Thump.
A liner up the middle smacked Blake Money in the side and meandered to Jacob Berry at third base, who could not make the play in time.
Dink.
Auburn RF Josh Hall laid down a bunt to the first base side. Tre’ Morgan fielded it but hesitated when he realized his pitcher was not going to make it to the bag. Infield bunt single.
Three batters later, Money has the bases loaded with two outs. DH Cam Hill has come to the plate.
This sound was much less dull than the previous two. Hill hit a ball hard towards Morgan at first. He was in good position to make a play and easily touch first base for the third out. LSU was going to get out of this jam and keep their lead.
Until they didn’t. The ball scooted underneath Morgan and into right. Two runs scored to tie it there.
Shortstop Brody Moore launched the second pitch of the next at-bat to left center for a three-run home run. Within 20 minutes, LSU went from leading 2-0 in the opening game of the series to down 5-2 and their tails between their legs.
The bleeding did not stop there. Jordan Thompson could not make a play at deep short to get Mike Bello, who then advanced to second on a wild pitch by Money. And to cap off the nightmare, Cade Doughty made an error to score the sixth run of the inning for Auburn. Six runs, five hits and one bad headache of an inning that mercifully ended was a frustrating experience for the team.
Emotions flared. The team limped back to the dugout to find a tight huddle featuring their coach in the middle, trying to recapture their focus and drive.
“I was just trying tell them, ‘Hey, there’s a lot of game left,’” Jay Johnson said. “Nobody likes how that went. Blake, Tre’, Cade, whoever else made a mistake. Those guys don’t like that. I just tried to get them back up to respond as quickly as we could.”
It was tough sledding for the next three innings. LSU only mustered two hits in their next nine outs given up. Johnson had felt that the team only took three quality at-bats during that span.
Enter Brayden Jobert once again. After terrorizing Florida and ULM in his past three games with five home runs and 16 RBIs, the LSU slugger struck once again, with a two-run homer to right field off the left-handed reliever Carson Skipper who had given the LSU fits all night. Heads perked up and the crowd kicked back into the game.
Behind the great relief performance of Bryce Collins on the mound, LSU held Auburn close, ready to finally close the gap in the bottom of the ninth. Doughty and Morgan each singled. Dylan Crews crushed a ball to deep center that scored Doughty from third and advanced Morgan to second. LSU was going to escape from their mistakes and rally back for a gutsy win.
Until they didn’t. Jacob Berry struck out behind Crews. Thompson fouled out to right field. Game over.
It’s a difficult loss for the Tigers that have yet to win an SEC series opener on three tries, one that saw a lot of pent-up frustration released in body language and energy. The team has to shake it off and bounce back tomorrow.
“That’s a tough one because if we just play through the original mistake a bit better, that game doesn’t get away from us,” Johnson said. “If we can just play through that mistake — and the margin between winning and losing with all these teams in the league is so small. You have to be able to get up after something goes bad and so hopefully, we’ll learn from that and be better for it tomorrow.”
While the rally was encouraging to see, the mistakes have to be remedied. Johnson stated that he has never seen any reason to question that the fight in the team is missing but rather the baseball aspects, such as making plays, can be lacking at times. LSU was 0-9 with runners in scoring position tonight and stranded nine runners. The Tigers again committed two errors in the field.
The beauty and agony of baseball lies in the sights, sounds, and feels of the game. Auburn was able to see, hear, and feel the thrill of laying six runs on a rival in their stadium. LSU was left to be haunted by those same plays in the fifth that doomed their series opener. The fickle pastime got the better of LSU on Thursday night.