Michigan baseball suffers more losses, strikes out on HC candidates
Michigan baseball lost head coach Erik Bakich to the Clemson Tigers and it has been loss after loss since.
It’s hard to blame Erik Bakich for leaving Michigan baseball to take the job at Clemson. Baseball in the South is an entirely different animal, especially at a place like Clemson, and the resources were never going to be the same at a place like U-M.
Still, Bakich was a spectacular head coach who nearly did the unthinkable, winning a national championship in baseball at a place like Michigan. The Wolverines fell one win short in 2019 and also won the Big Ten tournament multiple times including this past season.
Since his departure, some other top assistants such as Nick Schnabel have followed and a number of key players have left via the transfer portal such as Jimmy Obertop as well as four others who announced they were leaving: Riley Bertram, pitcher Jaylen Jones, Brandon Lawrence, and pitcher Willie Weiss.
Bertram has already committed to Clemson and it’s hard to blame any of these guys if they follow Bakich to Clemson. That’s just how things tend to work.
In more bad news, Michigan baseball has struck out on two of its top head-coaching candidates according to The Wolverine. Chris Fetter, a former Michigan pitching coach, who is now an assistant coach for the Detroit Tigers, was a top candidate but he will stay with Detroit.
Next. Michigan Baseball Needs to Pursue Jordan Bischel. dark
UConn head coach Jim Penders also took his name out of the mix. Last week, our Kyler Kregel wrote that Michigan baseball should target Central Michigan coach Jordan Bischel and right now that’s looking like a pretty strong option.