CCU Baseball Notebook: Status of key pitchers Kerr, Cunningham uncertain after arm injuries

In what has become an all-too-familiar and frustrating trend for the Coastal Carolina baseball team in recent years, another of its top pitchers is heading to get his elbow evaluated this week with his season potentially in jeopardy.

Senior left-hander Austin Kerr is scheduled to be examined Wednesday in Columbia, and while coach Gary Gilmore said he doesn’t know whether the steady veteran will be able to return in a week or need season-ending surgery, it’s not good news for the Chanticleers with start of the postseason less than a week away.

Further concerning for the team is that sophomore right-hander Alex Cunningham’s status for the rest of the season is also up in the air due to aggravation in his forearm after making a brief return from the injury list last weekend.

Cunningham (6-0, 2.56 earned-run average) and Kerr (8-1, 3.36) have been Coastal Carolina’s top two starting pitchers this season.

“With Cunningham down and Kerr down, it’s going to require some guys that haven’t pitched a whole lot this year [to step up]. Especially in game three,” Gilmore said. “We’re going to have to dig deep into that group over in the dugout and find a guy or two that can help us, and I think there’s a guy or two over there that have the ability, that will throw strikes and give us a chance. We’re going to have to be very defensive in the field and very offensive in the batter’s box to help ourselves.”

The Chants (34-16, 16-5 Big South) wrap up the regular season this week in Buies Creek, N.C., starting a three-game series at Campbell (29-22, 10-11) on Thursday.

As a result of this latest round of injury setbacks, freshman right-hander Bobby Holmes (4-0, 1.28 ERA), who made his first collegiate start last weekend, will move into the No. 1 starter role for now with freshman lefty Shane Sawczak (3-3, 4.86) sliding up to the No. 2 spot.

Gilmore said he isn’t sure yet who will start the third game at Campbell, though junior righty Tyler Poole (1-1, 4.08) could be an option.

“At this point if the rest of the guys can help us survive until a [NCAA] regional, it would be a huge shot in the arm if [Cunningham] and Kerr can both help us in a regional,” Gilmore said optimistically. “Between now and then, there’s several other guys that are going to have to step up.”

That’s a big “if,” though.

Kerr was putting up career-best numbers before showing some vulnerability in his last two starts against national power Florida State and rival Liberty. He gave up four hits, three walks and three earned runs in four innings against the Flames while taking a no-decision in the team’s loss on Friday.

“I have no idea [the extent of the injury]. It could be, ‘Take two aspirin and wait a week to pitch.’ It could be, ‘There’s a tear right here.’ We have no idea,” Gilmore said. “He was not able to fully extend his arm as of [Monday] so that’s not a good sign.”

If Kerr is recommended for Tommy John surgery, he’d join former Coastal Carolina top starters Josh Conway (2012) and Ben Smith (2014) who had their final collegiate seasons cut short with that injury.

Meanwhile, Cunningham, who missed a season and a half with a fractured pitching elbow before returning this season, missed two weeks with pain in his right forearm before returning to action Saturday to pitch 1 2/3 scoreless innings of relief when it tightened up again.

“It’s kind of out my hands, out of our hands. Between his personal doctor that did the elbow surgery and our medical crew, I’m sure everything that can be done is being done,” Gilmore said. “It’s just, is it going to get better this week, next week, two months from now? No one has a crystal ball. I’ve just got to find out when he can throw again and see where we’re at.

“It’s been proven with the last [tests] we did that there’s nothing structurally wrong with the arm. It’s something to do with this group of forearm muscles that when he throws and I guess stops his arm – he has this habit of [stopping his arm short of a follow-through] – and for some reason after all the pitches he’s thrown all year, at some point in time it just quit being able to accept that workload.

“Until they can get it completely calmed down and he can strengthen that area to the point where it can take the force or change that mechanic ... it’s hard to change that mechanic when you can’t throw. So it’s kind of a catch-22 for us.”

Extra satisfaction

Gilmore reiterated how proud he was of seeing his team respond Monday with a 12-1 rain-shortened win in the series finale with Liberty after having the game pushed back a day from Sunday due to the weather.

He also let on that there had been some comments made between the two teams that fired the Chants up for that game.

“They responded [Monday]. There was a bunch of chirping going on because we didn’t play a doubleheader on Saturday. And there was more chirping going on on Sunday. I let them know and they responded,” Gilmore said. “That was the team that showed up here earlier in the year in midweek against the North Carolinas, Clemsons and South Carolinas, Wake Forest. They came to play. ...

“They locked in for five full innings until the rain came. We’ve had moments during the year where we locked in for one or two and then just kind of sat around. [Monday] they were locked in for five full innings and I think they were locked in to stay locked in for the whole game. They didn’t like some of the things that were being said about them, so that was good.”

Lancaster finding a groove

Freshman second baseman Seth Lancaster has felt like he’s been having productive at-bats of late, but the results weren’t following suit for the rookie.

Until Monday, that is.

Lancaster went 3-for-3 with three RBIs in that 12-1 win to boost his batting average to .191 (9 hits in 47 at-bats) for the season.

“I felt like Friday and Saturday [I had] pretty good at-bats; it just didn’t end up well. I struck out a couple of times. But I’ve been working hard,” he said. “[Assistant coach Matt Schilling] has been working with me. It finally came around Monday. I felt good, saw the ball well, got some pitches I could hit, got some good counts and just swung hard, found the barrel, found some holes. ... It was a big relief.”

The rookie from Hanahan has started the last seven games for the Chants with junior Connor Owings moving from second base to the outfield, and Gilmore said it was important to give Lancaster that extended opportunity to work through some struggles and build confidence.

“He’s a good player,” Gilmore said. “He’s a young man that there was no doubt in my mind that defensively he was going to be an outstanding guy at second base and he could play short. He just needed an opportunity to relax and know he was going to get a chance to go out there for awhile. And he had to make some adjustments offensively and he has worked on it and has continued to get better every day. It’s been really good to see. He’s a great kid. Couldn’t happen to a nicer one.”

The three-hit effort Monday was Lancaster’s first multi-hit game this season. He joked that the secret was not wearing an undershirt beneath his jersey that game.

More likely, as Gilmore said, it’s a matter of just settling in and building confidence after serving in a bench role for the majority of the season.

“My whole mindset coming in was just [to] help the team. If I needed to sit the bench for a couple weeks, the whole year, whatever I needed to do, I was just here to help the team,” Lancaster said. “Here lately I’ve been getting some ABs, getting some playing time and I’m so lucky to be here. I’m just doing all I can to help the team. I’ve been trying to help defensively since my bat wasn’t coming around. Maybe both will come around [now] and I can keep helping the team out.”

This story was originally published May 12, 2015 at 6:12 PM with the headline "CCU Baseball Notebook: Status of key pitchers Kerr, Cunningham uncertain after arm injuries."