Tennessee baseball has been a clear No. 1 team in the nation this season. We all expected they would be good, considering the Vols were coming off of a trip to Omaha in 2021, but I am not sure anyone could have expected them to be THIS good. Especially when they lost a big chunk of talent from last year, and their expected ace, Blade Tidwell, was ruled out of the beginning of the season with injury.
But Chase Burns and Drew Beam, the two freshman pitchers leading this rotation, had something else to say about that. This Tennessee pitching staff leads the NCAA in ERA with a 2.18. Burns, the Vols' Friday night guy, sports a 2.09 ERA and 75 strikeouts through 56 innings of work, and Beam has a 2.14 ERA through 63 IP.
Burns and Beam joined me to discuss leading their team to so much success this season. You can watch the full video above and here.
Both are from Tennessee and both grew up closer to Vanderbilt than Knoxville, but the Vols were a clear choice for both.
Burns said coach Tony Vitello and the Tennessee atmosphere is what brought him to the Vols. "To make Tennessee something special, that kind of got to me, and I thought that was the best chance for me to play," he said.
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I asked both who in their lives is most proud of them right now. For Beam, the answer was easy — his mom.
"She's the one that texts me before the game and first person texts me after the game," Beam said. "She's just happy that I'm out there and getting to do what I love."
