There isn’t a lick special about this year’s Arkansas baseball team.
And yet.
And yet Dave Van Horn’s bunch finds itself inside the top in the country, atop the SEC West table and a legitimate national title contender. They’re 10th in the SEC in hitting and on-base percentage, ninth in slugging. They’re eighth in earned-run average, ninth in batting average-against and 12th in strikeouts.
Good luck explaining just how Arkansas is 8-4 at nearly the halfway point of league play, then.
But also, if you’re an Arkansas fan, does it matter?
Probably not. Not right now, anyway. The Diamond Hogs have won three of their four SEC series this season and are 26-6 overall with no losing streak longer than two games, and even those came against LSU, the No. 1 team in the nation.
A common refrain heard around this time of year is “Dave Van Horn.” In his 21st season with the Razorbacks, he’s been here a time or two. With seven College World Series appearances in that time, he’s not exactly short on experience.
Arkansas needs all of that it can get. It’s easy to forget, what with the glimmering record, seven of the nine regular hitters are in the first year as starters. Among the rotation guys, only Hagen Smith and Will McEntire have experience in that role.
So how is Arkansas this good, actually? Let’s take a look at some of the numbers that might help explain things.