Crunch Time in Waco: Breaking Down Baylor Baseball's NCAA Tournament Path

Coming off a recent road series loss to a strong Cincinnati squad and a thrilling midweek walk-off win over UTSA, Baylor baseball holds a 21-15 (8-7) record at the halfway point of conference play and is about to enter the home stretch. The Bears are currently 34th in the country in RPI and have faced the ninth-toughest strength of schedule.

Remaining Path for a Potential NCAA Tournament Push

With roughly a month left to play in the season, the Bears are sitting firmly on the bubble in all of the latest NCAA Tournament projections. Baseball America has Baylor as part of the “Last Four In” and a 3-seed in the Tuscaloosa Regional. A college baseball analytics site, PEARatings, also has the Bears in the “Last Four In” and a 3-seed in the Los Angeles Regional. Lastly, D1Baseball did a bracket projection on Tuesday morning, ahead of Baylor’s win over UTSA, and has the Bears sitting outside the bubble in the “Next Four Out.”

Now comes the teeth of Baylor’s schedule, as the Bears are set to face three of the top five teams in the conference standings-wise, with series against TCU (22-14, 8-7), Arizona State (26-12, 9-6) and UCF (20-13, 10-5) coming up all back-to-back-to-back. The good news is the schedule rounds out with two very winnable series against Texas Tech (20-15, 6-9) and Utah (17-15, 6-9), but these next three weekends appear pretty daunting on paper.

Starting with the three-game set this weekend against the rival Horned Frogs, I’d argue this is the biggest series of head coach Mitch Thompson’s tenure, and I don’t think it’s particularly close.

TCU has dealt with a ton of injuries this season and is coming off a home series loss to a lowly Arizona team. This Horned Frog squad isn’t the juggernaut it’s been in recent years, but they’re still plenty talented. The opportunity for Baylor to beat its rival for the first time in Thompson’s tenure is very real, but TCU’s going to come into Waco swinging, so the Bears better be up for the fight. This is a huge series for both programs.

Looking ahead for a minute, with or without a series win this weekend, I’ll forecast what I believe Baylor must do to make the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2019.

• Don’t get swept at Arizona State
• Split home series against TCU and UCF
• Win the series over Texas Tech and Utah

That’s tough, but it’s doable, in my opinion. I believe the Bears will need five series wins in conference play and somewhere between 15 and 17 wins in league play to make a regional. I don’t believe that four series victories, presumably over Houston, BYU, Texas Tech and Utah, would get Baylor in, even if that tallies up to 15 wins. Warren Nolan projects a 28-26 finish, while PEARatings has 30-24 as the most likely outcome.

If the Bears do what I listed above and take care of business in the remaining midweeks, they would have a 31-23 (16-14) record heading into the Big 12 Tournament — I believe that would be enough to have them firmly on the right side of the bubble, but you never can truly know how these things will turn out, especially considering half the Big 12 seems to be on the bubble. Baylor should, however, have an upper hand in strength of schedule, because those early-season classics in Houston and Round Rock are really paying dividends right now.

My preseason record prediction was 29-25 (13-17), so if you had told me heading into the year that Baylor would be 21-15 with a month to play and have a legit chance to make the tourney, I would have signed up for that 100 times out of 100.

Strengths & Weaknesses of This Year’s Squad

I’ll keep this section relatively brief because I’ve hit on these things quite a lot in recent weeks. Overall, I’m very pleased with what the pitching staff has done this season, despite limited depth. In the lineup, there’s been a lot left to be desired, but hopefully, the momentum from these last two games can carry forward because hitting is contagious.

Starting with the weekend rotation, this is a unit that’s had so many curveballs thrown its way this year. The team’s ace, Lucas Davenport (3.56 ERA, 1.29 WHIP, 30.1 IP), missed multiple starts, and lefty Stefan Stahl (1.54 ERA, 1.03 WHIP, 11.2 IP) was inserted into that Friday night role for a few weeks. Stahl dominated Oregon State and Ole Miss before getting hurt himself and being sidelined pretty much since.

Left-handed pitcher Mason Green (4.15 ERA, 1.15 WHIP, 4.1 IP) was expected to be a key piece on this year’s staff, but he was also shut down for the year after just three appearances. On top of that, Wisconsin-Whitewater transfer Cade Hansen (12.15 ERA, 2.25 WHIP, 20 IP), who had absurd numbers at the Division III level, never panned out.

With all of that going haywire, the best bullpen arm from the first half of the season, Zack Wallace (5.66 ERA, 1.34 WHIP, 35 IP), has been thrust into the weekend rotation and has done a commendable job, while veteran Ethan Calder (4.17 ERA, 1.30 WHIP, 45.1 IP), an All-Big 12 reliever in 2024, has been the team’s Sunday starter and has been outstanding.

Baylor’s also had a handful of relievers really step up, including closer Caleb Bunch (1.00 ERA, 1.04 WHIP, 27 IP), as well as Luke McLeod (1.62 ERA, 1.26 WHIP, 16.2 IP), RJ Ruais (3.06 ERA, 1.13 WHIP, 17.2 IP), Charlie Atkinson (3.28 ERA, 1.38 WHIP, 24.2 IP) and Brayden Bergman (3.94 ERA, 1.44 WHIP, 16 IP).

All things considered, what pitching coach Sean Snedeker has done with the group has been incredibly impressive, as the Bears are fourth in the Big 12 in ERA (5.24) and sit in the upper half of the conference in most pitching statistics. While the depth may be a little shaky, this group has overall been pretty good, and there’s a handful of key arms you can trust.

As for the lineup, they’ve left a lot to be desired, and it’s honestly been the expected result of relying on so many unproven players. The Bears are second-to-last in the Big 12 in batting average (.266), fourth-to-last in on-base percentage (.384) and third-to-last in slugging percentage (.417), while having the second-most punchouts (355).

The top three players — Travis Sanders (.338 AVG, .937 OPS), Brady Janusek (.338 AVG, 1.026 OPS) and Tyce Armstrong (.288 AVG, 1.054 OPS) — have been elite, but outside of that, it’s been a lot of ups and downs.

UTA transfer Cade Dodson (.232 AVG, .708 OPS) had a slow start to the season and never really rebounded fully, while Pearson Riebock (.208 AVG, .635 OPS) broke a finger during a game in February and hasn’t been fully healthy and able to build off his All-Freshman Big 12 campaign. Ty Johnson (.216 AVG, .599 OPS) has been better at the plate lately, but never fully regained his 2024 form, where he hit over .300.

There have been some young players who are really starting to flash recently, such as Brytton Clements, Dylan Perez and Bo Caraway, but it’s tough to be in a spot where you’re counting on those guys consistently.

This unit is not magically going to jump into the top half of the Big 12 overnight, so from here on out, all you can hope for is that they cut down the punchouts and let their athleticism wreak havoc on the basepaths. At the college level, good things happen when you put the ball in play, and that, quite frankly, hasn’t happened enough this year.

Overall Thoughts on the State of the Program

All things considered, this year has been a major step forward for Thompson’s program, and assuming this final month doesn’t end in disaster, there’s going to be some serious momentum heading into the offseason for arguably the first time in his tenure.

As a caveat, in the transfer portal era, one would prefer that it doesn’t take four years to be in a position to contend for an NCAA Tournament berth, but it’s better late than never to get the ship steered in the right direction.

With that momentum, however, comes a responsibility to capitalize on it, which hasn’t necessarily been a strong suit of Baylor Athletics this decade.

I know it’s early to even start to touch these topics, and they’ll be discussed ad nauseam as we get closer to the summer, but building that momentum starts with keeping some of the top returning players, such as Brady Janusek — a likely Freshman All-American — and Lucas Davenport — a legit Friday night starter in the Big 12 — and several others.

On top of that, the use of the transfer portal has to be seriously reevaluated going forward, because had there been anywhere from one-to-four more impact additions on this roster, I personally believe that would be the difference between being a bubble team and being comfortably in the NCAA Tournament. Baylor will never be a program that builds through the transfer portal, as Thompson prioritizes high school and junior college prospects, but it’s a great tool to supplement holes that might otherwise go unfilled.

Money has obviously been a big issue when it comes to Baylor’s use or lack thereof with the transfer portal in recent years. I don’t have any inside intel here, but I do know that first-year athletic director Doug McNamee, who was around for the Bears’ glory years in the early 2000s, fully understands the importance of maintaining a competitive collegiate baseball program. I’m personally hopeful there will be some urgency to give Thompson some more funds to work with this offseason, which never felt like a priority under the previous athletic director. The increased scholarship numbers should help as well, as the Bears have nearly doubled from the 11.7 number that has hampered them recently.

I also can’t help but notice that, judging by the transfer portal cycles for football and basketball in recent months, it’s pretty clear that schools are raising significant NIL money outside the allocated cap, which is roughly $20.5 million. Hypothetically, would that mean some non-revenue sports can raise their own money, and if that’s the case, could Baylor take advantage of that, especially if the Bears end the season on a hot streak? Would a donor step forward to use that money for the roster, rather than ballpark renovations?

There’s also a fair point when people look at other Big 12 programs in less traditional locations, like West Virginia, Cincinnati and Kansas, that have developed into really strong programs in recent years, and wonder why Baylor can’t reach that same level, especially since those teams aren’t likely rolling in dough either, right?

All of these are ideas are things that I’m hoping to get answers on in the coming months. I’ll forever contend there are plenty of talented players out there who want to play in Central Texas, so hopefully that’s something that really gets capitalized on this summer, and Thompson is able to get the adequate resources to make that happen.

On a closing note, I’m overall leaning toward a more optimistic outlook for the future, assuming the Bears don’t crash and burn the rest of the way. It seems like things are finally trending clearly in the right direction. The next step is to keep winning, close out this year on a strong note and be ready to build on that momentum this offseason.