As of 930 last evening, Tyler Cloyd believed he would be the opening day starter for the Reading Phillies.  That changed quickly with a phone call and off he went to Lehigh Valley to make his AAA debut and what a debut it was.  Cloyd pitched six perfect innings, dominating the Scranton Wilkes Barre Yankees, striking out 8.  He threw just 73 pitches in his six innings, however because of early season pitch counts was removed still perfect.

Cloyd impressed last year without overpowering stuff,  with his knowledge of “how to pitch”.  That translated very well to the AAA level tonight and while I expect he is likely headed back to Reading in the short term, it would be surprising if substantial time were not spent in the Lehigh Valley by Cloyd by mid season.

In one of the stranger baseball events in recent memory, Lehigh Valley starter Dave Bush, the planned opening day starter has been suspended for five games for an incident that occurred in Spring Training against the Pirates.  Following a homer, the next pitch Bush threw was high and inside, warranting ejection according to the umpire. ‘Pigs manager Ryne Sandberg mentioned there was some “unfortunate verbiage” between Bush and the  umpire, and Bush was suspended.

Benefitting from the suspension is Tyler Cloyd, who was set to start on Opening Day for the Reading Phils. CLoyd, 24, had an outstanding year last year, first with CLearwater, followed by a lengthy stint in Reading.  Cloyd was a combined 9-4 with a 2.77 ERA in 146 IP last season.  I was a bit surprised about his placement at Reading to start the season, thinking based on his success in Reading and in the Arizona Fall League that a spot in the Lehigh Valley rotation was likely.  Given this opportunity, it should be interesting to see how Cloyd responds.

So here’s my totally unofficial guess at who’s still in Clearwater. Some of these guys are leftovers from the Spring Training Workgroups and may have been released and a couple are guys who were in the system at the end of last season but did not appear during Spring Training, so who knows if they’re still in the system. Obviously some of these guys will end up in Williamsport, some in Gulf Coast and some back in the DSL or VSL.

Catchers
Willians Astudillo
Liam Bedford
Angel Chavarin
Chace Numatta
Kevin Quaranto Continue reading Extended Spring Training Rosters →