Hartleb reflects on state of Illini baseball

You know, the rest of the intercollegiate baseball world just gets so sick of Whining Big 10 wannabees like Hartleib. I think it's appropriate to share some of the facts which contradict the fantasies offered by Big 10 baseball people, including Hartleib in this article.....

Hartleib would imply that, because he won a series against LSU, Illinois' talent is equal to the national powers. Pure balderdash. First of all, go on mlb.com's DraftTracker. Compare the number of drafts from the top 20 teams to Illinois' total. If your talent's equal, why are so few of your players drafted? Look at the rosters of Cape Cod League teams or Team USA. Compare the number of U of I players (if any) to the top-20 teams.

The commonly-recognized standard for NCAA D-I baseball success is published weekly on an insider website called boydsworld.com. The site posts a weekly "Iterative Strength Rating" (ISR) and "Strength of Schedule" (SOS) ranking. The ISR computes won-loss against schedule strength. It's accuracy is supported by the fact that 7 of the College World Series teams were in the ISR top 10. This year, only one Big 10 team cracked the ISR top 50: Minnesota at 42 (SOS rank: 82). Ohio State was 56th (SOS 132) and Illinois was 87th (SOS 135).

In the past 7 years, the Big 10 has sent 10 teams to regionals and won just two. Both teams were handily swept in super regionals (once by mighty Southwest Missouri). If it weren't for the Big 10 getting automatic bids, perhaps one of those 10 teams would have qualified for a regional. In the same 7 years, the paltry Missouri Valley Conference put 3 teams in super regionals and won one of them (perhaps because it was against a Big 10 team).

FACT: You're no good. It isn't because of the weather, or because the rest of baseball is mean to you. Or because your horoscope is unfavorable. You're no good for two reasons: (1) Your institutions do not invest in competitive facilities and budgets. (2) Your coaches won't play competitive schedules. If Hartleib can't control (1), he certainly can control (2). Why doesn't he schedule nearby ISR/SOS top-50 teams like Arkansas, Middle TN, Louisville, Missouri, Western KY, Missouri State, Kentucky or Tennessee? Instead, he played Evansville, Akron, Army, Hartford, Central Connecticut, Western Illinois and Bradley -- each with an ISR or SOS between 142 and 275 of the 304 D-I teams. If you want to get better, play top-50 schools not bottom 50-150 teams. If you aren't willing to, at least, try to get better by playing superior competition, then admit you're a dog and shut up about it.

Parr says the nationally-competitive players show more composure after they've failed. They do. And they learn it by playing the best competition. Look at the California and Pac 10 teams' schedules. There are no easy games. Which is why those teams have been in 7 of the last 10 CWS championship games. No Big 10 team has been in that game since 1966.

Hartleib implies the Big 10 can't compete because it's more ethical than everybody else. Let me tell you about Hartleib's and the Big 10's ethics. I coach at a California community college. A few years ago, I contacted Hartleib's staff about a player. His assistants handled the contact in a less-than-respectable manner and then Hartleib tried to lie to me about it. A year ago, one of my players was recruited by Purdue. When he arrived for his visit, the coaches said they "made a math error" and the scholarship offer was $5,000 less than they'd claimed. Instead, he accepted a larger offer from a Big 12 school which made regionals 2 years in a row. I'll never refer a player to Hartleib or any other Big 10 team again.

FACT: You're no good. It isn't because you're ethically superior to everybody else; it's because neither your athletic department nor your coaches will make the necessary investment to compete.

Finally, the Big 10 teams almost never accept junior college players. Is that because you're academically superior? At our school, alone, two baseball players have transferred to Ivy League teams in the past 5-6 years. In the past 3 years, I coached another player who transferred to the Ivy, and another who turned down an Ivy and Georgetown. California junior colleges regularly transfer players to Cal Berkeley (academically superior to Michigan or any other Big 10 member), to UCLA, and USC. Rice takes junior college transfers. So do Vanderbilt and Baylor and Tulane. To say nothing of Texas. All those schools are academically equal to -- or better than -- Big 10 institutions.

FACT: You're no good. If can't compete, and you arrogantly choose to disdain transfer athletes who prove themselves capable of earning degrees from schools whose athletic and baseball records are better than yours, whose fault is that?

The Big 10 has greatly harmed Division-I baseball by politicking for NCAA rules which it hoped would make itself more competitive by making everyone else worse. The shortened season has greatly harmed student athletes in the process. You haven't gotten one bit more competitive in the process.

You're no good. You can't make EVERYBODY ELSE so bad that you'll ever be any good. So, do the rest of the world a favor: Either make the honest investment necessary for your baseball programs to become competitive, or shut up and go play hockey.