OSU's Dan Spencer to Texas Tech?

by Seth C on Jun 30, 2007 6:49 AM CDT in Baseball

It's not quite official, but it appears that Oregon State University's Dan Spencer has confirmed that he will be in Lubbock on Monday at a scheduled press conference. We've got a couple of news organizations to give credit to on this story.

First is Williams and Hyatt Show Blog who have been reporting these rumors for quite some time confirmed the press conference late last night. Hyatt also mentions that there could be another hire, although he isn't ready to divulge the specifics of that coach (see earlier posts).

Next is LAJ's George Watson who confirmed by phone that he would be in Lubbock on Sunday and will be at the press conference on Monday. This is from Spencer:

"I've been talking with them. Coach (Larry) Hays called me late in the year to talk to me and asked if I might have any interest (in joining the Tech staff). I was interested enough to come down and take a look and I'll be down on Sunday. I haven't taken (the job) yet. We're trying to do things right on both ends."

SNIP

"Coach Hays is one (factor)," Spencer said. "I played for him and he is a very well-respected baseball guy. It's the Big 12 Conference and that's something that's exciting. And it's the opportunity to do something different. There is a tradition of winning there although they haven't won as much as they would have liked in the last couple of years. But it wasn't so far long ago they were winning. I'm hoping I can come down there and help them get it going again."

George also muses that Spencer may be hired to take the same or a similar position, but it's also been speculated that Spencer might eventually be the next head coach. That really gets me excited. I think Coach Hays is a damn fine coach, but the prospect of having a guy who's had some success at the highest level be the man in place when Coach Hays retires is exciting. If Spencer can come in and do the same thing that he's done at OSU (scroll down to the team pitching ERA) then sign me up.

Jake at Building the Dam also had this news late last night, but earlier this week and he had this to say about Spencer's success:

Five pitchers were drafted from this year's staff, and last year, we lost two pitchers from our starting rotation, as well as our closer. So he keeps putting together a competitive staff every year. This year, we had four starters on our staff. Our Sunday pitcher moved between Daniel Turpen and Jorge Reyes during the year, but they ended up both starting games in Omaha. Saturday starter Joe Paterson was moved to a reliever in Omaha, and that was a great decision. Joe threw in every game, and was a critical part of our success in Omaha.

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anything to get tech baseball off the mat

by royalsreview on Jun 30, 2007 7:00 PM CDT 0 recs

Not knowing much about Spencer

I like the idea of hiring a young coach who's had success. I can't help but think that Spencer is charismatic (he was OSU's recruiting coordinator) and good at his job (led the Pac-10 in ERA 2 straight years).

Go Raiders . . .

by Seth C on Jul 1, 2007 6:54 AM CDT up 0 recs