Paul Mainieri can’t get much sleep.
As a Division I baseball coach, this isn’t exactly breaking news. But it’s the different causes of the nightly tossing and turning each season that made each of Mainieri’s 31 seasons a challenge.
This season — his eighth at LSU — it’s trying to find a closer.
Gone is the eighth and ninth inning luxury of Chris Cotton, the do-everything closer who nabbed Third-Team All-American honors from Perfect Game in 2013 as he tied the LSU single-season record with 16 saves.
Without a clear-cut replacement, Mainieri hinted junior college transfer Brady Domangue as the front runner for the position.
Domangue, who holds the LSU-Eunice record in strikeouts and lowest ERA, paced the LSU-E pitching staff with 118 strikeouts and a 14-2 record. He was also named to the NJCAA World Series All-Tournament Team in 2013 and a key component of the Bengals’ 2012 NJCAA Division II World Series championship.
Now facing the possibility of closing games rather than starting, Domangue said his mindset on the mound isn’t different.
“Wherever I end up, whether it’s closer, starter or long-relief guy, I just need to get guys out,” Domangue said. “That’s my mentality. But if it is closer, then I’m going to do what I have to do for the team, and if they put a batter in the box, I’m going to get him out from whatever role they need me in.”
Attrition and graduation took its toll on the Tiger bullpen as six established relievers are gone from the 2013 squad, leaving senior Kurt McCune and redshirt junior Joe Broussard as the veteran leadership among a fledgling crop of relievers.
Mainieri called the experienced duo the “key to our pitching staff” during his meeting with reporters at media day, pointing to each pitcher’s brushes with brilliance in their LSU career.
McCune, the Tigers’ Friday night starter in 2011, contracted mononucleosis, “mono,” during his sophomore season before suffering a stress fracture in his lower back on opening night last season, both injuries putting his freshman year successes in the rearview mirror.
The Norco native said he’s had a completely healthy fall — the first he can remember in quite a while.
“I think I’m ready to go and do what I need to do to be successful,” McCune said. “[It’s great] just to be able to get in a routine and throw and throw and make sure my fundamentals are right.”
McCune added his splitter to his repertoire last fall and said it holds the key to his effectiveness. He also said he’s thrown a two-seam fastball more often in the fall.
Broussard missed the entire 2013 season as he recovered from Tommy John surgery to repair a torn ulnar collateral ligament he suffered in the Cape Cod League.
“Next to [junior pitcher Aaron] Nola, [Broussard] probably has the best stuff of anyone on our team in terms of velocity and a tight breaking ball,” Mainieri said.
After concluding his year-long rehab, Broussard couldn’t contain his excitement to get back to the field in fall practice, although the start wasn’t just as he hoped.
“My first couple outings during the fall were a little rough,” Broussard said. “It was a little all over the place, but after each outing I felt like I was getting more confident.”
LSU pitching coach Alan Dunn didn’t shy away from the notion that the bullpen is a work in progress, pointing to the youth and inexperience as just a nature of the game.
Dunn said preseason scrimmages have helped to clear the murky bullpen waters thus far, and pre-Southeastern Conference games will also assist the staff.
“When you’re in college baseball, either through the draft or guys graduating, there’s a turnover,” Dunn said. “There’s guys who have come through the program who have to take that next step and that’s where we’re at now.”
“When that bell rings, we’ll be ready.”