Clark: Productive weekend on diamond offer promise for postseason

Here's where we are now with the Florida State baseball team: The Seminoles have won eight of their last 10 overall after this weekend's 2-0 series win over TCU.

And all eight of those wins have been over good teams: Florida, Louisville, Louisville, Louisville, Georgia Southern, Clemson, TCU and TCU again. Seven of the eight have been at home, and for any of us to truly believe in a higher ceiling for this particular club, we have to see them play well on the road.

They'll get a chance this week as they travel to Stetson on Tuesday and then Boston College this weekend.

But what we've seen the last two weekends at home — a sweep of Louisville and a sort-of-sweep of TCU -- at least gives one hope that this particular team has a chance to make some noise in the postseason.

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First and foremost, it has Parker Messick. There isn't another team in the country that feels better about its Friday night starter than the Seminoles do theirs. Bryce Hubbart, who was fighting a stomach bug this week, tried to gut it out on Sunday (pardon the pun) but clearly wasn't himself and lasted just three innings.

And we're still not sure who the third starter is going to be in the postseason after Carson Montgomery couldn't make it five innings on Saturday night.

But here's what we seem to know: Wyatt Crowell is going to be a pivotal arm for this team moving forward. He's had back-to-back outstanding long-relief outings the last two weekends.

And maybe, just maybe, the offense is coming around?

The Seminoles had 19 innings at the plate against TCU this weekend: They scored 23 runs on 27 hits. And 14 of those were extra-base hits. Fourteen!

Now, let's keep in mind that Alex Toral's home run on Sunday didn't wind up counting because the game was canceled in the bottom of the fourth -- because TCU had a curfew of 4:15 p.m. to catch a flight back to Dallas, and the rain/lightning delayed the game for almost two hours before it was finally called.

Logan Lacey, James Tibbs and Brock Mathis all had doubles that didn't count either.

But still. Stick with me.

Florida State came into the weekend with the second-lowest slugging percentage in the conference. And it was the lowest-scoring team in the ACC as well.

And in the span of 19 innings, the Seminoles put up 23 runs, 27 hits, 14 extra-base hits and five home runs. They also only struck out 16 times -- far, far below their per-game average.

I asked head coach Mike Martin Jr. about the offense after Sunday's rainout. And why he thought his hitters were able to put up numbers like this against a Top 25 team.

"Let the game come to you and (being) more relaxed in the environment," he said. "The pitch selection and what we're trying to do with the ball are starting to match up. The ball Toral hit (for a homer on Sunday) was a change-up. If he's thinking fastball and hitting pull-side out front, there's no way he's going to hit that. He's either going to swing and miss or hit it way foul.

"He was thinking fastball, let it get deep, he was slightly out front with the change-up and got it out of the ball park. So, a lot of good things."

Toral and Logan Lacey are both certainly bummed that Sunday's stats didn't count. Lacey, who had been mired in a pretty dreadful slump, followed up his three-run homer on Saturday night with a double off the fence and an infield single on Sunday.

Brock Mathis, getting a start at catcher, also made a bid for more playing time with a double and an RBI single -- even though, again, they didn't officially count.

With Jordan Carrion (stomach bug) and Reese Albert (hurt his foot in batting cage prior to Sunday's game) both expected back this week, the Seminoles maybe -- just maybe -- might have themselves a lineup that can get some things done in the postseason.

Florida State started Sunday's action with an RPI of No. 9. That's really good. And if the Seminoles can stay hot at the plate, maybe there's a chance they can sneak into Top 8 national seed territory. Despite all the ups and downs of the season, the metrics really like this team right now.

Speaking of really liking a team, there's just no way to emphasize how impressive Lonni Alameda's softball team continues to be. They hosted Oklahoma State for two games this past week and won them both by the score of 2-1 -- including one in nine innings.

And because it's FSU softball, you're never surprised when they win a close game and when someone you wouldn't expect comes up clutch in the biggest moments.

Chloe Culp hadn't hit a home run all season. She had just one extra-base hit in 40 at-bats in 2022. So, of course, she hit a go-ahead bomb to straight-away center field in the sixth inning of a 1-1 game to give the Seminoles the lead and the eventual win over a Top 10 team.

It's just what FSU Softball does.

The Seminoles are 45-5 overall. They have the best fielding percentage in the country. And they host Florida this Wednesday at 7 p.m. in the final home game of the regular season. Go watch them. If you can get in. It should be an incredible atmosphere.

And finally, I wanted to wrap up by just echoing what Ira wrote on Sunday about the NFL Draft and what it tells us about the lack of talent that's rolled through this football program in recent years.

It's great Jermaine Johnson got drafted in the first round. Bummer he has to live in New York, but what are you gonna do? You can't have everything in life.

But as it was in the 1990s and then again when Jimbo had this thing rolling, the NFL Draft is a great benchmark of what kind of program you have. And right now, not that anyone is surprised -- hence all the losses -- this program just doesn't have enough special players, enough game-changing difference-makers. Not yet.

Maybe they're coming. Maybe some of them are already here. In fact, I think there are a few that could be big-time players when it's all over. But right now, FSU has a good number of solid to decent college football players. And you can win games with those.

But to get to that next level, you need ELITE college football players.

And those have been in short supply around here for a long time. The NFL Draft just reminded us again this past weekend.

Contact senior writer Corey Clark at corey@warchant.com and follow @Corey_Clark on Twitter.

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