The dirt from the mound runs through Gary Henderson’s veins. The powder from the rosin bag still builds up beneath fingernails.

If there is one thing Henderson knows better than anything else, it’s pitching. It’s in his blood. It’s his forte and his love. It’s also what likely broke his heart in his first season as head baseball coach of the Kentucky program.

Henderson took over the reins of the program last season after a long and successful career as a pitching coach. In his first season as skipper, Henderson’s squad walked a fine line between potential breakthrough and disappointment.

Inexperience and injuries plagued the team, yet Henderson’s ballclub built a strong foundation for the 2010 season and was on the doorstep of postseason play until the final game of the season.

If there was one thing that ultimately let down the Cats, it was an underachieving bullpen. And by underachieving it’s not a knock on the players or Henderson’s first year, only a glimpse of reality of how decimated the relieving corps was because of injuries.

That, inevitably, had to make things unbearable for Henderson last season.

“The injuries are extremely frustrating in the bullpen,” Henderson said, almost hesitant to revisit the late-inning nightmares of a season ago.

See, if there’s one thing a pitching coach knows, it’s the importance of a bullpen. Chicks may dig the long ball and starters might make the big bucks on the pro level, but like all things in sports (defense in football and basketball), it’s generally the position with the least appeal that makes the biggest difference.

Yes, bullpens win you championships in college baseball.

“College baseball is a game of bullpens,” Henderson said. “The days of 35, 40 complete games from a pitching staff are over. People that pay attention know you can win with different styles of play and offense, singles, doubles and even three-run homers. But you cannot win if you don’t have depth and quality in your bullpen. It is an absolute given.  You have to be able to pitch when it’s important on the road and that is going to come out of your bullpen.”

That more than anything is what separated UK from making its third postseason appearance in four years and an early start to the golf season.

The Cats possessed as good of a starting trio in all of baseball with James Paxton, Chris Rusin and Alex Meyer last year, but when it came time to hand the ball over to the bullpen to close out the game, Henderson rarely knew what he was going to get.

Often times it resulted in headaches and additional visits to the mound. Last year, in innings five through nine, the point in the ballgame where a team’s bullpen will generally eat up the most innings, Kentucky had a 6.24 ERA. The only innings where teams hit over .300 came in innings six, seven and eight.

Henderson isn’t going to make excuses for the numbers, but logistically he simply didn’t have the numbers to compete. Injuries, most notably to Nick Kennedy, a suspension to eighth-inning specialist Tyler Henry and the ineligibility of Matt Little because of transfer rules, limited who Henderson could throw out there.

“Typically you can get a guy some experience positionally if you have enough regulars playing and you’re going to be able to survive that experience,” Henderson said. “You start putting guys in there that aren’t ready to pitch, don’t have enough experience or their skill level isn’t where it needs to be and that becomes very painful and very disappointing for everyone involved.”

Logan Darnell proved to be a reliable tourniquet last season and Braden Kapteyn, despite splitting time between the field and the mound, flourished in his surprising role as closer. But other than that, Henderson didn’t have many options.

“You can run your fifth or sixth outfielder out there and still have a very good game and play very well over the course of a weekend, but if you start running a guy out there on the mound that’s not ready and it’s going to be a rough one,” Henderson said.

This year Henderson has brought in help to aid his bullpen.

In addition to Little and the sidewinder Kennedy, Henderson can bring in any number of new arms, ranging from junior-college pitcher Kyle Jackson redshirt sophomore Joe Devine to freshmen Walter Wijas and Jon Carlson. That’s in addition to junior Mike Kaczmarek and sophomores Sean Bouthilette and Chase Greene, all who gained invaluable experience last year.

“The depth is dramatically improved, which is a great place to start,” Henderson said. “We’ve got some quality athletes, we’ve got some guys that have a little bit of experience and certainly many more options than we had last year. We don’t have the experience that we had in ’08 but that will come in time.”

Kennedy had screws inserted into his elbow last week, but Henderson expects him to be available by Southeastern Conference play.

“We’ll have some different options down there so you can give a guy some rest that’s pitched recently or give a guy a rest that’s maybe going through a rough patch,” Henderson said. “Those two things are going to be very nice to have. When you get Kennedy back, you get Little back, even if they are not the complete and total answer, what they do is give you a stop gap.”

The wealth of arms also provides Henderson with the ability to mix and match different options. If he wants to throw a left arm out there because the guy coming to the plate doesn’t hit left-handed pitching very well, he now has the arms to do it.

And that’s when Henderson is at his best. Henderson, cerebral by nature, can wield lefty-on-lefty or righty-on-righty matchups like a magician.

“Look at really good pitching staffs,” Henderson said. “What they’ve got are matchups and depth in the bullpen. What that provides you is the opportunity to use a guy like (former player Andrew) Albers in a very specific role because you know you have a guy like (former pitcher Aaron) Lovett either before or after him. When you start having those types of options, and (former reliever) Tommy Warner is good enough to get you two outs to get you out of the sixth, that saves you those 12 pitches for Albers that he can use in the eighth. Those are the things that having the depth and experience does.”

Last year he had few choices. He had to decide whether to use his top relievers in a tight game on Friday and risk not having them Saturday, or resting them Friday and throwing out inexperienced arms on the mound.

It’s a dilemma Henderson likely won’t have to deal with in 2010.

UK kicks off its season next week on Feb. 19 vs. Virginia Tech at the Caravelle Resort Tournament in Myrtle Beach, S.C.