Daily Archives: June 25, 2008

Threshers Update 6/25

02. Org Reports, 04. Prospect Features, 5. Clearwater, Savery, Joe

It’s been a couple of weeks since my last full Clearwater report, but not a lot has changed over that time. The first half of the season ended with the Threshers alone in last place with a record of 32-38 13.5 games out of first place, and the second half of the season has begun with the Threshers again in last place with a 1-5 record 4.0 games out of first. Edgar Garcia, Matt German, Brett Harker, and Gus Milner all took part in the FSL all star game for the Threshers at the end of the first half, and each performed well in the game.
Continue reading Threshers Update 6/25 →

Pitch Count Estimator v Reality, vol 1

Other Stuff

As I talked about last week, my newest obsession is the Pitch Count estimator I built in Microsoft Excel, as well as the Game Score calculator I built into the same file. My goal is to have people post the pitch counts of games when they find them, so we can try to figure out if this method has validity, and how accurate it is. It was then pointed out to me that milb gives pitch counts for all AAA games. While we don’t have many pitching prospects in AAA, we do have JA Happ, so I decided to plug all of his starts into the formula and get the estimates, and then compare the estimates to his actual pitch counts, which I hoped would give me an idea of how accurate the model is. So, lets get to it…

Continue reading Pitch Count Estimator v Reality, vol 1 →

Wednesday nuggets

Daily Discussion

A few quick notes on this Wednesday morning.

* First, I’d like to welcome our newest contributor, neduolcaz (Zac), who will be taking over the Reading report, giving you some weekly insight into our AA affiliate. As always, I greatly appreciate the help of my contributors here, who help make this site what it is. Be polite and welcome Zac aboard.

* I checked the Lakewood boxscore last night before heading to the gym, to see Julian Sampson had pitched 3 innings, allowing 0 ER and just 3 hits. I came back 2 hours later to find out he got shelled for 7 ER on 10 H and 2 BB in his final 2 innings. Such is the life of a young pitcher in his first full season. In many cases, guys are left in games like this to just experience that aspect of the game, to try and work out of it, and to take something from it. Sampson, as was expected, has been inconsistent, but there have been plenty of promising signs.

* Michael Taylor has struggled in his first 5 games at Clearwater, going 3/19 with 1 2B and 7 K, and has yet to draw a walk. There’s certainly no reason to panic just yet. Some players take longer to adjust, not just to the different quality of players, but to completely new surroundings. I can imagine the Jersey shore is a bit different than Clearwater Florida in the middle of the summer. I fully expect Taylor to turn things on in the next month or so.

* We talk a lot about Adrian Cardenas, and what position he should play, and how good he is defensively, but the thing about him that impresses me the most is this

v LHP: 47 AB — .319/.385/.468 — 5 BB — 9 K
v RHP: 151 AB — .312/.382/.470 — 18 BB — 23 K

Cardenas is actually hitting better against lefties than he is righties. Its very common for lefthanded hitters to struggle against lefties in the minors, and learn to hit them better as they see more of them. Chase Utley is a recent example of this, struggling against lefties for his first 2 seasons in the majors. Cardenas, while not facing tons of ML quality lefties, is more than holding his own against southpaws, something which can only be seen as a positive at this point in his development.