A certain stat says the Tennessee Vols had the best college baseball regular season ever
It is no secret that Tennessee Vols baseball has been on another level this season. They have undoubtedly the best pitching staff in the country. Their lineup is peppered with talent throughout, and they play solid defense. They have shown very few glimpses of holes in their game. Accordingly, Massey Ratings rank the 2022 regular season […]
It is no secret that Tennessee Vols baseball has been on another level this season. They have undoubtedly the best pitching staff in the country. Their lineup is peppered with talent throughout, and they play solid defense. They have shown very few glimpses of holes in their game. Accordingly, Massey Ratings rank the 2022 regular season for the Vols as the best ever. Tennessee had the top-ranked defense/pitching metric, and they were second in Massey's offensive metric.
The Numbers
Their total "score" was a 9.54 out of 10. The next closest season to that is the 2020 UCLA Bruins, a team that only played fifteen games due to COVID-19. 2017 Oregon State is next in the rankings with a score of 9.35. The Beavers went 56-6 and made a trip to Omaha for the College World Series. LSU knocked them out. If that can teach the Vols anything, it's that anything can happen in the postseason no matter how well you fare in the regular season. Nothing is a given in college baseball.
That being said #4 and #5 on the rankings for season success were College World Series champions. Oregon State from 2018 is fourth, and 2019 Vanderbilt is fifth. We all remember how dominant those teams were.
Regardless, the 2022 Vols clear them as of right now. At 53-7, they could break 60 wins for the season. That is an unreal number in college baseball. The sport is one of the most volatile in collegiate athletics, yet the Vols have remained extremely consistent.
They have beaten teams by an average score of 9.3 to 2.7. The Vols enter the tournament on an eight-game win streak and have won 12 of their last 13. They lost one series in the entire regular season and breezed through the conference tournament.
Their unfathomable success has people questioning – should betting folks bet on the Vols or the field to take home the CWS hardware? With the parody of college baseball, questions like this don't get asked every year. There's usually more of a cluster of success at the top, but Tennessee is in their own zone in 2022.
Featured Image via USA TODAY-Sports
