Will Blade Tidwell Start This Weekend? Definitely Possible

It could be Blade Tidwell time in Gainesville for a weekend start this weekend. Examining Tennessee's options with Chase Dollander banged up and more.

Tennessee's Saturday starter, Chase Dollander, took a come-backer off his throwing arm in the first inning against Alabama over the weekend. Dollander crashed to the Lindsey Nelson Stadium turf in pain and ultimately did not return.

After further evaluation into Dollander's arm, Tennessee received good news as there was no fracture. Dollander is day-to-day with a swollen and sore elbow as he looks to return as soon as possible, Volquest's Ben McKee reports.

While it is not a 100 percent certainty Dollander will not be available to pitch for the Vols against Florida, it seems likely as Zander Sechrist is the projected starter for Tennessee's midweek game against Bellarmine on Tuesday–not Blade Tidwell. Since returning to the mound from his injury halfway through the Western Carolina midweek game, Tidwell has been the Vols' midweek starter. This means Tidwell will be available to start for Tennessee this weekend, which would mark the sophomore's first weekend start of the season.

Following Friday's game against Alabama, before Dollander's injury, head coach Tony Vitello said they had flirted with the idea of giving Tidwell a weekend start.

"At some point in the rotation," Vitello said of Tidwell potentially starting on the weekends. "One thing you got with our schedule is you have the quirky Thursday TV stuff. Typically what we've done before is shuffle things around because of that. Now we're a couple of weeks away from that, but [starting Tidwell] has been floated around the office for when those Thursday games pop up."

But Tidwell's weekend start may happen sooner than Vitello expected.

The combination of Sechrist starting on Tuesday and Vitello's words before Dollander got banged up indicates it may be Tidwell time on the mound in a weekend starting role.

Tidwell served as the Vols' Sunday pitcher in 2021 and figured to be one of Tennessee's top arms in 2022, but shoulder stiffness held him out until the second weekend of SEC play.

Since his return in Tennessee's midweek matchup against Western Carolina, Tidwell has pitched 6.2 innings, dealing 15 strikeouts while allowing seven hits, two runs, two earned runs and zero walked batters. The sophomore has started a pair of midweek games against Lipscomb and Tennessee Tech and has made two additional appearances against Missouri and Alabama.

If Tidwell starts, he will most likely start on Saturday as Chase Burns and Drew Beam have served as Tennessee's Friday and Sunday starters all season, respectively.

Even with Burns struggling on Friday against Alabama for the second consecutive week, Vitello said the plan is to keep rolling with the freshman.

"He'll be right back to business," Vitello said of Chase Burns after another off night. "Any pitcher is going to scuffle a little bit. It's two in a row that haven't gone as well as he wanted facing good opponents. There's probably some stuff to reset a little bit and tune in to what he was doing well in the other outings and what caused him to scuffle in these. He'll get after it for a week and then pitch again next weekend."

Camden Sewell is also an option to start for Tennessee if Dollander cannot go. The senior worked through an impressive 4.1 innings against Alabama in relief of an injured Dollander. Sewell threw a season-high 58 pitches and gave up five hits and two runs that came off a two-run homer against his final batter. A Tidwell start followed by extended relief from Sewell would also make sense, as Tidwell has not pitched more than two innings in a game this season.

All in all, Tennessee has a plethora of options to put on the bump, even with Dollander working through injury and Seth Halvorsen out for the season. Tennessee has not been able to work an ace such as Blade Tidwell into their weekend rotation, which is a perfect example of how dangerous the Vols have been in their historic season.

But that may soon change, as the D1Baseball.com Freshman All-American first teamer has his best chance to get a starting nod this weekend with Dollander potentially unavailable.

The Vols' will take their NCAA home run and ERA leading No. 1 squad down to Gainesville this weekend against Florida for their third road series. The first pitch for game one against the Gators is set for 6:30 p.m. ET on Friday.

Photo Credit: Bruce Thorson

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