Have a feeling that there could be some VERY LONG Sunday afternoons being spent at NCAC diamonds.  I like the DH's being 7 and 9, ala OAC Doubleheaders, but just wish we were still doing it in last years' Round Robin format.  With the exception of DePauw and Wabash, who's closest NCAC oppoenents, other than each other, are Witt and OWU, would have to deal with some travel issues, like Allegheny would on the other side of the league, BUT, if a weekday NCAC League DH was allowed, then you could easily free up weekend for that traveling for the farther away contests.  Everyone else is fairly close enough to do the mid-week League contests.  Another aspect would be less overnight expenses for motels and the ability to make-up rainouts the next day if the weather permitted...

Just a few thoughts to improve the league....Though I do like the idea that Wooster is playing ALL their league contests up north and none during their Spring Trip....

If they go back to the Division format for 2012, I wonder if any thought would be given to re-setting the Divisions.  Instead of East and West, go with Northwest and Southeast.  The Northwest would be Depaw, Wabash, Kenyon, Oberlin, & Hiram, while in the Southeast you would have Wittenberg, Ohio Wesleyan, Denison, Wooster, and Alleghenny.  That would make both Divisions have about the same distance from their farthest two teams so travel would be about equal, and if you look at team strength, it would be a little more balanced, though you'd still have Wooster, Denison, Ohio Wesleyan, and Wittenberg all in the same group, and looking at strength, the other Division's strength would be Wabash, Depaw, and maybe Kenyon/Oberlin.  Extending the season two weeks and going Round-Robin is still the best format for equality.

Macdade, my son graduated a long time ago and not from Ohio Wesleyan.  OWU is just the local university I follow and baseball is a sport I love watching, reading about, and talking about.  I agree with you about the NCAC schedule format for this season and I've not seen the new bats in action that you referred to, so I can't say that they will make any difference.  I do find that it is interesting that COW is able to play a meaningful NCAC DH in Florida, while everyone else in the league, with the exception of their opponent Alleghaney, has to play all their league contests in the great weather of the mid-West....  Somehow that just doesn't seem right....your thoughts?

I agree with the NCAA holding off to at least say April 1st to announce the Regional Sites.  That would give a little bit better idea of who is playing well and who possibly may be involved in the Regional.  Even here in the fridged north, enough ball would be played for a better decision.  It would be nice for the location to be spread around as there is some really good baseball played in this Region.  Also, with most of the schools being located in smaller towns, it can give a decent shot to the local economy to be able to get to host a Regional every so often.  Maybe communities would be more willing to donate money for improvements to the facilities of their local school if they knew that somewhere down the road a Regional was coming...

Personally I believe that there will be more teams in the mix for league championships, so who ends up going to Marietta for the Regional may not even be showing on the Poll List they have out.  The "berg" and "etta" are probably the two it will come down to for the Region as Wooster may have a lot of rebuilding to do with so few position players coming back.  Someone is pumping sunshine up OWU's skirt too as their season could be done after their southern spring trip, playing the "berg" once and "etta" twice....But they do host COW the first weekend of NCAC play, and that's after COW plays at Wabash the day before....League Championships are WIDE OPEN this season....

What's going on in Westerville, OH with the Otterbein program?  I've heard rumors that there's been some bigtime internal problems with the team that the coach wasn't aware of and the Administration learned about through the wrong channels.  Guess the school is deciding on whether to suspend the players involved for the season to possibly even suspending the program for the 2010 schedule.  This could cause problems with future recruiting.

Play Ball ALL!!!!  It's Spring Time in OHIO and the Temps are achieving a balmby 43 degrees....Hey, LET'S PLAY TWO!!!!!!

I believe that the NCAC Tournament IS changing it's format for this season and it's REALLY going to be interesting to see the shake-up in the league's Regular Season for next year.  I understand that teams will be playing all other 8 members and will do it playing a DH on Sat versus one team and another DH on Sun versus a different team.  I bet travel and schedule make up will be a VERY interesting discussion when the time comes....

O.W.U. readied itself on Wednesday with a 7-6 victory over #3 Heidelberg in Delaware, OH.  The Bishops used 5 different pitchers during the contest, 3 of which were Freshmen, giving up just 9 hits and 3 Earned Runs, while striking out 8 and allowing just 1 walk.  Freshmen James DeBiasio and Senior Logan Hronis led the 8-hit Wesleyan attack with 2 hits apiece, while Junior Steve Ruygrok had the big hit, a 3-run blast, the team's first long ball of the season.

Ohio Wesleyan will take their 6-6 record to Crawfordsville, IN on Saturday to open up NCAC play taking on the Little Giants of Wabash.

OH, and one other thing that I'm sure will enter into the Wesleyan situation....a few days before they started their workouts, the head coaching job was posted for a search, so that could really affect the recruiting process for them for future years.  Don't know if their new coach is in any trouble, but seems like an odd time to be saying we're going to start a search to replace you...

BASH...Completely agree with the Winter sinking in a little deeper each year and I think you're right about Wooster starting to loose some of their luster each year.  OWU has beaten them 5 of their last 8 meetings, taking two Playoff series from them, yet the rest of the D-III world seems to think they are still the Golden Team.  OWU wins the NCAC for a 2nd year in a row in 2008 and as an In-Region League Champ, gets shipped off to the New York D-III Region, while Wooster remains In-Region with an "At-Large" bid...That made no sense at all.

The Scotts will probably not be challenged for the Division Title, though depending on  what happens with the Allegheny series in Florida they may have a little more pressure on them the last weekend of their League Season when they travel to Kenyon for 4 games.  I wouldn't be surprised though to see it again be an All Western Division, but as for who, my only sure bet would be that it won't include Earlham.

Wabash may have alot of returnees, but Dennison, Witt, and O.W.U. have alot of unknown Freshmen in their rosters.  The "unknowns" may play a big role in shaping the West this Spring...and it's going to be a complete "toss up" as to who'll make the Playoffs between the 4 remaining ball clubs.

So with the weather turning just a little warmer these next couple of days and the team schedules all getting ready to board the buses for competition and sunshine, what say you hearld scribes as to who will finish 1-2 in the East and West, who'll come out of the Semi's and head to Springfield for the Championship........

Dang it, it's BASEBALL SEASON, so let's get after it a little.....