Baseball preview: USC finally draws an ace in Kyle Davis

It was a day Kyle Davis would like to forget.

The USC pitcher was at a charity event playing basketball with kids last winter when he tweaked his ankle. Senior outfielder Timmy Robinson helped him off the court.

Robinson later discovered that it wasn’t a great day for him, either.

“It was just a bad day,” Davis said. “I got hurt, Tim lost his wallet, it’s a day that I really get upset about. So I remember it pretty good.”

Davis had let it be known he wanted a spot in the rotation, and after a strong end to his 2014 season, he was in line for that position. But it was more than just a tweak of the ankle. It not only cost him a spot in the rotation, it led to a groin injury later on.

“Last year was a tough year for me personally,” Davis said. “It was awesome for the team and it was great that we finally got back to a regional, but for me it was tough going through the injury. Knowing I would start opening day, being the Friday guy, and then getting injured, that was a little tough.”

Davis, now a senior with a four-pitch mix, will finally get that spot in the weekend rotation. The right-hander will headline a deep group of pitchers as the ace in Troy.

“We feel he’s our best pitcher,” third-year USC coach Dan Hubbs said. “We feel he’s the guy that we want on the mound to kind of set the tone for the weekend. He would have been that guy last year as well, but he had those nagging things with his ankle and his groin. Now, he’s 100 percent ready to go and he’s pitching excellent.”

• WHICKER: USC baseball is on the rise again, thanks to Dan Hubbs

With a veteran group of pitchers back, including senior closer Marc Huberman, senior right-hander Brooks Kriske and junior left-hander Beardo Flores, the Trojans are solid on the mound.

But with the loss of three of their top offensive producers, there are still questions in the lineup. Hubbs isn’t looking to specific players to answer those questions as much as he’s looking to the entire group to step up and fill the void.

“We did lose Bobby Stahel and Garrett Stubbs and Dante Flores and Blake Lacey and Kyle Twomey and Tyler Gilbert,” Hubbs said. “A lot of guys who played some big roles for us. No one person can say, ‘I need to replace those numbers.’ Everyone just needs to get incrementally better. And I think they have.”

Hubbs points to the improvement of senior outfielder Timmy Robinson, who got hot in the middle of last season and never cooled down.

“He was trying to show that he could hit for power, he was trying to do a lot more and he started to understand what his strength is,” Hubbs said. “When he started to use his legs a little more and he started using a little less effort in his swing — when he realized he wasn’t getting the results he wanted with a little more effort — the ball started really coming off of his bat.”

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Robinson finished the season batting .295 with seven home runs and a team-leading 53 RBIs. He’s hoping a more relaxed approach at the plate will help boost those numbers this season.

“Just working with the coaches on staying loose,” Robinson said. “It’s in there, but I try to do too much sometimes. I just tried to relax and have fun with it.”

Fun was’t necessarily a word associated with the Trojans until the past few years. Hubbs has effectively changed the culture after years of complacency. The former USC pitcher has forced the players to become accountable for themselves as well as one another. It has bolstered team chemistry and the results have showed on the field in the form of wins — 39 of them last year, to be exact.

“We’ve come a long way,” Robinson said. “We won 19 more games than my freshman year. We’ve seen each step throughout the years. Freshman year we were bad, sophomore year we just missed the cut and last year, finally got in. And now we want to take it to the next step and get to Omaha.”

USC, ranked as high as No. 17 in the preseason Baseball America poll, has a longstanding tradition at the College World Series. While it might have gone dormant for a while, the Trojans feel that they could be headed back to Omaha.

At the very least, they’re finally headed in the right direction again.

“The kids seem to like coming to the field all of the time,” Hubbs said. “Everybody is willing to do what it takes and that was what I wanted when I took over.”

2016 USC Trojans baseball preview

Last season: 39-21

Pac-12 finish: 18-12 (3rd)

Postseason finish: Lost in NCAA Regionals

Coach: Dan Hubbs (3rd season, 88-81)

Ballpark: Dedeaux Field, 1027 W 34th St., Los Angeles, CA 90089 (2,500 capacity)

Big losses: OF Bobby Stahel, C Garrett Stubbs, 2B Dante Flores, LHP Kyle Twomey

Key retuers: OF/DH Timmy Robinson, SS Reggie Southall, RHP Kyle Davis, LHP Marc Huberman, LHP Beardo Flores

Top newcomers: 1B Dylan Paulson, C/RHP C.J. Stubbs

Coach’s quote: “The thing is, they say winning is contagious and hitting is contagious, and it is,” Hubbs said. “But so is losing. When you get complacent about losing, when it becomes OK, you have that mindset like ‘Hey, it’s just one game.’ But that’s not OK. In my opinion, and where we got to (last year), is that every game should hurt.”

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