The inaugural season of the Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs could not have gotten off to any worse of a start, with the Pigs losing their entire initial roadtrip, ending it at 0-8. Currently, the Pigs are in last place, already six full games out of first place in the Northern Division of the International league. Upcoming this weekend is their home opener against the RIchmond Braves. There are very few Pigs among the league leaders however, Brandon Watson is 2nd in the league in hits (11), and Brian Mazone is second in the league in innings(13) and 4th in the league in strikeouts (12). Continue reading Iron Pigs Week One
Category Archives: 02. Org Reports
Clearwater Threshers Weekly Roundup
We’re now six games into this young season with the Threshers off to a slow start at 2-4 on the year. Five players: Adrian Cardenas, Quintin Berry, Gus Milner, Matt Spencer, and John Urick have played in every game, while six different pitchers: Joe Savery, Carlos Monasterio, Antonio Bastardo, Darren Byrd, Edgar Garcia and Dan Brauer have been handed the ball to start a game.
So far Adrian Cardenas has stolen the show for the team as he has hit safely in all but one of the games including a 3-4 and a 4-5 effort. He is currently hitting .417 with 3 doubles, a stolen base and a team best 4 runs scored. Continue reading Clearwater Threshers Weekly Roundup
Lakewood Report 4/8
The Lakewood Blue Claws got off to 1 win 3 loss start to the 2008 season
this week versus Lake County.
They lost the opener 4-0 behind a decent outing from Drew Naylor. He gave up three runs in a tough inning that featured a bunt single, a walk and two misplayed fly balls for hits. Naylor took the loss with 5ip, 5h, 3er, 6k & 1bb The Blue Claws could not come up with the big hit, twice loading the bases with just one out.
Blue Claws Drop Opener
Lake County 4, Lakewood 0
I had long basbeball day yesterday. Went to see the Phills look real ugly in first few inning before storming back. Left it the 8th in time to get to Lakewood for the opener.
Some quick notes and the game recap.
Drew Naylor took the loss but deserved a better line. 
Continue reading Blue Claws Drop Opener
Pigs Preview
The Inaugural Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs season kicked off Thursday evening in Scranton with the Pigs getting blanked 4-0 by the Scranton Wilkes Barre Yankees. The lone Pigs hit came on a single in the 7th inning by CF Brandon Watson. Kei Igawa started for the Yankees and was literally unhittable, leaving in the 7th inning with a no-hitter. Lefthander J.A. Happ started for the Iron Pigs and was average at best lasting only four innings, and giving up three runs on five hits. Happ walked one and struck out four. While all Pigs hitters struggled, TJ Bohn had the most difficulty, striking out in each of his three at bats.
[ed. note, I added the “read more” part]
Blue Claws Announce 2008 Roster
BlueClaws announce Opening Day roster
Phillies send 25 players to Lakewood
LAKEWOOD, N.J. – The Philadelphia Phillies have announced the Opening Day roster for their Class A affiliate, the Lakewood BlueClaws.
Of the 25 players that will be on the Opening Day roster, 18 played in Williamsport in 2007 under current BlueClaws hitting coach Greg Legg.
The roster also features seven players named in the top 30 Phillies prospects by Baseball America: outfielder Dominic Brown (No. 6), shortstop Freddy Galvis (No. 13), infielder Travis Mattair (No. 18), pitcher Julian Sampson (No. 19), outfielder D’Arby Myers (No. 21), and pitcher Drew Naylor (No. 29). Infielder Tyler Mach (No. 25) is also on the roster, but will open the season on the disabled list. Continue reading Blue Claws Announce 2008 Roster
Updated Minor League Rosters ST Week 4
Alright gang, here are this week’s updated minor league rosters. You can compare this to the week 3 roster and week 2 rosterand week 1 roster that I had posted earlier if you would like.
Quite a few cuts all in around in the minors this week, with one more round left to go this week before minor league rosters are finalized next Monday.
I’ll keep on the lookout for each new officially posted roster and keep them updated here as needed.
I don’t know how much of a limb I am going out on to project this, but I have updated my Clearwater Threshers website with this (click here) as my projected 2008 line up. The projection is based on the latest 2008 ST roster mixed in with a little intuition. I’m guessing I’ll have about 20 of the 25 players correct, with a few free agent signings thrown in at the last minute just to mess things up and maybe a few other moves in the mix.
New International Players In Spring Training
The minor league workgroups posted here list all the Phillies minor league players currently in camp. It is likely that most of the players in group 5 will end up at either Williamsport or on the GCL team in Florida. This year there are 17 new players on the roster that have not previously played for the Phillies on their U.S. affiliates. Given the huge number of new faces it is likely that a few will get sent back to their home country leagues (usually the DSL or VSL) prior to the start of the season. A final reason for the larger number of new faces is that the U.S. work visa limits have been eased in recent years. This allows more players to play in the U.S. or simply work out at Extended Spring Training in the minor league complex with all the coaches present.
This post will briefly go through the new names in camp with a summary of their statistics. The comments here are all based on statistics and observations on a handful of players from news stories over the Internet. In most cases we will not know how good these players are until we see them in action here. If 3-5 players turn out to be solid prospects among this group the Phillies will have done well. Continue reading New International Players In Spring Training
Early Blue Claw sightings
From Blue Claws PR: Not the biggest news, but its a start!
Galvis, Mattair, Brown all expected to start campaign with the BlueClaws
Lakewood has already produced a number of Major League stars and it appears a few more former BlueClaws are on their way to Big League fame. The 2008 season could produce the latest crop of future Phillies, with a number of big prospects likely starting the season in Lakewood.
Updated 2008 Minor League Rosters (Workout Groups)
I hit the Carpenter Complex to check out the first day of minor league games. It was the Clearwater (Group 3) team and the Lakewood (Group 4) teams against the Orioles. Nothing of terrific interest to report except that I did pick up the newly updated minor league rosters. This version has the guys broken out into five groups not four like the previous version that I had posted a while back. Continue reading Updated 2008 Minor League Rosters (Workout Groups)
Phuture Phillies 