HawgBeat – Adcock shines first for the Diamond Hogs
no. 7 Arkansas Razorbacks may have found another key piece in the puzzle, as right fielder Cody Adcock cranked out a six-inning, one-hit gem on Sunday in the Diamond Hogs’ 5-0 win over Auburn.
Arkansas entered the weekend with a different starting cycle than it did at the start of the year. Head coach Dave Van Horn elected to make Friday’s regular starter Hagen Smith a “wild card” and threw left catcher Holan on Friday, right Will McIntyre on Saturday and left Sunday as the TBA.
After deciding on Adcock as his starter in Sunday’s contest, Van Horn said on the pregame radio broadcast that he hoped for a four-round Crowder College transfer. Adcock went six innings in his first division since May 29, 2021, when he threw against Arkansas in the SEC Championship for Ole Miss.
“I felt like he didn’t have nearly as many bad mistakes,” said Van Horn. “He had a lot of close pitches. Maybe in the first inning or the second inning, he hooked a pitch when he was up on the count. Other than that, he got it together and pitched like he was on drive.”
Adcock threw with confidence and made no wrong pitches that he threw all this season. The Texarkana, Arkansas, native entered the game with a 7.82 ERA, but his efforts on Sunday helped him bring that down to 5.30.
“Yeah, I felt good today,” Adcock said. “I was just going to go out and give our team a chance to win. It’s really about executing pitches, so that’s what I’ve been doing, just trying to take it apart, and I’ve got the results. I do.”
The right-hander hit six and walked only one while facing one more than the minimum through the six innings. He issued a solo walk in the top of the second, but bounced back by prompting an out fly and getting the next batter out of trouble.
“Yeah, in the second round I didn’t think I was pitching the way I should be,” said Adcock. “I don’t know what it was, maybe after I went out to the third pitch for the warmup. I don’t know what it was, but something clicked, and I was like ‘Okay, time to go.'” “
Not only was Adcock’s start impressive, it proved that Van Horn and pitching coach Matt Hobbs might have made the right decision by making Smith a “wild card” entering the series. All three Arkansas starters went to exactly six innings, and it took just seven pitchers for the Hogs to sweep the Tigers and allow only five total runs for the weekend.
Next weekend will be the real challenge when the Diamond Hogs travel to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, to beat the record. 1 LSU Tigers. The first pitch is set for Friday at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN2.
