I kinda rambled on and on here. I blame the dudes tearing down a shed outside my bedroom window at 7:15 am. Anyway, Happy Draft Saturday, everyone! Let’s all keep a good thought for “Prep Arm With Upside” or “Toolsy Outfielder Who Really Isn’t As Interested In College As He’s Led His Parents To Believe, And Is Willing To Break It To Them Over The Next Five Weeks, Because While Breaking Your Mother’s Heart Is A Bummer, Money Is Way Better Than Learning And Stuff”.

On to Friday’s results – Cam Rupp had two hits and Cam Perkins drew two walks for LV. Perkins has done a nice job taking his walks this year, improving drastically over his 2013 rates. If you’re a corner OF with an ISO of around .150, any extra offensive value you can add is huge, and walking your way to an OBP over .400 is a pretty good start.

Jesse Biddle did not fair well in his start – 7R on 6H, 2HR, 2BB, 2K in 2.1 IP. Just under 60% of his pitches went for strikes. Colt Murray with six Ks in an extended relief, and first baseman Brock Stassi played mop-up for Austin Wright, inducing a fly ball out with the bases loaded to close out the top of the ninth of a Reading blow-out loss. Wright walked four men (around a FC and a wild pitch) in the ninth. That’s…that’s not so good.

Ethan Stewart induced 11 groundball outs and struck out five over seven innings. That’s the kind of performance that keeps people wondering if there isn’t something valuable lurking under the surface on that guy, if only he could be at all consistent. You don’t generally get 11 guys to ground out in a game by accident. Since a meltdown, seven walk performance on May 26th, Stewart has walked just five over 16.1 IP. So keep any eye on him going forward.

Dylan Cozens hit his third triple of the year. He’s a guy who’s not ready to give up on the idea that he can be a true athlete – he’s stolen 10 bases and been caught just twice this year. If he doubles up on his counting stats by the end of the year, (we’re close to the halfway mark), he’ll have 30 doubles, 6 triples, 14 homers and 20 steals. His 26% K rate is high, and his walk rate is historically low for him, ~6.5%. It was around 10% last year and even higher in the GCL in 2012. All in all, I’d take that kind of season as a pass of the level, for sure.

Also of note from Friday, Yacksel Rios struck out four in a two inning save, adn Carlos Tocci was 2-4 with a double for Lakewood. KC Serna had four hits including two doubles for CLR. Carlos Alonso hit a double and a home run for Reading. Sean O’Sullivan managed to work his way through seven innings of one-run ball for Lehigh Valley. And both Complex League teams lost to the respective Complex League Cubs, or “Los Cachorros”. I could never do the “rr” sound. It’s why my career dream of being a diplomatic translator for the Chilean Minister of Agriculture, Horticulture and Fisheries was eventually crushed. DAMN YOU TONGUE ROLL SOUND!!!!!!!!!!!

Roster news from the last couple days – Tyson Gillies was DFAed by the Phillies and cleared waivers, and is expected back on the Lehigh Valley roster. Cesar Jimenez was also DFAed to make room for Ronny Cedeno to go up to the Phils. Luis Garcia completed a quick rehab assignment at AAA and was optioned off the DL, and Jiwan James is back in Reading, as is previously injured C Lars Davis – not sure if they’ve moved Logan Moore back to CLR, but I wouldn’t be surprised, even though he’s had seven hits in his last four AA games.

Continue reading Box Score Recap – 6/6/2014 →

Maikel Franco and pinch hitter Greg Smith (uhh…ok) hit home runs for Lehigh Valley. Phillippe Aumont drew a walk in that contest. Baseball’s interesting. Both LV and Reading used what seems like all of their pitchers, so let’s hope for some long starts today. Aaron Altherr, Logan Moore and Carlos Alonso each had three hits for REA, and Roman Quinn managed the same for CLR. Looks like Jeb Stefan’s been pushed to the bullpen for that squad, and 2013 pick Mark Meadors made his first outing of the year there as well. Lakewood was blanked by Delmarva, though Carlos Tocci and Dylan Cozens managed  XBHs.

We reach the end of an era, as Jesus Alastre did not reach safely for the first time in his career. Pour one out, folks. And in the Dom Rep, the pitching tandem of Yonathan Trinidad and Yonathan Gonzalez couldn’t hold off the Cubs. It was a fairly low-scoring affair, and I wonder if anyone thought, “What A Yon Fest”. Probably not. And now I’m yawning. And can’t stop. And maybe so are you. Hope no one’s in a meeting or anything.

Continue reading Box Score Recap – 6/5/2014 →

Perci Garner gave up 3R on 8H, 1BB and 8K over 6 innings – he threw 65/100 for strikes. Good effort, and the first time he’s managed to allow just one walk since April 22. Dylan Cozens was 1-2 with a BB. Twice. He had an identical line in both games of the morning/afternoon double header. Impressive, I guess. Willians Astudillo‘s hit streak ended at 18 in a seven inning game which totally doesn’t count, IMO. He did pick up a hit in the “afternooncap”, as it were. Andrew Knapp was 2-3 in that game.

Jesus Alastre is back on the field for the VSL, so I guess he’s been dinged up or sick or on a surfing trip or something, and is not on the way to the states for the GCL. He had a hit, of course. He’s still been on base each game of his pro career.

For those interested, I just listened through the Mike Baumann/Eric Longenhagen draft discussion from Crashburn Alley. They answered one of my questions and two of Matt’s and had a nice long discussion of many different aspects of the draft and scouting. Entertaining stuff, and a decent focus on the Phillies #7 pick and second rounder at one point. It’s pretty long, close to two hours, so maybe turn it on in the background, The video is just the two dudes talking, so if you treat it like a podcast you won’t miss much.

Continue reading Box Score Recap – 6/4/2014 →

A quick note for the comments – please try to keep the daily box comments to prospect and minor league chatter. There’s been a great deal of Amaro/big club talk lately, and there’s nothing wrong with that, but try to take it to the general discussion. It just keeps the whole thing cleaner. I get that the team and its minor league/prospect components cannot be completely extricated from one another, but the site is intended to be for prospect talk. I don’t want to be the guy going through and asking you to move on to another section every day, (especially when I am guilty of it at times, as well), so just try to think about it when you’re typing, say “Amaro” or “Revere” or “Kendrick”. Maybe it’s big league talk for the General Discussion. I welcome your feedback on this subject.

A couple notes on Tuesday’s results – Reading pitching, led by five innings from Hoby Milner (who was pulled after a rain delay), and three from Sean O’Sullivan, no-hit Harrisburg for 8.2 innings before Kyle Simon gave up a hit with two outs in the ninth. ALVIN!!!!! I mean SIMON!!!!!!!!!  Lehigh Valley managed 11 singles and no extra base hits in a losing effort against Louisville. It’s been widely reported that Darin Ruf went down with a wrist injury and needed stitches on his leg after sliding for a foul ball near the wall in left field. Not great.

Jeb Stefan couldn’t get out of the first for CLR – the bullpen did a good job in mop-up to not let the game get further out of hand – kudos to Dan Child and Lino Martinez for that. And there were a bunch of nice performances in the Lakewood game – mainly by the Andrews Brothers, Pullin, Knapp and Anderson. Ok, they’re not really brothers, nor do brothers generally all have the same first name as opposed to the same last name. Except George Foreman’s kids. (Now who’s off topic?)

Continue reading Box Score Recap – 6/3/2014 →

Brad Lincoln pitched well for Lehigh Valley, allowing three hits and three walks while striking out five in seven scoreless innings. Ken Giles earned the save there with a clean inning, with 1K. Maikel Franco was 1-4 with a 2B. Clearwater was blanked by Bradenton. With Andrew Knapp gone, it’s Quinn and Lino and not much else to get terribly excited about from a prospect point of view.

Speaking of…all it took was a demotion to Lakewood to get Knapp back on track – he’s OPSing 1.267 on the year in four (4) plate appearances at that level. (For those uninitiated, that’s me being funny. Watch for it. Hard to spot at times.) Dylan Cozens was 2-5 with two doubles and Willians Astudillo extended his hitting streak to 17 and walked twice (!!!).

And speaking of…DSL’s Edwin Rodriguez with the Golden Whatever-it-is-when-you-walk-four-times-in-a-game. Golden Ticket, (as in a “free pass”)? Golden Egg, (as in the goose-egg for number of ABs)? Umm…Golden Corral? Golden Earring? Golden, Colorado? Steven Golden? Ok, I got nothin’. Point is he walked four times.

Continue reading Box Score Recap – 6/2/2014 →

Couple notes here as I post the graphic. Leandro Castro is trying to get back on track, OPSing near .800 for his last 10 games after a 3-4 with two 2B on Sunday. Severino Gonzalez got roughed up after a trio of decent outings previous – he was throwing strikes, though many of them were hit with bats, and three of those traveled quite far.

Andrew Knapp hit his first HR of the year. Ethan Stewart had a nice line, his best since the third week of the season. Willians Astudillo kept his hitting streak alive at 16 games. Delvi Francisco came apart at the seams, and our main man in the VSL Jesus Alastre has been out of action for a couple days now.

Continue reading Box Score Recap – 6/1/2014 →

Jesse Biddle returns from a bout with hail-head to pitch pretty well – 3R, 2ER, 5H, 2BB and 3K in 6.1IP. Kyle Simon didn’t do Biddle any favors, allowing both of his Biddle-inherited runners to score. Miguel Nunez made a triumphant return to starting after a couple weeks in XST and the CLR bullpen – he went six scoreless innings, striking out five and allowing just three hits and one walk. Roman Quinn with a hit in that game. He’s still yet to draw a walk in nine games.

Willians Astudillo kept his hitting streak alive at 15, going 2-4 for Lakewood, while Dylan Cozens received a pretty terrible 20th birthday present. It came in a large hat box and it shines like Skinny Elvis’ most famous suit. I think Fat Elvis’ karate jumpsuit is probably more famous than the one from the postage stamp. so I figured I’d point out which iteration of Elvis I was talking about. And for all the young folks out there, Elvis was a rock n roll singer. People used to make music with like their mouths and instruments and stuff instead of computers. Wild, I know.

And DSL started today, with Edwin Rodriguez the most interesting guy to watch, IMO. He’s 16 for a couple more days, and received $100k to sign – Ben Badler from BA reported at the time that he was a “corner outfielder with a nice swing, a good approach, gap-to-gap pop and below-average speed”. The DH was Luis Beaufond, who’s listed as a catcher and will play the year as a 17-year old, so it’s worth watching him as well, I’d say. The more interesting names that were on the roster just a few day ago have been removed, and are likely headed to the Gulf Coast League roster when they kick off a few days after the draft concludes.

Continue reading Box Score Recap – 5/31/2014 →

Colton Murray‘s getting it done at Reading – one hit and three Ks over 2-1 scoreless today, and he stranded the runner he inherited. Gabriel Lino was 2-4 with a 2B and 2Ks, while Brian Pointer was 2-3 with a pair of 2B for CLR.

Willians Astudillo has now hit in 14 straight, but Delmarva’s Hunter Harvey shut down Lakewood pretty well. Again. He did the same a few weeks ago, though this time the Claws managed two hits instead of one and two walks instead of one and scored a whole run instead of, well, not. The Orioles should promote that guy already.

Continue reading Box Score Recap – 5/30/2014 →

Maikel Franco was 2-4 with a 2B and a 3B, his first XBHs since May 19 (8 games). Tyson Gillies threw out Brett Wallace at the plate to end the game, saving the save for Ken Giles, who gave up 2R on 2H, 2BB, 1WP and 0K in his most tumultuous inning of his short stint in AAA. Cesar Jimenez hasn’t allowed a run all month for the Pigs. He’d seem to be the next lefty up to the bigs.

Cameron Perkins left the Reading game after being hit in the arm with a batted ball while leading off third. He tried to tough it out, apparently, but was removed an inning later. Jeb Stefan pitched well allowing one run on just two hits and two walks in six innings , but his offense couldn’t score, managing just two hits and one walk in support. Ramon Oviedo entered the game with one out in the seventh and two men on base, recorded three total outs and walked five men, and did not allow a run, thanks to a DP in the seventh and a caught stealing in the eighth. Amazing.

Willians Astudillo has himself a 12 game hitting streak. Also worth noting – he’s been behind the plate nine times in the last 18 days. And Jesus Alastre kept his on-base streak alive by virtue of getting plunked in the eighth inning. Well done.

Continue reading Box Score Recap – 5/29/2014 →

Tyson Gillies (2) and Cameron Rupp (6) went deep for Lehigh Valley. The pitching there was not so good. Brad Lincoln got good and messed up. Meanwhile, Rob Rasmussen is in the Toronto bullpen. Just sayin’.

Cameron Perkins hit a walk-off 3-run home run, his third, to win it in the 12th for Reading. Good performance from Tyler Knigge there. Art Charles‘ 3-run shot tied it for CLR in the ninth and Logan Moore walked it off with a single in the 11th. Good line from Colin Kleven there. Roman Quinn‘s some kind of scuffling in his small sample of a season – 10Ks and no BBs thus far, and he’s OPSing .465 through 7 games.

And finally, Dylan Cozens was 2-4 with two doubles for Lakewood. His last multi-hit game was five days ago when he hit two home runs at West Virginia. Robinson Torres was 1-3, but that hit pushed across Cozens and Willians Astudillo to make a winner out of recently demoted Jon Prosinski.

VSL was off, but a friendly reminder that the DSL starts on Saturday. Among those inpresently rostered there are Luis Encarnacion and “that German guy” Julsan Kamara.

Continue reading Box Score Recap – 5/28/2014 →