Inside the Tide: Ready for Postseason

It has been a rough two weeks for Alabama softball. This has been the worst two-week stretch that I have been apart of since I started working with the program in 2009. The most frustrating part about losing five of the last six games is that we were one play away in four of those five losses. That is a tough pill to swallow, but you have to move on.

Even though the Crimson Tide went from the three seed to the eight seed in a matter of just over a week, it has not been all doom and gloom. There have been some big signs of improvement that will be key for success in the postseason.

First of all in my book is the vast improvement on defense, while I realize it doesn’t show in the box score and the fact that Alabama has made a few errors in the last few weeks, there has been a solid improvement on defense in the past two weeks. There was the two errors in the LSU fifth in the series finale that allowed the tying and go-ahead run to score for the Tigers and while I realize that is huge, compared to the rest of the season, the defense was much improved and making plays that had not been made the entire season up to that point. We saw a lot of World Series-caliber defensive plays over the past two weeks and that is what you want to see at this point of the year.

I also really like the production we are starting to see out of the bottom half of the order, which has been a problem for much of the season. Alabama still struggles to string together hits and that has been something the Tide has been one of the trademarks of this team for the last several years. Bama has to start putting together big innings or at least coming through with a run when you have an easy sacrifice opportunity (or two) in an inning.

While I certainly understand the struggles of the past two weeks can give you a bad outlook on this team, they can break out at any point. This is the most talented and dangerous team in the conference when clicking on all cylinders. Don’t let the seed fool you, Alabama is more than capable of making a run to Saturday in the SEC Tournament this week. There has only been one team outside the top four seeds to win the SEC Tournament and that was South Carolina in 2000. It won’t be easy, but we’ve all seen how crazy the SEC has been this year. Don’t be surprised to see the Tide still in Lexington come Saturday.

I’ll take a shot at projecting the NCAA Tournament a little later today and will have it for you here on 991wdgm.com.

If you are traveling to Lexington have a safe trip up and we’ll see you at the new John Cropp Stadium! If not, look forward to seeing you back at the Rhoads House for the Regional in two weeks. Roll Tide!