In case you missed it …
- Marlon Morgan of the Memphis Commercial Appeal visits with former Redbirds Donovan Solano now a member of the Miami Marlins AAA affiliate the New Orleans Zephyrs.
- Zack Cox talks with Morgan about his rough start in Memphis. Cox seems to keep a level head about his 0-for-26 slump noting, “All the great hitters have been through some kind of struggle, maybe not as bad as that. You’ve just got to try to be mentally tough and just persevere.”
- Steve Batterson of the QC Times writes about the River Bandits’ catcher, Juan Castillo, including comments on the time Castillo threw his bat at an opposing pitcher.
- Over the weekend, Kary Booher notes that Tommy Pham has once again found his way to the disabled list. The Springfield Cardinals replaced him with Kyle Conley fresh off his own DL stint. This is Pham’s third season in Springfield. Despite being in the farm system seemingly forever, Pham is just 24. Hardly the oldest prospect to pass through Springfield in recent years on their way to the majors.
- Derrick Goold gets a candid response from Robert Stock regarding his conversion from catching to pitching. If there’s an organization that should make you feel good about transitioning from catcher to pitcher, it out to be the Cardinals who have groomed both Jason Motte and David Carpenter into big leaguers. Casey Mulligan ascended to AA after his transition to the mound before being sidelined by injuries.
- Jose Pasen, a right handed starter in short season baseball for the last two years, was suspended for performance enhancing drugs as Jenifer Langosch reported this week. Pasen had posted solid numbers at Batavia and remains on their roster. He will have to serve a 50 game suspension for his positive test results.
- Alex Castellanos continues to make hay in the Dodgers organization. I’ve seen numerous tweets about his conversion from outfielder to second baseman being a surprising success in the sense that he’s potentially a viable option there long term.
- Baseball Instinct profiles Kolten Wong.
- Jason Parks of Baseball Prospectus goes back and looks at his responses from a 2011 draft amending and elaborating on them months later. It includes comments on Wong.
- Matt Adams earned the spotlight on John Sickels’ site as a prospect of the day. He also appeared in a notes column a few days prior.
- Sickels also commented on Oscar Taveras hot start. I think that we’re going to find, similar to Adams, that Taveras is a player who can maintain a high batting average and will never draw a ton of walks. It leaves them vulnerable to slumps when their swing mechanics get out of whack and they don’t have plate discipline to fall back on but it’s also an inherent part of their game. I think there’s an understandable and correct bias to favor players with good walk rates but consistent “hitters” may be something we have to cope with when watching some of our own prospects.
- Matt Carpenter also gets profiled by Sickels. (It was a big week for Cardinal prospects on Minor League Ball.) I’m really thrilled to see Carpenter contributing in so obvious a way to the major league club. As a committed and vocal advocate of Carpenter’s offensive abilities, it’s reassuring. It would be more reassuring if he was doing it by drawing walks.
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Where does Carpenter fit with the cards? I still see a trade likely. I am sure Zona, phillies and dodgers would be interested.
We need a solid backup corner infielder with the injuries histories of our starters there. Even if Adams eventually solves that problem at 1B, Freese is still a durability question-mark at 3B and Zack Cox isn’t doing anything to push his way onto the major league roster (other than the fact that he got an MLB contract when he signed). I think there is a role for MCarp for the next few years at least.
Liked that writeup on Carp…oh, and he walked the first two times up tonight.