Alabama at UL

WHERE: M.L. “Tigue” Moore Field
WHEN: Three-game series starts at 6 tonight; Game 2 is at 2 p.m. Saturday and Game 3 is at 1 p.m. Sunday.
RECORDS: Alabama 4-3; UL 8-1.
RANKINGS: Alabama No. 21; UL No. 10.
RADIO: KPEL 96.5-FM with Jay Walker tonight and Saturday and Scott Prather on Sunday
TV: None tonight or Sunday; Game 2 on Saturday will be televised locally by KLAF
INTERNET: Tonight’s and Sunday’s games streamed on RaginCajuns.com
PITCHING MATCHUPS

TONIGHT: UL junior RHP Austin Robichaux (1-1, 2.25 ERA) vs. junior RHP Spencer Turnbull (0-0, 1.12 ERA)
SATURDAY: UL junior RHP Carson Baranik (1-0, 1.10 ERA) vs. junior LHP Justin Kamplain (1-0 2.45 ERA)
SUNDAY: UL TBA vs. sophomore RHP Ray Castillo (0-0, 3.38 ERA)
ABOUT THE CAJUNS: After dropping its 2014 season opener to Eastern Illinois, UL has won eight straight – including a three-game road series sweep of Southern Mississippi last weekend, and a 4-1 win Tuesday night at No. 1 LSU. … LF/DH Caleb Adams and LF Ryan Wilson both are hitting a team-high .368. … Wilson, CF Seth Harrison, RF Evan Powell, C Michael Strentz and 2B Jace Conrad each have one home run. … Wilson and Conrad each have a team-high seven RBI.
ABOUT THE OPPONENT: Alabama lost its road opener 2-1 Wednesday night at Southern Mississippi on an RBI-single with one out in the bottom of the eighth inning. … The Crimson Tide also has dropped the first game weekend series with Saint Louis and Stephen F. Austin. … SS Mikey White, a 2013 Louisville Slugger Freshman All-American, hits a team-high .345. … Alabama leads the all-time series with UL 3-0, including two NCAA New Orleans Regional wins (4-3, 7-5) when ranked 16th in 2005.

* * * * * * * * * *

On Saturday, Carson Baranik will take the mound to pitch against Alabama. Two nationally ranked teams will go at it; the ball will be in his hands.

But Baranik won’t be throwing for the team he always figured he would, the one whose uniform he once wore with pride.

“I’m not gonna lie: I was an LSU fan my whole life growing up,” said Baranik, a product of Parkway High in Bossier City who was drafted by the Cincinnati Reds in the 41st round of the 2011 Major League Baseball Draft. “I committed there when I was a sophomore in high school. That was the place I wanted to be.”

Instead of Baton Rouge, however, he’s spending 2014 in Lafayette, at UL, where the stadium is smaller, the count of College World Series appearances is much lower and the color of preference is shaded much more red than it is purple or gold.

It’s all because of one misguided choice that cost quite a price.

It was February in Baranik’s freshman season at LSU, and the 2012 season wasn’t far from beginning.

“It was the last Friday before the start of opening weekend,” Baranik said.

He had been drinking, and does not deny it.

But that’s not all.

It’s a fact he deals with head on, just like the Alabama batters he’ll face in the second outing of a three-game non-conference series that starts tonight at M.L. “Tigue” Moore Field between the No. 10 Ragin’ Cajuns and the No. 21 Crimson Tide.

“I met a few friends downtown (in Baton Rouge),” Baranik said, “and just was kind of stuck without a ride, and just made a poor decision.”

He sat behind the wheel, and after allegedly running a red light was arrested for driving while intoxicated.

X X X

Two years and change later, some good has come of it.

Baranik thinks he’s a better pitcher, and – much more importantly – a better person. But the road bridging the two places comes with no small toll.

“The advantage he has … is the mental toughness he has, (with) what he had to go through,” UL coach Tony Robichaux said.

The expense, however, has been multiple changes of addresses, an out-of-state stint and a college career much different than the one he envisioned back in Bossier City.

“In one breath, he’s at one of the best programs in the country,” Robichaux said, “and then one night, one decision, the next morning he’s got a lot of bad press and he’s got to be removed from a team and doesn’t know where he’s gonna go.”

“I’m extremely pleased for Carson, to see he’s doing as well as he is,” LSU coach Paul Mainieri added. “Personally, I always liked him. I thought he was an outstanding pitcher. I thought he came from a great family. And it’s unfortunate that sometimes youngsters have to learn from mistakes. Drinking and driving is a very serious matter.”

X X X

When Mainieri heard of the arrest, he immediately suspended Baranik.

The disciplinary action later was lifted, but Baranik wound up making only three appearances in 2012.

One was his LSU debut, a no-hit, two-strikeout inning in a midweek March game – just more than a month after the arrest – against Southern.

One was 0.2 innings of work a week later with two hits allowed, one walk issued and two strikeouts as 10 Tigers pitchers combined for, coincidentally, a 5-0 shutout of UL.

The last was 2.0 innings with one hit allowed in early April – against Louisiana College.

Baranik remained with LSU the rest of the season, but never did throw again for the Tigers. When it was done, he and Mainieri sat down.

“We both agreed that it was good for me to get a clean start somewhere else,” Baranik said.

In this instance, though, the decision that mattered most was Mainieri’s.

And it was driven by Baranik’s February decision.

“It was just one of those situations,” the LSU coach said in a phone interview Thursday, two days after UL beat his No. 1-ranked Tigers 4-1 in Baton Rouge, “where I felt like he needed a clean start, he needed to kind of learn from it all.”

Baranik understands why.

But it took him some time.

X X X

It was only after he’d lost so much, in fact, that the bill hit Baranik like a fastball to the shoulder blade.

He was no longer welcome to play baseball in Baton Rouge for the team that meant so much to him.

“Really,” Baranik said, “it took a while for everything to sink in. And it took me a while to really come to terms with what had happened.

“I’m not gonna lie: It didn’t happen until I left LSU, that … I really digested it all.

“And at the point,” he added, “I had to decide whether I wanted that to be kind of like a legacy … or would I go back to the beginning, and kind of start over, and try to make a new name for myself. Because I knew, at that point, it would always be with me.”

Baranik made his choice, and this one wound up better than that other one.

“It took me a while, but I really respect Mainieri for the way he handled it,” he said earlier this week. “Because I didn’t see it as-clear when it happened then.

“But now, looking back on it, everything played out like it should have. The way everything was handled was proper, and I have a lot of respect for him for that.

“It took those few months for me to kind of grow up. … That experience sped up the process,” Baranik added. “I had to become a man in dealing with everything from court dates to (having) an attorney. Those kinds of things, you wake up.”

X X X

So much finally so clear, Baranik had to determine what was next.

He transferred to Miami Dade College, whose highly regarded South Florida junior-college baseball program was coached for 30 years until 1990 by Demie Mainieri.

That’s Paul Mainieri’s father.

“I followed his career down there,” Paul Mainieri said of Baranik, “and I was just so happy when I heard he came back to Louisiana and was going to pitch at ULL.”

Before signing with the Cajuns, however, Baranik had to prove himself in Miami.

But it had much less to do with accomplishments on the mound and more with how he’d handle himself in a city where the lures of South Beach and Coconut Grove lead some to a lifestyle that isn’t exactly conducive with the mission Baranik had in mind.

“That’s not a very good place if you’ve got a big-time problem,” Robichaux said, “because in Miami there’s a lot to do and a lot to get in trouble with.”

Baranik began his stay at Miami Dade, where he wound up 6-2 with a 2.83 ERA and a team-high 59 strikeouts, by coming clean with new teammates wondering how a highly regarded LSU pitcher had been relegated to their juco.

“I’m very upfront about it,” he said. “I’ve come to terms with it. It happened. I can’t hide from it.

“I learned a lot of good things (at Miami Dade) about pitching,” Baranik added. “It was a really easy place for me to start fresh.”

X X X

UL was turned on to Baranik by Jarvis Larry, an ex-Cajun baseball player in the early 2000s now working for Bossier City’s police department.

The two knew each other.

“We got to talking about the future, and I had mentioned to him this was a place I’d like to play,” Baranik said. “All my summer coaches had done nothing but talk about Coach (Robichaux) and his pitching system and how he develops pitchers.”

“Jarvis called us,” Robichaux added, “and we looked at it as a coaching staff.”

UL associate head coach and primary recruiter Anthony Babineaux soon made contact.

But the Cajuns still had something to figure out.

“Was he a good kid that made a bad decision,” Robichaux said, “or was he a bad kid that made a decision?”

The Cajuns met with Baranik and his family around Christmastime of 2012.

They also monitored him via Miami-Dade head coach Danny Price, Florida International’s coach from 1980-2007 and someone Robichaux calls a “good friend.”

He ultimately decided the answer was one Baranik believed all along.

Robichaux’s own rule for a player facing similar circumstances is that he either stay away from UL for one year before returning, or leave.

Robichaux said he figured Baranik had paid his “penance” by being away from Baton Rouge for a year, and signed him.

“I knew I was a good guy that made a bad mistake,” Baranik said. “I wasn’t a bad guy, that this was a recurring thing.

“I think the only way I could prove it was over time. I realized it was a risk for them to take me here (at UL). I understood going into juco it was a risk for them to take me there.”

X X X

When he was initially arrested, Baranik didn’t know what to think.

“It was surreal for a few days, when it first happened,” he said.

Right away, he pondered long-term implications – including potential impact on a possible pro career.

Not to mention the stigma.

“It’s always gonna be with me,” he said. “I know, no matter what I do now, that I’m always gonna have that 30-minute reputation – you know, 30 minutes before you meet somebody they already know that about me.”

But Baranik has tried to put the incident in his past.

“It took a little time,” he said. “I had a lot of friends-and-family support.

“I took it as a growing experience, where it made me a lot humbler of a person, a lot humbler of a man. That’s really what I got from it.

“I like the person I became because of the situation,” Baranik added. “I like where I’m at now, with the friends, the relationships I have in life.”

Now UL’s No. 2 starter, Baranik is 1-0 with a 1.10 ERA in two starts.

He won Sun Belt Conference Player of the Week honors after his first Cajun appearance, a 1-0 win over Eastern Illinois in which he struck out eight and allowed just one hit over 7.1 innings.

Rather than get too buoyed by the award, however, he’s tried to be levelheaded.

“I was thankful, I was grateful,” Baranik said. “But I knew what it was like to be really down, so I didn’t let that get me too up.”

Another lesson he’s learned is that sometimes even what seems like the toughest of times can be overcome.

Even when his slider and changeup were both up and he gave up four runs in the first inning of an eventual 8-5, 12-inning win at Southern Mississippi last Saturday, he threw 8.0 shutout innings the rest of the way.

“I still get excited about all the emotions of the game,” Baranik said. “But … the pressure out there isn’t the pressure I felt (when arrested), or the days after.

“When I get a guy on second, honestly, it kind of helps. I don’t get as nervous. I think about how I’ve been in a lot tougher spots – in a jail cell, at 3 a.m. This guy on second with one down isn’t as bad as that situation.”

 

Said Robichaux: “I think that’s why he has so much composure when he takes the mound.”

X X X

There’s something to be learned too, Robichaux also is certain, from how Baranik has rebounded to this point.

“I’m proud of his journey – the power of redemption, and being able to take that journey, and being able to do something positive with it when it turned, probably, negative on him a couple of years ago,” he said.

Baranik senses the same.

“You can’t let that define you. … There’s always another day,” he said. “The sun will come up.

“There’s a redemption story for everybody, whether it’s that or anything else – that you can always come back from it, as long as you just kind of keep going through the darkness and keep on pressing through.”

That darkness, though, was bright compared to what it might have been.

Mainieri knows, and has told Baranik as much.

“Like I told Carson at the time … the lesson could have been learned in a much-more difficult way had somebody been hurt or killed, because of his lapse of judgment,” he said.

“You’re especially proud of the kids that don’t have to go through what he went through. You know, that was his choice he made. And it caused him to have to deal with some stuff. But … it’s also nice to know that you have the ability to recover from it.

“He’s an outstanding young man that just made a terrible mistake that one night. And, as it turns out, he’s got a full life ahead of him,” Mainieri added. “He can recover … and it appears he’s well on his way to doing that.”

Mainieri seems sincerely pleased Baranik is.

“I’m not surprised at all by the kind of success he’s having,” he said. “We anticipated he would have that kind of success at LSU.

“At the end of the day, things have a reason and maybe this is what was in his life’s plan.

“I’m very happy for him. I’m happy for Tony Robichaux and the ULL program if Carson can help them in a big way,” the Tigers coach added. “But, primarily, I’m happy Carson has learned a valuable lesson in his life and that he’s getting on in a very productive way.”

He is.

Just not where he initially planned.

“I go back to that,” Baranik said. “I had to leave a place I dreamed about playing for. The decisions I made, it cost me the chance to play there any longer.”