SURPRISE, Ariz. — The comparisons are inevitable but ultimately meaningless.
Yes, the 2025 Arizona baseball team also started 0-3. Heck, if you look at the scores, that team’s opening-weekend performance was way worse than this year’s.
Michael Lev is a senior writer/columnist for the Arizona Daily Star, Tucson.com and The Wildcaster.
The Wildcats were outscored 33-7 in Arlington a year ago; the cumulative score was 21-14 at this past weekend’s College Baseball Series at Surprise Stadium. There were no blowouts in the bunch.
So there’s really no reason, then, to sound any alarms. But one could also argue that the entire exercise is futile because (A) this is a completely different team, and (B) the team you are in February isn’t the team you eventually become in May.
The latter is especially true of the ’26 Wildcats, who retained a handful of key pieces from last year’s College World Series team but mostly consist of new players — many of whom never played an inning of college baseball before this past weekend.
So what should we make of Arizona heading into Tuesday’s home opener against Omaha? Here are my top five takeaways from Surprise:
The Wildcats gather around head coach Chip Hale following Arizona's 4-1 loss to Michigan in the final game of the College Baseball Series at Surprise Stadium on Sunday.
1. This team isn’t that team
Heading into last season, I thought Arizona was an Omaha-caliber team. The timing was right; the Wildcats had gone to the CWS every four years it was contested since 2012. And many of their top players, including Brendan Summerhill and Mason White, were entering their junior seasons.
I thought Omaha was a strong possibility even before Owen Kramkowski and Smith Bailey emerged as weekend warriors and Tony Pluta became the best closer in the country.
This year’s team had a fair amount of preseason hype, including a No. 24 ranking by D1Baseball and a second-place prediction by the Big 12’s head coaches. But it has a long, long way to go.
“I don’t think the expectations are as high for this group,” UA coach Chip Hale said a few days before the opener. “We have a lot of questions to answer in the first month of the season.”
They sure do. One of them is the composition and order of the lineup. Does Hale stick with the vets if they aren’t producing? Or does he give more playing time to the freshmen who are pushing them and have the look of future starters?
The bullpen is another. We don’t know yet how much the Wildcats miss the injured Pluta because they never took a lead into the ninth inning. But the bridge between the starters and new closer Garrett Hicks was flimsy at best; Stanford and Oregon State each scored five runs against the bullpen, and Michigan plated two in a 4-1 win Sunday.
Pluta’s season-ending injury was part of a bumpy offseason that saw Arizona cycle through multiple pitching coaches. It’s no one’s fault that that happened. But it’s unrealistic to expect a perfectly smooth transition.
2. More needed from vets
Most of the lineup struggled on Sunday. The Wildcats reduced their strikeouts, fanning nine times after striking out 33 times in the first two games. But they didn’t hit many line drives, and they didn’t work enough walks (one, by No. 9 hitter Mathis Meurant).
Arizona's Maddox Mihalakis gathers his thoughts before the first pitch of the season opener vs. Stanford in the College Baseball Series at Surprise Stadium on Feb. 13.
The three players who hit atop the lineup — veterans Tyler Bickers, Maddox Mihalakis and Andrew Cain — combined to go 1 for 12 against Michigan. That included three straight unproductive outs after Meurant reached third base with nobody out in the third inning. Cain had the lone hit, a single off left-hander Shane Brinham in the eighth.
I’d put that in the encouraging category as Cain struggled against lefties last season (.161 average). The Ironwood Ridge High School product had a decent weekend, going 4 for 13 (.308). But he also struck out swinging in the ninth inning against Stanford and Oregon State — the latter with the tying run on second base.
Cain and Mihalakis had matching 1-5 walk-to-strikeout ratios. Mihalakis managed just one hit in 12 at-bats. I wonder if both are putting too much pressure on themselves.
They weren’t asked to do as much a year ago, when the likes of Summerhill, White, Aaron Walton and Adonys Guzman could carry the offense. They weren’t batting second and third in the lineup. This is a new experience for them, and the load was even heavier this past weekend with fellow veteran Easton Breyfogle (shoulder) unavailable.
Breyfogle is expected to return sometime this week, maybe as early as Tuesday. He could provide a spark — provided he can stay healthy.
Bickers’ UA career started promisingly. He reached base four times vs. Stanford and twice vs. OSU. He looked the part of a leadoff hitter, drawing four walks.
Bickers went 0 for 4 vs. Michigan with three strikeouts, too often chasing breaking balls out of the zone. Hopefully, that was just an off day and Bickers will return to his table-setting ways. He had a .482 on-base percentage last season at Milwaukee.
3. The start of something
Although Kramkowski didn’t have a great start on Friday, Bailey and Collin McKinney looked the part over the weekend.
Bailey got better as the game went along vs. Oregon State. He was having some trouble spotting his fastball in the early innings. Once he got that straightened out, he cruised.
Bailey retired the last seven batters he faced, notching three of his four strikeouts during that span. I’m confident he would have kept rolling had he not reached his early-season pitch count.
Arizona's Smith Bailey delivers a pitch against Oregon State in the College Baseball Series at Surprise Stadium in Surprise on Saturday.
McKinney wasn’t quite as efficient; he threw 82 pitches in 4⅔ innings vs. Bailey’s 76 in six. But McKinney wasn’t ’25 McKinney either, and that’s a good thing.
After walking the first batter he faced on four pitches, McKinney issued only one other free pass. He didn’t plunk anyone, which was a recurring issue a year ago.
McKinney worked quickly, landed multiple breaking pitches for strikes (he has a cutter, slider, curve and changeup to complement his fastball) and displayed an all-business demeanor on the mound. Last year, he’d often unravel once he got into jams.
“He kept it together,” Hale said.
Assuming Kramkowski bounces back, Bailey continues his ascent and McKinney provides some facsimile of what he did Sunday, Arizona has the makings of a stellar starting rotation. Hale and his staff just need to figure out the rest of the team.
4. French connection
Meurant was a bright spot.
Arizona's Mathis Meurant celebrates a hit against Oregon State in the College Baseball Series at Surprise Stadium on Feb. 14.
The senior shortstop played flawless defense and did exactly what a No. 9 hitter is supposed to do at the plate — get on base by any means possible.
Meurant had three hits in eight at-bats, plus a walk and a hit-by-pitch. He has a team-high .455 on-base percentage entering the home opener.
The switch-hitting transfer from France, via Cochise College, flashed big-time power early last season; in his first five games, he hit two home runs and had a .462 batting average.
But opponents started giving him fewer pitches to hit, and Meurant struggled to adjust. His strikeouts spiked, his average dropped and his playing time diminished.
Meurant worked extensively in the offseason with hitting coach Toby DeMello, adjusting his stance and approach to be “more on plane with the ball,” Meurant said.
He had an especially impressive at-bat in the sixth inning vs. OSU. Batting from the left side, Meurant fell behind 0-2. He then poked a breaking ball away into left-center for an RBI single.
Meurant was pushed hard by freshman Cash Brennan during the offseason. Meurant has held him off so far. He’s also developing into a team leader.
“Slow the game down,” Meurant said when asked about taking on a leadership role. “That’s what I keep saying to myself first. And then trying to help my teammates.”
5. Fab freshmen
Some of the freshmen already are playing meaty roles.
First baseman Tony Lira and DH Nate Novitske are sophomores academically. Both redshirted a year ago and made their official UA debuts over the weekend.
Lira had a rough game at the plate on opening night, going 0 for 5 with three strikeouts. He was unfazed by it, though, responding with a 3-for-5 performance vs. Oregon State before going 2 for 4 vs. Michigan.
Critically, three of those hits came with two strikes. Lira, who’s listed at 6-2, 233, has prodigious power. The question was whether he could make enough contact to play every day. So far, so good.
Arizona's Nate Novitske celebrates a hit vs. Oregon State in the College Baseball Series at Surprise Stadium on Feb. 14.
“I know that God's got me,” said Lira, who also made multiple strong defensive plays over the weekend. “I have faith. I know who I am as a player. There's a reason why I'm here. I just believe in myself so much that I know that no matter what, if I get out, I'm gonna bounce back the next AB and help produce for the team.”
Novitske went 3 for 10 with a double and an RBI. He had some trouble with breaking balls down and in, but otherwise showed the keen batting eye and ability to make contact that earned him a spot in the lineup.
True freshman Caleb Danzeisen has a similar approach. In his first career at-bat, in the ninth inning of a tight game vs. OSU, Danzeisen fell behind 0-2 before working a 10-pitch walk. He started Sunday and logged his first career hit.
Not every freshman is ready for prime time. Reliever Benton Hickman and catcher Joe Forbes were thrust into a high-pressure situation vs. the Beavers and looked a bit jittery. You gotta start somewhere.
Arizona has several promising young players, and we might get to see another on Tuesday if flame-throwing freshman Jack Lafflam gets the starting nod.
The Wildcats’ future looks bright. The present remains in flux.
