Who will be catching the ball in 2009?

Anyone who has dismissed or failed to watch the College World Series has missed out on some great baseball.

I have always enjoyed college baseball and in Oklahoma, but I wonder if I’m in the minority, or if the sport is underrated and undercovered.

The Texas-Southern Miss game, where the USM pitcher walked in the winning run in a game that went back and forth in the latter innings, kicked it off.

Then, the Arkansas-UVA game, where UVA put runners in scoring position in the 9th, 10th and 11th innings but couldn’t score and Arkansas pulled it out in the end, was even better.

Arkansas is currently taking on LSU for a right to advance to the title game, likely against Texas (The Hogs have to beat LSU twice).

As for OU, while disappointing, those two blowout losses to Arkansas in the Norman Regional don’t look so bad now.

** Listening to the radio yesterday, there was a small discussion about how many passes Jameel Owens would catch this season. Which got me thinking: what will OU’s reception breakdown look like next season, considering the Sooners lost 3 of the their 5 top receivers.

Last year, it went like this (not including running backs):
Iglesias 74
Gresham 66
Manny 42
Broyles 46
Chaney 29
Tennell 9
Owens 4
Caleb 4
Eldridge 4
Miller 2
K. Smith 1
Hanna 1

This is a guess of how the distribution will go in 2009:

Gresham 71
JG will still be blocking some

Broyles 61
Fills the role Manny/Iglesias held