Florida State blows early lead as offense goes anemic against Georgia Tech

No. 5 Florida State jumped all over No. 3 Georgia Tech for a 3-0 lead in the top of the second inning. John Stuetzer had an RBI single, and Cal Raleigh blasted a two-run home run to give starting pitcher Wes Mendes a comfortable lead against the best offense in college baseball.

Link Jarrett has to pull a couple of these guys out of the lineup who are nearly automatic outs at the plate and give others a shot.

Mendes surrendered a solo home run in the bottom of the second, but kept the Georgia Tech offense in check until he ran into some trouble in the bottom of the sixth. Mendes exited the game after 5.1 innings, with runners on first and second base. He allowed six hits, three earned runs, three walks, and nine strikeouts.

John Abraham entered the game, balked, and threw a wild pitch before a bloop two-out single scored the final run in the inning for a 4-3 Georgia Tech lead.

Florida State’s offense went anemic, with 15 batters getting retired in a row before Cal Fisher was hit by a pitch in the seventh inning. FSU threatened to score in the top of the eighth when Brayden Dowd hit a double in the left-centerfield gap. However, two groundouts and a flyout ended the threat.

The Noles threatened again in the top of the ninth. Chase Williams and Stuetzer had back-to-back hits with one out. Fisher hit a ball back to the pitcher for a groundout, and Williams was thrown out at the plate to end the game in a double play.

That’s the story for FSU baseball all season: poor situational hitting and too many poor, uncompetitive at-bats. FSU only managed seven hits and two walks.

It’s what I’ve been saying the past couple of weeks regarding the FSU offense. FSU pitching has zero margin for error, and they pitched well against an explosive offense, but still lost the game. The offense will need to find something over the next two games for FSU to have a shot at winning the series, or they’ll lose their first ACC series this year.