Clearwater Threshers Report–4/11/11

5. Clearwater

Well, this has been a fun start.  Four straight wins to start the season–pounding a good major league starter en route to a 10-1 win in the opener, outpitching Dunedin in the next two, then a huge comeback win on the strength of 7th inning bombs from Leandro Castro and Kyle Lafrenz.  Lots of positives, a few negatives, and a need to remember we’re only four games into the season.

Typically, I won’t do game-by-game recaps (you can check milb.com for those), but given the short week, I’ll throw a little extra in this week.  Opening night saw the Threshers knock around Brandon Morrow for eight hits and four runs in just 2.1 innings.  Jarred Cosart struggled with his control but held Dunedin hitless into the fifth inning.  Five Threshers hitters had multi-hit games.  If you want to fish for negatives, Cosart’s control was off and Cesar Hernandez and Sebastian Valle combined to go 0-for-11.  The next two games were all about pitching as Jon Pettibone and Trevor May combined for 11 innings of two-run, one-walk, ten-strikeout pitching.  Sunday’s game featured an early exit from Brody Colvin (as I type this, there’s no indication of any injury) and a big seventh inning comeback.  Oh, and through all this, Joe Savery treated FSL pitching the way Jameson’s treated me at spring training.  Now, onto the stats:

Hitters

  • Joe Savery: 12 for 15, 2 2B, HR, 2 RBI, 0 K, 1 BB
  • Leandro Castro: 7 for 15, 2B, 2 HR, 7 RBI, 3 K, 0 BB, SB, CS
  • Jonathan Singleton: 5 for 15, 2 RBI, 5 K, 3 BB, CS
  • Jiwan James: 4 for 16, K, 3 BB, 2 SB
  • Cesar Hernandez: 3 for 18, 2 RBI, 3 K, 1 BB
  • Sebastian Valle: 2 for 13, 3 K

Pitchers

  • Jarred Cosart: 6 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 2 K, 4 BB, 0 HR, 11/1 GB/FB
  • Tyler Cloyd: 6 IP, 6 H, 2 ER, 6 K, 0 BB, 0 HR
  • Trevor May: 6 IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 4 K, 1 BB, 0 HR
  • Jon Pettibone: 5 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 6 K, 0 BB, 0 HR
  • Brody Colvin: 2 IP, 3 H, 2 ER, 0 K, 1 BB, 0 HR

Note:  For those of you who didn’t religiously follow my Lakewood reports last year, this is generally the format I used.  I tend to focus on individual performances and will gloss over team results, especially game-by-game recaps.  Once the season gets going, I try to throw in extra color from local papers or Baseball America or whatever.  If anyone has suggestions for things they want to see covered (or not covered), feel free to leave feedback in the comments.

44 thoughts on “Clearwater Threshers Report–4/11/11”

  1. Good to See Jiwan drawing some walks, hope he keeps it up, having better plate discipline would be a huge step for him.

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  2. Obviously, this is the team that most of us will look to first. Its a great start by most of the guys, but not Valle, and I’m looking forward to see J Rod’s first start and the secodn turn of the rotation. Castro can hit, no doubt about it, but I’d like to see a few walks thrown in as he sees fewer strikes. As for Savery, its early but he’s showing he needs to be up at Reading.

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  3. So, you got something against percentages, or does that start a little later. See, I see something like 2 for 13, I start wanting to try to figure it out, but not really. Also, the game by game thing can be useful , because it adds context, the context of time, when a thing happened. Sometimes just cumulative stats for the week, can leave a false impression as to what is the status of various things. Also, the stats look kind of incomplete , to me, at first glance, and kind of leaves me looking for more, Not every stat known to man, just a couple more, but maybe that comes a little later.

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    1. I love percentages. Fractions, ratios, everything of the sort. I figure that if you see 2 for 13, you’ll know a guy had a bad week regardless of whether it’s .150 or .160.

      Not sure what you mean by what additional stats you’d like: things like OBP, SLG, etc. are kind of useless in the limited sample size that a week’s worth of PAs provides–I try to limit my writeups to counting stats as the % stats are much more meaningful on a cumulative basis and can be found from many other sources.

      Point taken on the game-by-game stuff: I typically will include contextual reports (GW RBI, a pitcher working out of a jam, etc.). I just don’t see a need for “And then in the second inning, Singleton walked, the next guy struck out, then there was a balk, etc.).

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  4. Puko, thanks for doing this, I like it fine. Considering the number of Threshers that tweet, perhaps you could summarize any additional color you get from reading their tweets? It might not provide anything useful, but maybe there are additional insights to be gleaned there.

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    1. Last week Cosart tweeted that the Threshers rotation was the “Fab four”. He included Colvin, May and Pettibone in the quartet. Left out Julio Rodriguez.

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        1. I like Julio Rodriguez more than I do Pettibone. I think even if for some season J-rod doesn’t turn into a MLB starter (doesn’t add a third pitch), he could be a wicked set-up guy with his fastball/curveball combo. The great relievers usually all have a strike-out pitch that baffles hitters and his curve could be that pitch for him… and being a reliever would maximize his highest possible fastball speed.

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    2. Thanks for the feedback. I kind of shied away from Twitter as following all the guys (and pretty much everything on Twitter except for Norm MacDonald) was really clogging up my feed with trips to Target and busting each other’s stones about video games and the like, but if people think there’s occasionally something of value, I may revisit.

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  7. RB: Thanks for the website for Minor Lg radio broadcasts.

    I note that all of thePhils’ minor lg teams, except for Clwtr Threshers are broadcasted.

    If you know, why not the Threshers, too?

    Thanks again.

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    1. Surprised the Thresher have no Gameday audio especially this year with one of the most highly touted teams in the minor leagues playing in Bright House. Even the Dunedin Blue Jays are listed on Gameday audio just up the road.

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      1. Guess there’s no radio deal in Clearwater? Was spoiled last year being able to listen to Lakewood (well still can), but would like to listen to the games of the prospects that moved up to Clearwater… Guess it’ll just require listening to a lot of their opponents if they have a radio deal lol.

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    1. Dude hits it all over the place. Double to center this time. home run to right center. double to right. Single down third. double to left. single to right. single up the middle.

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      1. He’s slugging 1.186 on the year now…his OPS is up around 2.000 (too lazy to calculate it by hand)

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        1. you would think they would try and get him to chase out of the zone or something, and then, if you walk him, oh well. But he has only walked once.

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            1. I wonder what these singles to third are all about. Does he purposely drag it down there and beat it with speed or is he ripping them down the line ala Todd Helton

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  13. In addition to Savery you have Castro, Rizzotti and Overbeck off to insane starts too. Very fun.

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  14. Is there just no way Overbeck can play third? Is he that bad? With the power numbers he had last year and to start this year the Phillies should be hitting him ground balls every day at third to get better.

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    1. I remember watching him a few years back when he was in the NY Penn league and he was a butcher to put it politely. From the scouting reports I’ve heard since then, he hasn’t really improved.

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  15. Savery just made his first out of the night…and dropped his average nearly 50 points to .778.

    He’s dead to me.

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