There were shutouts, blowouts, and extra innings galore! Plenty to read tonight, as David Freese begins his rehab and Punto continues his. Johnson City had its first game tonight, and Tyrell Jenkins made his much anticipated debut as their opening starter. Read on to see how he did…
- Adron Chambers belted 2 home runs for 3 RBI
- David Freese began his rehab with a double and finished 1-3
- Matt Carpenter replaced Freese at 3rd and hit 2-2 with a double, RBI, and walk
- Donovan Solano was 2-4 with a double, 3 RBI, and 2 walks
- Nick Stavinoha hit 3rd and went 3-6 with a double
- Tyler Greene went 2-5 with a double and walk in his first game since being demoted
- Bryan Anderson was the last hitless batter in the game before hitting a 3-run bomb in the 8th inning
- P.J. Walters gave up 3 runs in 7.2 innings with 9 hits, 1 walk, and 5 strikeouts
- Jess Todd gave up no runs in an inning and a third and struck out 2
- Alex Castellanos drilled his 15th home run of the year and was 2-3 on the night
- Continuing his rehab, Nick Punto hit 3-4 with a double and RBI
- Eric Duncan had a solo-blast, which was his 5th in his past 5 games
- Steven Hill hit 1-4 with a double and a hat trick in strikeouts
- Zack Cox was 0-4 and committed his 10th error since being promoted to Springfield
- Ironically, Jermaine Curtis pitched the best tonight for Springfield after throwing a perfect inning
- Nick Greenwood pitched 2 scoreless innings out of the pen
- David Kopp gave up 9 runs and 3 homers in just over 3 innings pitched
- Edgar Lara had the only extra-base hit for the Cardinals and finished 2-4 with a double
- Ted Obregon hit 2-4 with 2 RBI with his 4th stolen base in 14 games
- Adam Melker was 1-2 with 2 walks and a RBI
- Luis De La Cruz went 1-4 with 2 RBI
- Eric Fornataro went 6 scoreless innings and struck out 8, but he walked 4, gave up 5 hits, and threw 2 wild pitches
- Mike O’Neill led off and finished 2-4 with a double
- Romulo Ruiz was 1-3 with a double and walk
- Cesar Valera recorded a double and hit 1-3
- Virgil Hill went hitless in 3 at-bats and has a sub-.200 average with just 7 walks in 135 at-bats between Batavia and Quad Cities
- Javier Avendano started and went 3 innings, giving up 2 hits, 0 runs, 2 walks, and struck out 2
Johnson City 7, Kingsport 6 in 10 innings
- The Man, The Myth, Robert De La Cruz went 3-5 with a double in his 2011 debut
- Kolby Byrd hit 3rd and finished 3-6 with a double and RBI
- Steven Ramos led off and hit 2-5 with 2 RBI
- Matthew Williams was 1-3 with 2 BB
- Ronard Castillo hit 2-4 with a double, triple, RBI, and walk
- Tyrell Jenkins, who will turn 19-years old in a month, made his much anticipated debut this year and pitched well. He went 5 innings, gave up 5 hits, 2 runs (1 earned), 1 walk, and struck out 5. He also threw a wild pitch.
Entries (RSS)
Anyone know something about Ronard Castillo? I don’t usually expect much from right fielders slotted 9th in the Appy. Still, he’s big (6’5″, 200), apparently fast (2B, 3B and SB in his stateside debut) and his 20:22 BB/K ratio from 2010 is something you don’t see very often in the DSL. He’s also listed as an IF by MiLB.com. I’m intrigued.
He’s always been tagged RF though his arm is considered below average at this point.
The one and most important thing you need to know about him is that he is still 18 y.o and only in his 2nd yr of professional ball.
4 straight solid outings for PJ. 8 straight for Todd.
Most important about RDLC’s strong night is he had 0 K’s.
Jenkins solid but I’d like to see more GB’s.
Fornataro continues to flirt with turning himself into a real prospect.
Solano had 11 walks last year – he already has 17 this season.
Kopp???? leaving him at AA to work out his problems doesn’t hurt us but does it help him?
CC, pretty astute comment regarding Kopp.
I meant pretty insightful!
Is it time for Todd to be up in St Louis? I know he’s not a Duncan favourite, but he’s always got GB in the minors and has to be better than Batista/Franklin/Miller/Tallet right now.
Count me basically off any sort of Solano bandwagon, but if we need an occasional AAAA guy on the Memphis shuttle who can play some SS, I wonder if he’s not a possible better option than Greene right at this moment.
I’m not sure it’s perhaps not time to stick a fork in Kopp. Obviously the org will continue to give him a chance but I really don’t see him making the majors in any capacity the way he’s pitched the last two years. Even though he’s been injured it looks to me like he’s very hittable and doesn’t really strike enough advanced hitters out.
He had surgery this off season and didn’t start Spring Training himself till everyone else’s was done. Why would you stick a fork in him?
I’m not saying I’d release him, just that I think he’s a AAAA guy, at best. He was adequate at AA last year with a low K rate, has had injury problems, and has utterly sucked at AAA this year. He is approaching his 26th birthday. That’s not a future major league regular.
And he pitched great in Sprignfield last year before he got hurt and then promoted.
Johnson City had 8 errors, wow.
Gonna chalk those up as first game jitters?
13 HR hit the last 2 nights in Springfield, I’m sure David Kopp isn’t a fan since all 8 of his HR allowed this year have came at home leading to a 9 ERA there in 5 starts. Zack Cox play with Springfield isn’t fun to watch right now with tons of errors and K’s and not many hits.
I’m really starting to question Cox’s high ranking in the organization? Are we seeing another Rob Stock? An initial ranking in the top 5, only to see that plummet in year 2?
I know Cox is hitting better respectively to Stock at the same time, but still there was a lot riding on him when signed….a MLB contract!
Cox hit .335 in High A ball after a slow start. He’s started slowly in Springfield, but has only 99 ABs there. The jump from High A to AA is supposed to be the toughest to adjust to; its his first full year in pro ball…PATIENCE.
I’m confused. Many people on this site are critical of Adams batting and errors and have even commented that the pitching is bad this year in AA. So what is it, is Adams just a better contact hitter, as he skipped high A to AA. I would think that a jump from low A to AA would be a more difficult transition to make.
I’m willing to be paitent with Cox, if others are willing to cut some slack to Adams.
He has not yet played one full season of pro ball. He’ll be fine
Agree with T Bird and PJ–Cox will be fine. Have seen him play a handful of AA games, and he is being challenged, no doubt about it. However, his track record (AFL, A ball) profiles as that of a slow starter. The first couple of times I saw him play he looked totally overmatched against lefties (but an 800 opsish type player against righties). Looking at his numbers it seems that his splits have normalized in spite of the current slump, which is a good sign in the long run. He will hit righties. If he can be competent against lefties he will be a very good player.
More concerning, it seems his struggles at the plate have bled into his defense at times (sss). Given preliminary reports about his body type and range, I was suprised to see in person that all the pieces are there for him to be at least an average defender. He has a respectable/good arm, and I’ve seen him make several nice plays that I was somewhat surprised he came up with. If he can be an 800-850ish OPS guy in the majors, with average defense, he will be a significant asset during his cost controlled years. If he is still hitting like this in September there may be some grounds for being moderately concerned. However, I believe he will have turned it around by then. He should play the entire year in Springfield, and it isn’t entirely out of the question that he would benefit from starting there next year with a relatively quick promotion to Memphis.
Solid start for Tyrell. Looking forward to seeing him some more.
Encouraging debut for Roberto De la Cruz, Jenkins, and Roard Castillo.
Why didn’t Jenkins start pitching until now? I’m not really understanding why he didn’t open the season at Quad Cities.
What am I missing?
He’s really, really raw. Despite the great body, great makeup on the mound and great velo and movement on his fastball, IIRC when he was drafted it was with a nascent curve that looked promising but that he didn’t really command and no real third pitch. I’m guessing they wanted to keep him in EST to at least get him working on his secondary offerings and then introduce him slowly against weaker competition where he can experiment a bit with them, rather than throw him in against guys 2 or 3 years older where he’d have to lean heavily on his fastball to have any success. He’s still only 18 I believe – there’s plenty of time for him, but before he can start ascending the ladder he’s got plenty of learning to do.
JB-He is a very raw very young pitcher. Not many pitchers start at QC before they turn 19. Rememberhe didn’t sign till very late last year which is why he only got 2 innings in at JC. It’s best to keep him at EST and help turn him into a pitcher than to just throw him out in the Midwest League andlet him get beat around by much more experienced hitters. Remember he hasn’t even focused on baseball full time until we signed him. The organization is absolutely doing hte right thing with him.
Agreed 100%
Agreed. Getting stuff like mechanics and mound demeanor is infinitely more important this year than actual production. Don’t get me wrong, I like production but you’ve got to teach him to pitch, not throw.
Real nice debuts for the two youngest players on J.C.’s roster. Tyrell Jenkins allowed just 5 hits, all singles (two infield); he also fanned five, all swinging.
Ronard Castillo not only doubled & tripled, but also walked to start the bottom of the tenth, stole 2nd, and came around on a single with the winning run. Sweet night.
Coupla Castillo details: before getting hurt two weeks into the season last year, he had a 12/3 walk/strikeout ratio. This was of course a mini-micro sample size (around 50 PA’s), but it’s still pretty freakin’ rare strikezone control for *any* hitter over *any* sample size—much less a 6′ 5″ seventeen-year-old.
The other detail, Jeff Luhnow (or maybe it was Vuch) described Castillo in the classic “the ball sounds different off his bat.” Love that quote.
Johnson City 2B Trevor Martin left the game after falling down trying to field a ground ball. He appeared to be favoring the wrist on his glove hand as he left. I haven’t seen any details about it yet. (The local paper might get around to it for the Thursday paper.)
The local paper is on the ball. A separated shoulder for Trevor.
The Appalachian League has a lot of college players. Its a good test for kid like Jenkins. I would not expect him to dominate and be promoted, but would hope he can perform well, as he did last night.
In retrospect Cox probably should have stayed in the FSL. He’s looking overmatched right now against Double A pitchers. Hopefully he’ll make the necessary adjustments, but I’m not a big proponent of promoting a guy 1/4 of the way through his first full professional season unless he is absolutely dominating or not being challenged enough. I never got the sense that Cox was doing either in the FSL, aside from the high average.
Completely agree. It would have suited him more to stay put in the FSL.
Kozma all over again, in other words?
Does anyone know what has happened to Bryan Martinez? He’s one that I really have my eye on and really tore up the GCL last year. I was expecting him to start out in JC at least this year.
Nevermind, I finally found a link to the GCL Cardinals and he’s on their roster. This is his age 20 season so I would hope he at least ends up at JC in a month or two if he pitches like he did last year. In the GCL last year as a 19 year old he had a 1.95 ERA and a 1.1 WHIP in 37 IP. Not to shabby……
Side note, can’t wait to have Freese back!! Knock on wood he doesn’t fall down in his rehab assignment, AGAIN.
Bryan Martinez has an injury so isn’t listed as part of the rotation in the GCL. He apparently will be when he gets better. We don’t know wha the injury is yet.
What happened to Matt Adams? Did he end up having surgery or something?
I don’t know for sure, but I believe someone mentioned on here earlier this week or over the weekend that he was coming back sometime this week. I have no info to back that up, but that’s what I remember reading.
He should be back in the next couple of days. Stay tuned.
Wasn’t there a guy by the name of Curt Smith with Springfield last year? What ever happened to him? He was a 1st baseman and outfielder I think.
Curt Smith was released this spring; not sure if he signed on anywhere else.
Adams reinjured his left oblique, its the type of injury that lingers so they are being very careful with him now. Should be back in 10-15 days if there are no set backs.
Adams may be back in 2-3 days.
http://blogs.news-leader.com/cardinals/2011/06/20/injured-adams-may-return-in-four-days/
My guess is Thursday he’ll be in the lineup.
The Midwest League All Star Game was last night too.
QC had Stanley, Rodriguez, and Rosenthal playing. Rosenthal and Stanley both started.
What are people’s thoughts on Duncan? Former first round pick correct? Have we caught a late developer on the chearp or is this park/league factors inflating his #s?
Duncan has an OPS of .745 in AA as a 27 year old. I don’t think he’s anything more than organizational roster filler.
Duncan is 27 in aa and only hitting .260 with a 4% walk rate, Has gotten hot with the bat in a hitters ballpark and league but I dont think there is anything special happening there. Spent parts of 4 seasons in AAA with no success at all so had lots of time to prove himself a prospect.