BATON ROUGE — LSUsports.net sat down with Skip Bertman to discuss the upcoming season, including the NCAA Regional Format, the future of Alex Box Stadium and the RPI rankings in part two of an exclusive two-part interview.
Webmaster: Last season, you were forced to go to Alabama for the NCAA Super Regional due to win-loss comparison and RPI rankings. Has the middle-of-the-week game changed in it’s importance to you?
Bertman: Yes. The RPI is important, and for us it’s high. But the ultimate thing is the wins and losses. Other teams with less competition than us but more wins is still going to get that edge. There’s no doubt about it. The wins make more than the competition, unless you’re not playing anybody ever. To play Arizona State while somebody else plays some mid-western team doesn’t make any difference. We better win. Now, in order to compensate for an Arizona State loss, or another, you need that mid-week game later on.
Another things will renewed importance is the Southeaster Conference Baseball Tournament. Winning the tournament will be a big thing, now. Playing longer in the tournament, getting more wins and seeing who’s eliminated firstPeople don’t realize that there will always be what happened last year. There will always be four (teams from the SEC) that’ll be in that category. There will always be somebody who’s going to stay home and somebody who’s going to travel. They may not travel to one another like we did last year, but they will be there. Of the 16, there may be as many as eight (SEC teams in the NCAA Super Regionals).
So, to answer your question, yes, we have to win more games than we won last year so that we don’t have to go to the other guy’s ball yard. But, let me give you some more stuff that you didn’t ask, because you couldn’t have known this: At the convention, I told some people that I thought they had this format backwards. A lot of coaches have agreed with me. We ought to play the two-out-of-three first. There are 64 teams, so there will be 32 sites. That’s a good thing, because that’s what they want. The problem for them is that No. 1 is supposed to play No. 64, and it’s a blowout. Then the next week, give us a regional with four teams at each place and the winners go to Omaha. I think that’s a much better place to go. But, I think they thing they’re going to make more money their way with the two-out-of-three games.
It’s so hard to beat LSU here twice. And Alabama at Alabama. Auburn went to Florida State and had no chance. But, if Florida State went to Auburn, they might not have been in the championship game. Wake Forest went to Miami (Fla.) — No Chance. But nothing’s happening. We talked about it, we’re going to look into it and the SEC’s going to look into it, but the long and short of it quite obviously is that nothing’s going to happen for awhile.
Webmaster: What are the plans for Alex Box Stadium over the next few years?
Bertman: It’s not going to be a renovation, but rather a new stadium. The only problem is that we can’t build it anywhere but where it is presently which causes a problem finding a window between July 1 and February to build in. That’s almost eight months. They can work for eight months and get almost half of it done. In the next eight months, they can finish. I don’t think there is much doubt that the stadium is a reality. Architects are turning in a plan at the end of this month. But, the plan’s not official. Then, we’re going to the state in March to ask for the capital outlay of $10 million. I’m pretty sure we’ll get it. Then it’ll be bonded for us to pay it back. What will pay it back will be the skyboxes and the attendance.
Another record was set this year. We sold 6,600 season tickets. That’s more than basketball has ever sold. Ever, in the history of the school. Not just the last few seasons when the team was down, but I’m talking about when Dale Brown went to the Final Four in ’86 they didn’t sell that many season tickets.
This stadium will be increased to 8,400 or 8,600. We don’t know yet because the architects aren’t finished yet. It’ll look a lot like Alex Box will look now and fit into the LSU dTcor and will still be called Alex Box. There’s no doubt about that. But, how to do it and where to place it is still being planned by architects, who probably will take another year.
Webmaster: Will the new stadium have a grandstand that covers the from foul lines to the fence?
Bertman: The way it looks, it’ll be about halfway down the sidelines. The grandstand that’s there presently, which will be removed, the new one will continue down sideline and take the first bleacher on the left field side and the first two on the right field side putting maybe 4,000 to 4,800 into the grandstand where there are only 2,500 now. They’ll all be chair-backed, we think. If I had my wish, we’d have 16 skyboxes. We’ll definitely have 12, but it depends because we have to stay within the structure over there. Everybody’s telling me these things can be done, but they haven’t shown me for the price.
Webmaster: What influence has new assistant coach Turtle Thomas had as a recruiter and as the hitting coach?
Bertman: He’s been a great addition. He’s had a massive impact, first, on the recruiting because that’s the first thing he did. The day he started, July 1, he was on the road. That’s what he does best. We recruited the largest recruiting class, and I think a very good one based on paper and who goes to the pros. It is certainly much better than we’ve had in years and years. He can do that without any forethought. He couldn’t recruit for us while he was at Miami, which is the way it should be. And, we didn’t take anybody from Miami’s list. He started cold and did a great job.
Second thing, he’s a very underrated teacher/coach. He’s very good. He handles hitting, catching and outfield play. He could do anything else, but that’s what I wanted him to do. The kids are very impressed. He also handles something that’s new to me as a coach. He handles our fitness program. Normally, a strength coach does that, or a trainer do it. He wanted to do it, and I see why. He’s much tougher than they are.
Webmaster: How difficult is the non-conference schedule this year?
Bertman: For no intentional reason, we beefed up the schedule this year. Some of this schedule was made in advance. We dropped the Superdome, so I wanted a series we could travel to and they would come here. So, we did Arizona State after doing Texas last year. But, where I think we toughened up is where we have to go back on the road to the University of Central Florida because they were here for the past two years in a row. Normally, there should be another school in there instead of Central Florida like Ohio, or some team that’s not so good. Then, we wanted to go to Houston or Rice, because that’s where our recruiting base is. So, we got Houston two years in a row before we go back to them, which is OK because they’re coming here and we needed the home game. The problem is that they’re very good. We shouldn’t have Houston, Arizona State and Central Florida in the same year.
Virginia’s not a bad team, but they’re not as ready as Arizona State. They won’t be as far along because of the snow and the indoors. You have to get a couple of those. Tulane is magnificent at that. They get the Chicago circle, Notre Dame and everybody out of the snow. He plays 42 home games.I don’t want to do it that way. I want to do it right. But, the problem is that we might have toughened up a little bit. We’ll find out. Next year, I don’t think it’ll matter. We’ll lose a lot of people, but we’ll have a lot of people already recruited by Turtle that aren’t here yet. That’ll be a big thing.