The third extra inning game in a row for Quad Cities, plus much more in tonight’s old DFR.
First inning.com is acting foolish tonight and not loading, so you will have to do without any links tonight.
- David Kopp, making his second start at AAA got touched up, but he was able to strike out 6 and walk only two. He did have success on the offensive end going 2-2 with 2 doubles.
- Andrew Brown and Oneli Perez finished off the game.
- James Rapoport was 2-5 with a caught stealing.
- Joe Mather was 1-2 with 2 walks and a caught stealing.
- Kevin Howard and Ruben Gotay had doubles.
- Arquimedes Nieto forgot his mirrors at home tonight. He gave up 4 runs over 4.2 innings. He allowed 9 hits, 2 walks and 2 wild pitches.
- Jared Bradford stranded Nieto’s 2 runners and allowed 2 runs of his own over 3.1 innings. He struck out 3 and walked 0.
- Joel Pichardo finished the game.
- Colt Sedbrook had 2 hits.
- Jared Bogany had 2 hits.
- Joe Kelly pitched the first 6 innings and allowed 3 runs on 5 hits.
- Dean Kiekhefer pitched the next 4 shutout innings. He only allowed 1 hit and struck out 2 while walking 1.
- Jason Novak blew the game in the 11th even though the River Bandits took the lead in the top of the 11th. But he was able to get the win by closing down the 12th inning.
- It was the Michael Swinson show as he went 4-6 with a triple short of the cycle and 4 RBIs.
- Freddy Parejo had a triple.
- Billy Corrigan got the start for the Muckdogs pitching staff and allowed 2 hits and 1 run over 4 innings.
- Kevin Siegrist took the loss with 1.1 innings and 4 runs.
- David Kington, Brett Lawler and Keith Butler finished off the game.
- Nick Longmire was 2-3 with 2 walks. He also the base running trifecta: SB, CS and PO. 2 out of 3 of those things are not good.
- Rainel Rosario was 2-4 with a double.
- Alan Ahmady was 2-3 with a walk.
- Cale Johnson got the dubya with 6 strong shutout innings. He scattered 6 hits striking out 4 and walking 1.
- Andrew Benes pitched 2 shutout innings striking out 2 and walking 1.
- Iden Nazario gave up the only run and Aidan Lucas came in and got the last out after allowing Nazario’s 1 run to score.
- Philip Cerreto was 2-4 with a double and 2 RBIs.
- Virgil Hill had a walk and a stolen base.
- Greg Garcia was 2-4 with a SB.
Entries (RSS)
Is it just me or Cardinal’s minors SPs are terrible?
Down in the Gulf Coast League, Richard Mendoza had one of the great pitching lines of all time. In 2 IP, he gave up 0 hits and 4 ER, with only 1 walk. There’s only one way that’s possible, right?
In the top of the 7th, with 2 outs, he hit 4 consecutive batters, and was finally pulled from the game, with the bases loaded. The next pitcher came in and immediately gave up a triple, so all 4 guys Mendoza hit ended up scoring.
I’ve heard of pitchers walking the bases loaded. But plunking 4 straight?
Final insult to the baseball gods: The pitcher who gave up the triple got the win!
The Post is reporting Descalso is out for at least three weeks with a hairline fracture of his collarbone.
Lou- That is about the craziest thing I’ve ever heard.
Nmstar-On a different note what is going on with all the injuries in our system this year. Penny/Lohse Rasmus and Freese already missed a week. Ludwick has missed about a week now and Freese is back on the DL as a result of this previous injury.
Gotta love this quote: “Descalso, primarily a second baseman, was batting .274 with a .414 on-base percentage, four homers and 52 RBIs in 76 games.”
-1 for P-D’s fact checkers and Strauss’s stats.
Billy Corrigan is now playing baseball? At least he stopped trying to re-invent the Smashing Pumpkins and gawd-awful new CDs.
@Ozn:
Where do you get this? Kopp and Gorgen have been great at Springfield, Lynn is off and on this year. Kelly, Hooker and Schneider have been great in QC.
I tend to agree with Ozn, our minors starting pitching has not been good overall. There have been few bright spots and positive surprises (Schneider, Dickson, Fick and Gorgen (pre-injury) being the main exceptions. It is hard to evaluate much of the Memphis pitching due to the ups and downs with STL. Kopp, Kelly, and Hooker have been good but far from great (ignore Kopp’s W-L record and look at his peripherals). Lynn had some good games early but lately has been worse than terrible. A healthy Gorgen would make the overall pitching assessment a lot brighter.
If Longmire hits a HR tonight, I’m not only calling for his promotion but that they dedicate a day to him not just in St. Louis but nationally!
@Andrew:
Baseball and injuries go together , that’s part of the game. In some cases, it’s just playing hard, in others, it’s getting old.
@cariocacardinal:
I’m very happy with our SP. Most of the reason for our teams successes, QC and Springfield is SP. Palm Beach I just don’t know much about at all. Memphis is hard to tell. I think the systems record is a good indication of the state of our starters. We may not have any lights out prospects other than Miller but alot of 3 through 5 guys.
@Andrew: Andrew, I’m glad you are happy with our minor league starting pitching. I’m not particularly unhappy with it but not overly thrilled with it either. Those are subjective things. On the more objective side, I dont think the facts support your assertion that starting pitching is the key to the QC and Springfield success. In Springfield we are 2nd in the league in OPS and runs and 4th in team ERA and by my eyeball calculation 7th (of 8 teams) in FIP. I dont have that broken out by starting pitching but I think nobody would say the Springfield bullpen has been a weak spot. In QC we are 5th in OPS and 3rd in runs while we are 8th in ERA (too many teams to do a FIP calculation). Again, that pitching number is not broken out by starter/non starter. QC did have some relief pitching issues early but it has since become a strength so it could be a wash. In summary, these teams are being supported more by their hitting than their pitching.
I’m on the pessimistic side WRT the starters in our system. Kelly and Miller are 3 levels below AAA, and Matias is 6 or 7 levels back. Above the Midwest League, I don’t see anyone who projects as a major-league starter. Ottavino’s AAA numbers are the best of his career so far, but you can’t be encouraged by his performance on the varsity. Lynn has had three horrible starts in a row. Kopp needs to show he can stay healthy and stay effective. And Gorgen is hurt.
We have some good arms, sure, and we’ve had some good performances. But I can’t think of anybody above A ball who’s combined tools with consistent performance this year.
Disagree on QC they got off to a great start fueled pretty much exclusively by very good pitching. The offense was anemic for most of the year. QC manager discussing Matt Adams troubles said that for much of the year has been the only threat in the line up so teams eventually just started pitching around him and he expanded his zone. Check out the scores of QC games. Alot of 3-0, 5-0 2-0 games. While you may see that as the offense doing its job, I believe those wins are more a result of the dominant pitching. The ERA has taken a hit from a few big run games. Schneider, Hooker, Kelly and Fontanro have been outstanding this year and have out performed every position player not named Matt Adams or Michael Swinson
I cited the facts andrew. If you’d like to dispute them with other facts I’m willing to listen but anecdotal evidence wont sway me.
Schneider and Hooker have been outstanding. I’d say Kelly and Fornataro have been good.
Ingram was better than all those players at QC and if being better than Swinson has this year is the measuring stick I’d argue that Vasquez, Shepard, Stidham and possibly Lara fall into that category as well. Swinson has tons of potential but we are talking about performance.
@Andrew: Some pitchers at the A level have done well (Hooker, Schneider). Miller has been much hoped for, but is not having a knockout Rick Ankiel kind of introduction to pro ball. The pitchers at Palm Beach seem generally unexciting.
@cariocacardinal: Swinson is doing a lot better than Darryl Jones in his 3rd season of pro ball. Swinson is very promising.
I agree I Castillo and Nieto haven’t done much at PMB. Brodrecik and McGregor have been pretty good though nothing that exciting though.
Moss for Batavia has a perfect game through 7 innings with 7 K
@rydeshelby: Did I say something to about Swinson to the contrary? I Dont understand your comment.
I have a friend whose son was drafted out of HS round 20, 125k he kind of had up and down seasons (never great numbers)and today is the #1 starter on a ML team.
I looked at Wainwright’s stats, it took him 5 years to make his debut and began his career in relief.
I think our teams do pretty well considering that the Cardinals pick late each round and don’t spned teh bucks like some other teams do. Now take a team like NWA that is loaded with lots of first round picks, you would expect that they would have better stats in both pitching and hitting, and wins, yet their big club can’t get it together year after year.
It really doesn’t matter what most of us think of our starters or pitchers anyway, we have no clue who will be a starter, relief guy or closer or even make a ML roster.
I’m not on the Shelby bandwagon yet either, that’s all you hear about, Shelby, he is ending his second season (yeah he didn’t pitch his first was that for a reason other than just negotiating) and hasn’t pitched much at all to show me that he has star quality. He has a loooong way to go as do most of these guys, sorry it isn’t exciting, they are still in the learning process.
@Lou Schuler:
I agree. I’m not sure why some observers are giddy about Lynn, Ottavino, Kelly et al. Kelly has been less than dominating at Quad Cities and it’s not like he’s a 19 year old. Ottavino has shown much better control but not really better overall results at AAA. I still think he’s reliever material. Lynn has been abominable and, unless he’s got an undisclosed physical problem, I suspect he’s reached the level of his incompetence. Guys like Schneider and Fortnatero hang around the minors for a long time but rarely contribute in the show. There are few pitchers at the lower levels who show the kind of strikeout stats that indicate they’re capable of pitching in the majors.
I think we’re left with Miller, possibly Hooker or Gorgen, some possibilities in the DSL and the guys we’ve drafted this year for starter material. For sure somebody may emerge from the rest as a 4th or 5th starter but overall I think that Ozn’s observation is correct.
Easy-Not every pitcher arrives at the big leagues on the same path. Kelly has always been a reliever. He is has a power arm and it’s going to take some time to develop him into a pitcher and not just a hard throwing closer. His age isn’t an issue. If you look at Ottavinos results since he turned it around midseason last year they have been outstanding. The first few games this year nonwithstanding as he had a sore shoulder. Lynn has been up and down. He was the Cardinals May pitcher of the month. You talk about “guys” like Schneider-Are you aware that he has only been pitching for 2 years? Manager Johny Rodriquez said he has a really good shot to make it to the Majors. Not many minor league coaches will flat out say asomething about it. Regarding strikeouts I half agree with you on that but in the low minors the strikeout rate seems to only correlate to MPH. Only the protypical hard throwing, fast mover, fits that describtion of high strikeout guys, often those guys get lit up in the majors because they don’t know how to pitch only throw. See Kyle Farnsworth.
My take on our starters is this, our minor league system is working on developing pitchers and not moving them level to level as fast as possible. When people rush young pitchers through the system you get a situation like Rick Porcello where you have to be sent back down. I would rather then take it slow and teach guys to pitch than let Miller rely on his fastball and have him in AAA next year without having an idea where the ball is going or how to throw a changeup.
@Andrew:
Re: Rodriguez’ comment about Schneider I seldom hear minor league coaches say anything less about any player than that they have a “shot at the majors”. It may also be true. I suspect we have several pitchers in the system, including some that haven’t shown it yet, that do “have a shot at the majors”. So does every other team and I think most have more and better prospects than us. Kelly, Ottavino, Lynn and others may have “major league arms” but they are not pitching like high ceiling prospects at their levels for their ages.
I think the system’s weak in starting pitchers and that the FO knows it, hence the Matias signing and the concentration on pitchers in the recent draft. Hopefully Miller, Matias and maybe a guy like Jenkins can develop into really front line prospects. That would make me feel better about the Kelly’s and Lynn’s who, I think, have ceilings as back end of the rotation fillers.