East Carolina baseball coach Billy Godwin was generally pleased with his program's fall workouts, including the Purple-Gold World Series, and the offseason focus has now moved to individual skill development.

"These next five weeks is the time that we really hone in on some areas that we need to attack," Godwin said. "I don't like to use the word weakness but there are areas ... we need to improve. ... We've got a lot of returning position players. Our position players did very well (in fall practice). We swung the bat well. I saw some depth really emerge among our position players. I'm really impressed with the athleticism of our guys, and really what they bring to the table as a defensive and offensive package."

Godwin divides the year into four segments — the fall, the preseason, the season and the postseason. Tyler Joyner, Jharel Cotton and Kevin Brandt are the leaders for weekend starting assignments coming out of fall ball. Joyner is a junior left-hander out of Northern Nash, Cotton is a junior right-hander who transferred from Miami Dade and Brandt is a lefty who has been a mainstay since his arrival from Fuquay-Varina, making freshman All-American in 2008. Brandt recovered from a bit of a sophomore slump last season. ECU should benefit from his ample ability and experience.

Pitchers Shawn Armstrong and Michael Wright went pro from ECU after their junior seasons in 2011. Godwin said there are more arms remaining with exceptional stuff but their challenge will be to become more consistent. The Pirates lost pitcher/first baseman Rookie Davis and left-hander Shawn Morimando to the pro ranks from the incoming freshmen class as well as catcher Cameron Gallagher.

"Guys are going to have to develop, kind of baptism by fire," Godwin said of his pitching staff.

Godwin recently returned from a recruiting trip to Florida where he saw a lot of the players that will comprise the next recruiting class, which will be announced Nov. 9.

"Recruiting is about identifying the guys within your program who can compete at a high level, developing guys and then recruiting to your needs," Godwin said. "We're not out recruiting anybody and everybody. We're recruiting to mix in with the guys who are going to be here. The class that's on campus now was a very pitching-heavy class. We ended up losing 400 innings so we brought in eight guys.

"Next year, I see it going back to ... four to six pitchers signing. With Zach (Wright) being gone and having to replace a senior, probably a catcher will be in this class. We've got three senior infielders so probably a couple of infielders will emerge in this class. It's not rocket science. The tough part is projecting for juniors like Wright and Armstrong and how many of those guys do you have to replace? It will be a typical signing class, probably somewhere in the 10 to 12 range. We're really excited about the talent we're putting together."

Super conference talk

The latest conversation piece in the conference realignment game is a possible merger of the Big East, Conference USA and Mountain Went into a 32-team super league.

ECU's focus in recent weeks appears to be on the development of such a super conference. The Pirates apparently have waning interest in moving to the disintegrating Big East.

"I like what we've got in Conference USA in baseball," Godwin said in reference to conference realignment issues. "But I know it's not about baseball. From that standpoint, I'm for what's best for East Carolina."