Top Shelf Grumbling Episode 48 Baseball Eggbowl

The rivalry is back on the diamond. ⚾🔥

In this episode of Top Shelf Grumbling, we break down the upcoming SEC showdown between the Ole Miss Rebels baseball and the Mississippi State Bulldogs baseball as the two in-state rivals get set for another huge weekend series.

We dive into the current state of both programs, key matchups that could decide the series, and what each team needs to do to come out on top in one of college baseball’s most intense rivalries. From pitching rotations to lineup production and the atmosphere that always surrounds this matchup, we cover everything heading into the weekend.

If you’re a Rebel fan, a Bulldog fan, or just love SEC baseball, this is a series you won’t want to miss.

👍 Like, comment, and subscribe for more Ole Miss sports coverage from Top Shelf Grumbling.

#OleMiss #HottyToddy #MississippiState #SECBaseball #CollegeBaseball #OleMissBaseball #HailState

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Dang these mugs. Damn mugs. Anyway. I kind of think so producer may be tweaking. Tweaking. Welcome to the Top Shelf Grumbling Podcast with Dan the Don Walls. This episode is brought to you by our sponsors, Lawn Hub for all your lawn care needs. Pricecutter, the best meat in town, Hale State. Russell Motors, go see Austin. It's got what you need. But your block restaurant for the Best Biscuit and Best Breakfast 2025. Available wherever you get your podcast, coming to you from the Wilder Fitness Studio. Presenting Aware You Media Production, this is Top Shelf Grumbling. Hi guys, we're back here with the Top Shelf Grumbling Podcast. Thursday night big show. We got a big weekend coming up. We've got some friends in here tonight. It's uh not June yet, but there's June bugs. June bugs taken over the back porch. Uh funny story. Uh back when I was in college and waiting tables at Jochna River End, there was a bartender, and I will not name his name, uh, that was out there waiting for a table and a June bug flew in his ear and he had to go to the damn hospital and get it taken out. And so I have uh I've had an irrational fear of June bugs ever since.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

How big was this guy?

SPEAKER_00 1:19

If you see me with the uh with the fly swatter and I'm just uh going 90 to nothing, then we're not having any June bugs around here. How big was this, how big was this guy's ear hole for a damn June bug? I'm telling you, there's different sized June bugs as many as I've uh already swatted around here already. There shouldn't be any left. No, it shouldn't be, but they're all they're all well. They is attracted to the lights tonight. We're here in the Wilder Fitness uh back porch studio. Wilder Fitness back porch studio. Uh the weather's just been too nice to be you know up in the up inside. So uh got a big show tonight. Gonna talk about uh some big baseball this weekend. We got a huge series in Oxford. Uh I'll be over there Friday night. Uh, gonna watch the watch the breaking news.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

The producers on the grounds.

SPEAKER_00 2:01

Be on the grounds, get a get a bird's eye view, maybe get a little footage for uh for next week when we open up our next episode. I'll throw that up.

SPEAKER_01 2:09

Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_00 2:10

Stick around next episode. You can you can see the live footage from the game.

SPEAKER_01 2:14

Normally on Monday nights from here on, like during baseball season, we're gonna like preview the big series of the weekend. And that's what I we planned on doing tonight. There's there's only two ranked matchups this weekend, which is us and uh Ole Miss and Mississippi State. Not a lot of action. And Oklahoma and um UT uh Texas. Uh Red River, Red River baseball edition. Um But the uh the SEC's got this is full of good teams, but yeah, we're going normally try to do ranked matchups on our preview, and there was two this weekend. We're really not even gonna talk much about Oklahoma and Texas, at least not at first.

SPEAKER_00 2:53

So let's uh get on into the Rebels Bulls. So the Rebels and Bulldogs look big rivalry weekend.

SPEAKER_01 3:00

We've kind of talked about this a little bit already. It's still early in the season. I st I don't really have the warming fozies about this series this weekend. Yeah. Because we got Hunter Elliott starting on a Friday, which he's been dialed in here lately. And we've got TBA, TBA, Saturday and Sunday. But there's been kind of rumblings, of course, Cade Townsend. He may go, he may not. There'd also be a little bit of gamesmanship, you know. That's what I was saying. Even if you play on him going, you still do that. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

You still have to for sure.

SPEAKER_01 3:31

And um after that. But there's there's been kind of some rumblings of our uh Sunday starter. Um uh TBA Sunday starter, Will Libert, like I said, has been having has has been struggling. He was dialed in in the pre-season, uh pre-SEC season. Yeah. But um since uh SEC play has started, he's uh been struggling. He's got a 12 ERA or 11.8 something ERA. Hasn't won a game, obviously. Um They've been talking about Hudson Calhoun or um Taylor Ray, Raby or Raby, whatever his name is, yeah. Possibly coming in and um taking that third roll. And they've been pitching good, only you know, kind of spot on D, like a couple innings. They've they've looked at it.

SPEAKER_00 4:17

You know, he's been a he's been a good pitch. Is it Rabe or Raby? That's what I mean. I think it's Rabe, but uh either way. Uh he's been coming in, you know, and pitching in spots that we need him, and if we have to take him and put him on, you know, the rotation, that might change up some some of the dynamics.

SPEAKER_01 4:31

Well, I mean, if he did that, he would probably just throw Will Libert into that role. Yeah. But if he can't get it out, then hopefully you may not be able to. I don't know really what's going on with you. He may I know SEC play is way tougher, but he was he looked pretty good, serviceable at least in the non-con play.

SPEAKER_00 4:53

Um but I mean a 12 ERA is just I mean get out. That's a lot of runs. And you know, we're gonna talk about something else as well, too. Uh the Rebels have been struggling with runners in scoring position. Uh they're currently uh 14th, uh, thanks to Chase Barham for doing the uh the the work on that, but we're 14th in the uh in the SEC in uh with with runners in score position.

SPEAKER_01 5:18

Well we gotta be. We were like three for thirty something before the Kentucky series, and we we did okay in that.

SPEAKER_00 5:25

Well, and those are some timely hits as well, too, but it's still that was I think we got from you know sixteenth to fourteenth.

SPEAKER_01 5:31

And look, we we went to Memphis and I've put myself through two or three hours of agony watching that damn game against uh Tiger High. Yeah. Tuesday night, I guess it was. Look, I don't usually put much stock in midweek games. I've always said that. Yeah. But that was that was kind of ugly. Memphis was six and seventeen. Now they're seven and sixteen or whatever. I mean, and they were according to the how many times did did the announcers say it's Johnny Holestyle, Johnny Holstyle. And like it wasn't like Memphis.

SPEAKER_00 6:03

Insufferable.

SPEAKER_01 6:03

It wasn't like Memphis threw their ace pitcher and he just had a good knock. They they did it to us with like three or four different guys.

SPEAKER_00 6:09

I mean, it's four or five. They they swapped pitchers almost every inning. It felt like that. Oh man, it was there was one guy now that the starter went a couple innings.

SPEAKER_01 6:17

We didn't have but like three or four hits, and one of them was damn questionable. They gifted this a damn replay, I think. Yeah. But it could have gone either way, but I can't believe they overturned that like they did. But big weekend coming up.

SPEAKER_00 6:29

Um That game worries me. Big series. But we talked about it, you know, on Monday night as well, too. If you get one of these games, uh you're in you're in good position.

SPEAKER_01 6:37

You don't want to say that, but like I still think this team is kind of finding itself. Yeah. I think you come back at the end of the season. State's way better than Ole Miss right now. Yeah. But I think you come back to the end of the season and Ole Miss is going to be right there with State, with all these guys. I just have a feeling I like this team. I don't think we're not there yet. We we hadn't played our best baseball by any stretch.

SPEAKER_00 7:00

We had a game or two here and there, but we've got like 30-something errors, for God's sake. Yeah, that's just the errors have been pretty bad as well, too.

SPEAKER_01 7:07

But it like this stuff is fixable.

SPEAKER_00 7:09

You hope you hope that you know home field advantage, you know, helps you out a little bit. Uh you get a good crowd in there, and it's a rivalry game. And you know, rivalry games just throw out the the dynamics of who's supposed to be the better team or anything like that. If you steal two out of three, that's going to be a a major W.

SPEAKER_01 7:23

Uh I think we're 16 or 17 and one at home this year.

SPEAKER_00 7:27

Yeah. Well, I mean, look at teams like like LSU. They were preseason number one, and now they're they're just flaunc floundering. I mean, it's bad. South Carolina's a terrible baseball team. They fired their coach. Um national championship winning coach. National championship winning coach, yeah. When I heard they fired him, I said, golly, that's uh that was rough.

SPEAKER_01 7:45

But he'd been there for a couple of years, and they had just been god awful. Like not even competitive, really. Yeah. Um kind of back to towns and for a second. Going back to I said, this end of the uh long season. Yeah. Long season, long season. I wouldn't rush him back. I mean, you want to win this series, but yeah. You want to have him for the rest of the year, the home stretch. Yeah. And I'm not trying to build in excuses or anything. State's got their uh what's their pitcher's name that's out this weekend. Yeah, I saw that, but I didn't remember his name. It's um McPherson's out for state this weekend, so we both we we're both gonna have possibly a pitcher down in our rotation. Yeah, yeah. Um look, old Miss has got. I mean, we've got uh Bassetta's been hitting, Reuter, Furnace, they and you know, maybe one or two more here and there. We we've got like four or five good hitters. Well, not saying we've got four or five people that are actually hitting right now. Dom Decker hadn't done that much. Yeah. Um He seemed to hit some loud outs, though. Like he's I think I said this Monday, I think he's gonna get going.

SPEAKER_00 8:55

I really do. I do too. And you know, Judd Uttermark was hitting home runs at a crazy clip. Um, and he's kind of cooled off and still, you know, hitting some loud outs and stuff too, but they got to get him going.

SPEAKER_01 9:08

Um still uh been tearing the cover off the ball. Although uh against Memphis other night, he had a couple opportunities and he struck out the bases load. I know I won't say twice. I know one time. Um trying to hit a long ball, maybe. Well, I mean he's been having to do it. I mean um but look State I'm worried about this damn game. I I mean this series, I really am. Um State's been tearing the cover off the ball. I mean, they've got uh seven or eight um seven or eight headers in their lineup or um hitting over uh 350. You got the Bryce Chance kids hitting a 452, which leads the SEC. Give him his flowers.

SPEAKER_00 9:57

Um thanks for uh Drew Chapman for uh asking us to shout out. There you go, Drew. Yeah. And um I mean just 317 1331.

SPEAKER_01 10:06

Give him a call, yes. Um like I said, batting for over 450 just leading the SEC. Ace Reese, he's got 30 30 uh 30 hits and 11 doubles. That leads the SEC. Uh Noah Sullivan's batting the DX first baseman's batting 386. Aiden Till's batting 360. Reed Stallman's batting 380. Gosh. And that's that's when I just handed off five or six people.

SPEAKER_00 10:36

Yeah, that's most of the lineup though.

SPEAKER_01 10:38

I mean, good I mean he's gonna leave it off like two, you know. Sorry, guys.

SPEAKER_00 10:42

Um honorable mention.

SPEAKER_01 10:45

I don't know how you pronounce this guy's name. Thoma, Thalma, Valinese, Valinus, Valinus, stakes Ace. He's 5-0 with a 1.3 ERA, 1.4 ERA. That's stout. Um Duke Stone is 4-0. He's got like a 3 or 4 ERA, but I mean that's pretty damn good as well. I don't think they know who they're gonna pitch uh yet as they're the uh Sunday guy. I think they're gonna what do they call it? Uh the Memphis guy, the Tiger High kept calling it Johnny Holstaff. They may be Johnny Holstaff and Sunday, and it looks like we may be too. So bet the over if you can get it uh on the Sunday game. Johnny Holstaff. We're gonna pitch everybody. I mean, that's what it's gonna be. And I I was I was I was wrong on this. I was kind of crowded. I was like, we got a good Sunday, we got a bona fide Sunday starter in Wheel Liberty. Like, he's gonna be good. We got a good Sunday starter.

unknown 11:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:39

There's still time to recover.

SPEAKER_01 11:40

And I'm gonna say there's still time to recover. It's a long season, long season.

SPEAKER_00 11:44

But at the time, you know, sometimes you need to be pulled out. I remember sometimes when I was in high school and I got yanked and I said, I don't want to do that again. So you gotta get back in there.

SPEAKER_01 11:53

Yeah, this is gonna be.

SPEAKER_00 11:55

Yeah, I mean, I just like you said, like you said, hopefully the home field or you know what the um the line on the games are or line on the no um my book don't hardly ever put them up to like right before the game.

SPEAKER_01 12:11

They were with college and up to a couple years ago, you couldn't even hardly find them anywhere. Yeah. Um it's just such a crap shoot. Like anything betting on anything else, really, but baseball's even more. College baseball's like crazy. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:24

Um very unpredictable.

SPEAKER_01 12:26

The SEC's, like we've been saying, you know, the stack this year. Um ten or eleven ranked teams in the top twenty-five, six out of the top ten.

SPEAKER_00 12:36

I mean that's an insane stuff.

SPEAKER_01 12:39

Well, and I can't figure out how come there's only a couple of ranked matchups this week. How does it fall like that? I mean, there's not that many unranked teams. Um I'd like I I'm kind of reiterate again on old miss, like I said. I just think like a long season, long season.

SPEAKER_00 12:55

Long season.

SPEAKER_01 12:56

I just have a feeling about this team in the long run. We're gonna we're gonna find, like we said, we've got Udemont, we've got Rudy, we've got Basetta that are hitting, hitting the tearing the cover off the ball. We just need about one or two more to go with them. Yeah. Get Decker, Decker, and maybe one more to step up, and I think we're we're gonna be good.

SPEAKER_00 13:17

I think if Frederico could get back some of that magic he had a couple years ago. Or Folly, too. Folly can.

SPEAKER_01 13:24

He can he's got so much potential, I feel like he just and he has he had he had a pretty good series against Kentucky.

SPEAKER_00 13:30

He had a well he had a couple hits anyway. And he he's good with you know, he hits for power sometimes too. He hits a lot of sneaky home runs. Um, so you know.

SPEAKER_01 13:38

And don't I wouldn't, like I said, I wouldn't rush.

SPEAKER_00 13:40

No, don't don't rush him back.

SPEAKER_01 13:42

Don't rush Townsend back either. Um uh just try to get one. We saw we have to waving the white flag. We're not waving the white flag. We're just saying we're not playing state's hot as a damn dance in the bobcat.

SPEAKER_00 13:55

No, we're being we're being realistic about the expectations. Like I said, you know, anything can happen, though, because it's it's a rivalry series and and we got some, you know, maybe some home field advantage. So it's we better hope we win Friday, tomorrow night. It's gonna be a it's gonna be a fun time. I can't wait.

SPEAKER_01 14:08

Oh yeah, yeah, you're going, you're going. Live footage, live footage. Right behind home play. It'll be fun. Um the only other ranked matchup this weekend is Oklahoma and Texas. We got a red river red rivalry shootout. Red, red rivalry, river, red river rivalry. Red river rivalry shootout baseball addition. Um look to my from my money right now, these are the two best teams in the SEC. Oklahoma was picked like towards the bottom of the conference and have been on fire. I mean, they're ranked number six, number seven, I think.

SPEAKER_00 14:45

Texas is no one or two. Big time overachievers. Um We saw Texas firsthand.

SPEAKER_01 14:53

They won um Texas, Texas has hit 41 home runs in like 20, however many games. I mean, that's insane. Yeah. Um Oklahoma Oklahoma's pitching. Oklahoma's pitch has been dominant. Yeah. They play a lot of small ball. Um I think um a good top to bottom lineup. Their entire uh one through nine is uh batting 300 as a team. And I think ten different people have hit uh ten different players have hit home runs. But I mean nobody I just don't see anybody beat taking two out of three from Texas this year.

SPEAKER_00 15:32

It's so hard to sweep, though. They're pitching, they and their pitching impressed me more than anything. I mean, they hit the ball well too and and fielded, they fielded just fine, but their pitching was they they basically shut us down.

SPEAKER_01 15:43

I mean, just any staff, we've made like multiple m mediocre pitching staffs look like just we've done that a lot. But like I said, on time temporary expectation, but I'm not I think this is I think I I think this is a team this team made the super or was one out of way from making the super regionals last year, and we were pretty good last year, and I think we were better, I think we were better this year than we were last year. I really do.

SPEAKER_00 16:11

Six starters come back too, and a bunch of pitching.

SPEAKER_01 16:13

And I just think that in the long run, all you gotta do is go about five around 500 and SEC play to host.

SPEAKER_00 16:21

Yeah. And and like I said, we're we're they're accustomed to postseason play. Uh they've been together as a team mostly. Uh, and that that means a lot just in ILA.

SPEAKER_01 16:29

We just gotta kind of hold it together, and I think we'll jail through. I just I don't I just have a feeling that we're gonna have a couple hitters come around. That's all that's I really that's really all we're lacking, is a couple more. And the weather's gonna be nice, too. Oh, it's gonna be It's gonna be pristine. A bluebird, Chamber of Commerce type day in Oxford this week.

SPEAKER_00 16:46

All weekend long. Epic photography going on over there when that sun's gonna be.

SPEAKER_01 16:50

Now, it's supposed to be um windy as hell. Yeah. Um uh I think tomorrow.

SPEAKER_00 16:55

It's like 20-something mile an hour. I don't know about tomorrow night. Yeah. It probably calms down the afternoon, it'll pick up, but probably calm down closer to the game time.

SPEAKER_01 17:03

But the bottom line is we've been kind of sputtering, puttering and puttering at our lineup.

SPEAKER_00 17:09

We're gonna have to be consistent, you know, at one through seven or eight at least, uh, and get some timely hits. Like I said, we've got to get out of that the rut of not hitting uh with with batters uh on score position. I mean, you gotta runners in score position. That's that's gotta change.

SPEAKER_01 17:23

Uh I don't understand. Like you get them in position, you it's not we can't do it, we're just I don't know what it is.

SPEAKER_00 17:30

If Hunter has a crazy game tomorrow, you know, and and we can back it up and win a 3-2 game or a 3-1 game or something like that, and not get into a uh a hitting contest, uh, it might steal one. But it's gonna be a good weekend. I'm excited about it. I am too, and I'm gonna be tuned in heavily, but I just think that And while you're here, if you're tuned into this, like and subscribe and like and subscribe, like and subscribe, like and subscribe. You definitely need to like and subscribe.

SPEAKER_01 17:57

Subscribe and like. Um but um I really believe just stay with this team, Rebel fans. Don't um even if you were to get sway up this weekend, yeah. I still think that we can finish that. I still think we can host. And once you host, all bets are off.

SPEAKER_00 18:24

We can't wait for this weekend. It's gonna be a great weekend. Uh, Rebels in the ball. Get the ball, old man. Hit the ball. Hit the ball. And uh I'm gonna go play some golf tomorrow, so.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

But one thing too. Our pitch has been fine. We just need to find somebody a couple more to say that. I'll say one more time.

SPEAKER_00 18:41

If you're if you're looking for anything else, too, you can go to Ole Miss365.com. There's a good article Adam Brown wrote for us tonight on there. Um previewing the weekend. It's a it's a great, great article. And we thank you guys. Uh, thank you guys to Drew Chapman uh uh for sponsoring this episode as well, too, and all the rest of our sponsors.

SPEAKER_01 18:58

Ole Miss 365, the message board is still kind of coming along, but as far as like the editorial and the writing, you're not gonna find anywhere else, even clothes.

SPEAKER_00 19:08

Any better. All right, guys. Thank you all very much. Have a good night. Howdy, howdy. Haddy totty. This has been Where You Media Production. You can find us anywhere you get your podcast. If you're watching on YouTube, please like, share, and subscribe. Leave us a comment. What's your cinema?