Dan Bass will do whatever it takes to get a win for Ursinus College in college baseball. The senior pitcher does not need his elbow to function properly at the next stop of his career.
He is set to graduate at the end of May!
This kind of excessive pitch count goes against the norm for college baseball but Division III is different than Division I so there is a lot more leeway. Bass is the kind of guy you want on your team!
Who is Dan Bass and what is Ursinus College?
Ursinus College is a private liberal arts school in Collegeville, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1869, it enrolls only ~1,500 undergraduate students. The campus is located about 30 miles from downtown Philadelphia and 43 miles from Allentown on 170 acres.
To be completely honest, even as a college sports aficionado, I was not previously familiar with Ursinus until I discovered Dan Bass. The Bears compete on the Division III level of NCAA competition as members of the Centennial Conference. Approximately 40% of the student body plays for one of the 26 varsity athletic programs. Bass is one of them.
The 6-foot-1, 215-pound righty serves as the ace on the college baseball team. He led his team in ERA as a freshman and a sophomore and led the team in strikeouts as a junior last season.
This is his senior year. Bass currently holds a 2.64 ERA over 47.2 innings in nine appearances. He has allowed only 35 hits and 14 walks against 189 batters faced. Nobody can hit him!
How many pitches has he thrown?
Ursinus College currently holds an overall record of 17-9 with 13 games remaining in the regular season. Dan Bass, aka Danny Biscuits, has been on the bump for more than one third of the year.
His pitch count is astonishing. Especially over the last three games in a span of 12 days.
Bass has thrown 732 pitches in total since the 20th of February. That comes out to approximately 81 pitches per game. Some less, like his 1.2 inning appearance against Salisbury, some more, like his 111 pitch outing against Swarthmore.
Lets focus on the latter.
Bass pitched seven innings against Washington College on March 28. He threw 105 pitches. Bass was back on the mound against Swarthmore seven days later. He threw 111 pitches in seven innings of work.
That was on a Friday. The senior ace got toed the rubber for the third time in 11 days on that next Tuesday night against Franklin & Marshall. Bass threw 66 pitches in four innings.
That brought his 12-day total up to an astonishing 475 pitches!!
Just to compare, Ole Miss ace Hunter Elliott has only thrown more than 100 pitches one time this season and got at least six full days of rest between each start. Bass did not.
If you are concerned about the health of his elbow, don’t be! Dan Bass reposted the following analysis on his Instagram. He won’t need his elbow to work a desk job at a bank in just a few months!
Fair enough! There are not any concerns about longterm arm health because his college baseball career is almost over and he is not going pro. Whatever Danny Biscuits needs to do to win, he will. That rocks.