University of North Carolina Athletics
Tar Heel Baseball Q&A with Mike Fox
April 28, 2004 | Baseball
April 28, 2004
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. - During the nine-day break for final exams, TarHeelBlue.com sat down with sixth-year Carolina baseball head coach Mike Fox to discuss the 2004 season, what lies ahead for the 16th-ranked Tar Heels and what the players and coaches have been up to during the exam break.
TarHeelBlue.com: In addition to giving the players more study time, what does this break do for the team?
Mike Fox: It gives them a chance to rest their baseball mind and their bodies. The most important thing is to rest some injuries over the first four days. We've got guys with some nagging stuff and obviously Justin Webb. It's a time to slow down and get away from the game for three or four days, which I think is good.
THB: What does the coaching staff do over this break?
MF: For me personally, I get a chance to see my son play this week, which is nice since I haven't seen him all year. Coach Holbrook and Coach Williams are out seeing high school games, and we get chance to catch up on some things. We'll do some scouting for our next couple of opponents. It gives us a chance to get away for a little bit. We haven't had a day off since the season started, so it gives us a chance to take a little time off too.
THB: What are some characteristics of this team that has made it so successful so far?
MF: Resiliency is one. We've bounced back pretty quickly from a poor performance, or a bad inning or a maybe a poor pitch. I'd say maturity with some of our upper class players. They see the season has kind of an ebb and flow to it. You're going to hit some tough spots ... We've kind of stayed away from getting too frustrated. I think we've got some good leadership. We're only going to be as good as our leadership in the clubhouse and off the field. I think we're expecting to win more than ever after our success last year. I think we've got some confidence.
THB: With it being exam time, if you were a professor what grade would you give your team at this point of the season?
MF: I'll grade us at the end of the year. I'll say that I'm extremely pleased with where we are and what we've accomplished so far. And not just wins and losses. Do we need to improve and get better? Without question. The toughest games and toughest part of the season is coming up. When you get to the end of the year, if you play .500 baseball like we have over the last eight or 10 games, you're not going to go anywhere. You're not going to reach any of your goals. You've got to be really good ... I'll just say this, we're certainly out of the C range by far and into the B range. Our goal is to be an A by the end of the season.
THB: How does your team stack up with the rest of the ACC and on the national scene this season?
MF: The ACC is very balanced this year. Just look at the scores over the last couple of weekends. I think certainly we're capable of competing and beating anybody in our league. But on the other hand, the other teams can say the same things about us. It's just who plays well a particular weekend and who gets the big hit. Playing at home has a lot to do with it. The teams at home usually win a lot of the close games. That's the most disappointing thing about our Clemson series. We had close games and we're supposed to win those at home.
There are some great teams in the country, but the only thing I have to go by is Rice. We haven't gotten to play South Carolina yet. We competed against Rice but we're not in their league yet. I hope we'll be better and be able to battle more against their great pitchers by the end of the year. The better our pitching gets and the more confident we get with Daniel Bard, Garry Bakker and Andrew Miller, the better off we'll be. It starts on the mound, and we've got to think we can beat anybody when those three guys throw like they're capable.
THB: In addition to Bard, Bakker and Miller, Adam Kalkhof and Robert Woodard have thrown well in the middle of the week lately. What kind of advantage does having five quality starters give you when you get to ACC and NCAA Tournament time?
MF: I think we've pretty much established our five guys. It's just evolved over the season. We didn't start with those five guys initially. Our pitching staff has taken a beating. We didn't know we weren't going to have Matt Danford, one of our best relievers from last year, and Rob Wooten was somebody we had some good plans for. We feel good, but we could have more depth than we do. As far as the ACC Tournament, you're not going to play in any other event where you've got to have five or six starters out there to win it. The NCAA Regional is only a four-team, double-elimination tournament, so you can win that in three games. It will help us if we get into the fourth and fifth day at ACCs, but we've got to get there first. I like the way our pitching staff has unfolded, but if we get Kevin Brower and Scott Senatore back throwing like they're capable with Michael Gross and Whitley Benson we've got nine or ten guys that we feel comfortable with and that's all you can ask for. Bryan Phillips threw well in practice the other day.
THB: What will it take for this team to win another Regional and then take that next step and win a Super Regional?
MF: We've got to improve defensively. We can't get into a situation where we're battling against a good team and getting good pitching and just kind of blow up defensively. You can't do that and win a Regional. The teams are too good. We've gotten away sometimes with giving teams four and five outs in an inning. We can't do that when we get into NCAA Tournament play. We've got to be more consistent moving the ball offensively and cut down on our strikeouts. Sometimes that's easier said than done because you're going to be facing really good pitching in the NCAA Tournament. I'd say more than anything else we've got to improve defensively. When we get Justin Webb back that'll help us because there's no question that he's one of our best defensive players.
THB: Who are some guys that have exceeded your expectations so far this season?
MF: I've got to start with Chris Iannetta even though he was one of our best players coming back from last year. Chris has taken the whole burden of our catching duties on his shoulders. On top of that he had a 23-game hitting streak. He carried offensively for about a two- or three-week stretch where he was hitting every ball hard. He's one of our leaders. Chris, Marshall Hubbard and Sammy Hewitt have had pressure on them hitting 3-4-5 in the order. Everybody knew we lost so much offense last year that those three guys had to hit.
You have to throw Marshall in there because we hadn't seen him play here over the course of 40 games. He's near the top of our league in home runs and RBI. That's what we needed and wanted out of him as a coaching staff. We didn't know if we were going to get it because we never had seen him over that period of time.
We knew what we were getting out of Sammy. He's rebounded back from a poor start and we need to get him back on track. We signed Jay Cox as an infielder and he's playing left field for us. That's a little unexpected. And he's doing well for us offensively.
You can throw our pitchers in there when you have two freshmen (Bard and Miller) throwing as well as those guys. Everybody said they were supposed to be that good, but as a coach I knew better. That's a lot to put on them, and they've met all the hype and have been throwing pretty well.
