Ray Birmingham pays little attention to BYU’s stat sheet or depth chart.
Tell the Lobos’ head coach that the Cougars are 13-14 overall, he’ll tell you otherwise.
“BYU’s record is way misleading,” Birmingham said.
As is the UNM baseball team’s own record.
After UNM defeated then-No. 1 Texas to begin the season, expectations soared for the program. After taking two of three from UNLV in Las Vegas, UNM is 19-10 overall and 6-3 in the Mountain West Conference, heading into Thursday’s series opener with the Cougars.
“It’s like we’re 19-10 and people are going, ‘What’s the matter with you?’” Birmingham said.
If anything, the Cougars started off on opposite tracks, losing their first four games, but they’ve since gone 13-10 since February 25 and have shown signs of life in the batter’s box, with a .379 team batting average.
On the mound, freshman Mark Anderson is slated to start Thursday’s game for the Cougars. Anderson is 1-0 this season, with an earned run average of 5.83 in seven appearances for BYU.
In 20 innings of work, Anderson has walked three more batters then he has struck out – 14 walks to 11 strikeouts – and allowed batters to hit .342.
The Lobos, too, have struggled in the bullpen and had patches of spotty play in the starting rotation during part of the season.
Birmingham said he’s not as concerned about the quality of pitching anymore.
“Pitching is getting better, a lot better,” he said. “I thought, except for one pitch, we should have swept the series (against UNLV). We’ve pitched a lot better.”
Of those who have helped turn UNM’s pitching woes around in the last few weeks is senior Willy Kesler.
In his last two starts, Kesler has been superb. He is 2-0. In his last performance, Kesler pitched 7.1 innings, fanning five batters and allowing two earned runs.
“He has been outstanding the last two times out,” Birmingham said.
Even better considering what he’s endured lately.
Before his return to the UNM pitching staff in 2010, Kesler had Tommy John surgery, which he said took a huge toll on him mentally.
Not only that but Birmingham said he stripped Kesler of his scholarship and put it “back in the bank,” until Kesler recently earned it back.
“I messed around and was pretty upset about how I was playing,” Kesler said. “My grades starting last spring — they dropped. Coach pulled my scholarship. I had to pull out student loans and stuff like that.”
But Kesler raised his GPA from a 2.1 to better than 3.0 average last fall, which earned him his scholarship back.
“I busted my tail in the fall with support from my parents,” Kesler said. “It was frustrating with money and everything in this day and age. It was definitely stressful, sitting there thinking, ‘You know, where am I going to come up with this money for class?’ It was an eye-opener type thing.”
