injury to Erik Tolman should come Monday or Tuesday, but the Sun Devil head coach noted frequently the prevalence of bullpen games – and specifically, Friday night bullpen games – in ASU’s future.
“I feel like a lot of our guys in our bullpen are top-tier arms,” said Tomczak. “It’s not really surprising to me that we can get a shutout using most of our bullpen.”
