Observations: Rebels fall in extra innings to drop series at Auburn

Ole Miss fell to Auburn, 5-4, in 10 innings Saturday, dropping the series in the process and falling to 10-8 in the SEC and 27-14 overall with 12 SEC games remaining and nonconference dates with MSU, Southern Miss and Arkansas State.

The Rebels led 5-4 after Tyler Keenan drove Grae Kessinger home from first on a double in the top of the 10th, but Auburn loaded the bases with no outs in the bottom half and got the winning single with two outs. The Tigers are also 10-8 in the league.

Here are observations and reactions from the day and the weekend.

Grae Kessinger has reached base in 29 straight games, and he did all he could on Saturday, hitting two home runs and scoring the go-ahead run in the 10th inning. His first home run started the scoring in the first and his second came with two outs and a runner on first to tie the game in the middle innings.

Kessinger entered the day hitting .437 in league play with a 1.080 OPS against SEC pitching. He’s been Ole Miss’ best player — while there are arguments for Cooper Johnson, Cole Zabowski and Parker Caracci — the past month, and Ole Miss wouldn’t be 10-8 without him.

Speaking of Johnson, he hit a 3-0 fastball out of Plainsman Park to tie the game in the ninth inning and played another exceptional game defensively. He’s been a leader vocally and really matured since earlier in his career. A team is going to get a steal with him this June considering he’s unlikely to rocket up draft boards for whatever reason.

Ryan Olenek’s hip injury is certainly not a blessing because he’s not back yet and Ole Miss just lost two SEC games without him. However, Josh Hall may be the answer to that empty spot in the lineup defensively. The Rebels have been rotating multiple players in right field and looking at several DH options for the better part of the season because of Tim Elko and Chase Cockrell struggles.

Hall had a couple hits, including a triple, on the weekend and made a key defensive play on Saturday. He can bunt, run and give Ole Miss some non-station to station options toward the bottom of the order. Teams don’t have full scouting reports on Hall and Knox Loposer yet, so it makes sense to give them at-bats and see what happens. Those two -- along with Graham against right-handers -- presently are justifying at-bats. Graham has also been good at first base.

Justin Bench should be back from his hand injury soon, as well.

Chase Cockrell had a great run during 2018, but he doesn’t have an extra base hit in 20 at-bats in SEC play and is slugging just .303 without a home run in 76 at-bats this season. College baseball is a short season, and it may be time to give the at-bats to younger players who have produced more in 2019.

Parker Caracci gave up the winning run in the 10th, yielding a walk and three hits over a 1.2 inning stretch. The fielder’s choice in the 10th broke his 14.1-inning scoreless streak. Caracci was still topping out around 94 MPH with his fastball and didn’t show signs of stress, though he threw 95 pitches over two days including 46 pitches on Friday.

Austin Miller, who has a 9.1 scoreless streak of his own, threw two innings in 28 pitches on Friday and got five outs on 21 pitches on Saturday. It’s possible that leaving him in for another inning on Friday would have altered Saturday’s result, but the bigger issue is the bullpen depth that Mike Bianco currently trusts.

Max Cioffi has been excellent his last two outings, but Bianco is showing supreme trust in only Miller and Caracci. Connor Green hasn’t looked as sharp consistently of late compared to earlier this year, Tyler Myers has fallen off some, as well, though more on that below.

Houston Roth, Jordan Fowler, Kaleb Hill and Greer Holston aren’t giving the Rebels anything substantial, and that severely diminishes what we expected to be a deep bullpen prior to the season. The bullpen has done a decent to good job, but any margin for error is gone because of the lack of options being used.

That’s compounded in series finales when two games have already been played, and Ole Miss can’t get any length out of Gunnar Hoglund. The freshman went 2.2 innings on Saturday, giving up a huge double that changed the early innings.

Ole Miss is 3-3 in SEC series finales and allowed 10 runs in one of those wins. Hoglund retired eight in a row to open the game and is really good without runners on, but he struggles to limit big innings, and he's not consistently effective out of the stretch.

Ole Miss may well go back to the drawing board with that third rotation spot, but there’s not a clear answer. Tyler Myers saved Ole Miss against Florida when Will Ethridge had a blister issue, and he had quite the bullpen run at one point; however it’s possible he beginning to hit a first-year wall.

Myers didn’t allow a run in 10 innings from March 13 to March 31 and then gave up only two runs to the Gators in 5.2 innings on April 5. Since then three hitters reached in 1.1 innings against Southern Miss, four reached against Kentucky in 1.2 innings, four reached in two innings on Thursday at Auburn and one of two hitters hit a double on Saturday.

This is admittedly overly critical, as he’s a top bullpen arm and has managed innings effectively. And Myers isn’t walking hitters which is job No. 1. But for a first-year player it’s worth examining closer than if there’s a large sample size. And as outings have been a little less clean recently, it’s something to keep an eye on moving forward with the depth issues Ole Miss is already dealing with.

Thomas Dillard went 1-for-11 on the weekend and has only one extra base hit in his last 54 plate appearance. Dillard’s last home run was March 24 at Missouri. He has walked 13 times in his last 54 trips to bat.

Keenan had six hits on the weekend including two for extra bases. That put to bed a 2-for-22 skid and may be a nice sign for Ole Miss moving into Mississippi State on Tuesday and Texas A&M for Double Decker weekend.