Doi questionable for opening night

Hawaii baseball coach Mike Trapasso said before Tuesday’s practice that sophomore Marcus Doi‘s status for Friday night’s season opener against No. 16 Oregon is still up in the air.

Doi has been dealing with a groin injury for almost a full year now and had surgery in November, but tweaked it again in practice last month.

He hasn’t run at full speed until this week and still needs to show Trapasso he is capable of taking the extra base if necessary. Unlike last year, the coaching staff won’t rush to get him back out on the field.

“He’s shown this week he can go from home to first,” Trapasso said. “He’s got to show that he can go from home to second or first to third without injuring himself. We’re not going to play that game like last year where we rush him into games where he’s not at full strength and we tweak it and then have to sit him out another two weeks.”

“We’re going to wait until he tells me, ‘yeah, this feels good and I can go hard first to third or on a ball in the gap.'”

Doi played in 18 games (13 starts) last year and hit .345 overall and .359 in games he started. He had at least one hit in his first six games before first suffering the injury against Albany.

Doi called himself day-to-day but said, “I feel like (Trapasso) is leaning toward putting me in the lineup on Friday.”

Hopefully it’s not just wishful thinking.

>> UH’s rotation for the weekend is set. Junior RHP Tyler Brashears, sophomore LHP Quintin Torres-Costa and junior RHP L.J. Brewster will go the first three games. Senior LHP Andrew Jones, freshman RHP Ben Mora and junior RHP Kyle Von Ruden seem the most likely choices to start the fourth game. Jones could be the guy but he could also see time as a closer if the situation presents itself in the first couple of games.

>> LHP Jarrett Arakawa suffered a small setback in his return from a second shoulder surgery last summer but just started throwing again last week. Were he healthy, he likely would have started opening night, but the hope is to get him back by conference. Backup catcher Steven Pollakov is out with an elbow injury and freshman outfielder Fred Williams is also hurt and will likely redshirt this season.

>> Oregon coach George Horton told reporters on Monday that he will start sophomore left-hander Cole Irvin on Friday night but hold him to a 30-35 pitch count. Irvin sat out all of 2014 after undergoing Tommy John surgery. Irvin was 12-3 with a 2.48 ERA as a freshman in 2013 and got his first win in Hawaii against the Rainbow Warriors in his collegiate debut, allowing five hits and three runs in seven innings.

The rest of the Ducks rotation will see freshman LHP David Peterson go Saturday, followed by sophomore RHP Trent Paddon and senior RHP Jack Karraker. Missing from the rotation is sophomore LHP Matt Krook, who also had Tommy John surgery last year. Krook made his collegiate debut last season against UH and struck out eight in seven innings without allowing an earned run.