Ole Miss picked 16th in Baseball America’s preseason top 25, two hurlers honored

After being in the top 15 in both D1Baseball and Perfect Game’s preseason polls, the Rebs seem to be right at home in Baseball America’s edition, coming in at 16th in their preseason rankings. Mike Bianco’s club seems about right at this spot judging from how their offense performed last year with a heavy-freshmen lineup and some inexperienced hitters. Despite the mediocre .253 team average, more times than not, baseball is won on the mound.

And the Rebs got that covered in spades. Rated a top 10 pick for the upcoming 2018 MLB Draft by virtually everyone, true sophomore Ryan Rolison headlines a loaded group on the bump. All three weekend starters, barring a surprise, will most likely be veterans who have started games and/or pitched in big spots.

On the back end, it doesn’t get much better than Will Stokes and Dallas Woolfolk. Both run it up there in the mid-to-upper 90’s and can jelly those legs with offspeed stuff to keep you honest. But, again, the bats will have to come around if this team wants to make noise out in Corn Country.

Rolo and Wolf get All-American nods.

D1 Baseball released their preseason All-American picks and the two Rebel pitchers made the cut. Rolo was tabbed a second-teamer and Dallas made the third team. Seems a bit odd that Rolison can be as high as No. 2 on some draft boards but not be first team but I’m just a blogger, what do I know?

Woolfolk, who is coming off an outstanding sophomore season in which he carved up lineups in the last few innings, securing a 2.15 ERA, 12 saves, striking out 41 in 37.2 innings pitched, and only walking 5(!) batters in 26 appearances.

The offense is going to have to be better, but as always, the pitching will need to pace this Ole Miss team. And there’s no doubt these two are more than capable.