The upper minors had some excellent hitting and pitching performances, including an absolute slugfest in AAA as the system goes 3-2-1.
- So yeah, this happened. The Redbirds scored in every inning but two and launched a pair of grand slams in the 4th.
- Steven Hill hit one of those grand slams and was 5-5.
- Pete Kozma hit the other and was 4-6 with a double.
- Mark Hamilton was 2-4 with 3 walks.
- Adron Chambers was 2-4 with a walk.
- Eugenio Velez was 2-4 with a double and 2 BB.
- Ryan Jackson has been hitting quite well lately and was 4-6.
- Forgotten in this madness was Brandon Dickson‘s good outing, allowing only 2 runs on 7 hits in 6.0 innings with 7-1 K-BB.
- Greg Garcia flashed some unexpected power today, going 3-4 with a pair of home runs. His OPS is up to .862 now.
- Xavier Scruggs hit his 16th home run, going 2-4.
- Jamie Romak was 1-2 with a pair of walks.
- Scott McGregor threw 7.0 strong innings, allowing only a run on 3 hits, 4 Ks, 0 BB,
Palm Beach 6, Brevard County 4
- Mike O’Neill was 1-3 with a pair of walks.
- Alan Ahmady was 2-5.
- Geoffrey Klein was 2-5 with a home run.
- Rainel Rosario was 2-4 with a double.
- Ryan Sheriff continues to be effective, lasting 7.2 IP only allowing a single run. He struck out 6 and walked 2.
- Nick Martini and Matt Williams each had a single and a walk.
- David Bergin was 2-4.
- David Medina was 2-5,
- Willy Paulino has struggled this year and tonight was no exception. He gave up 6 runs in 4.1 innings, walking 3 and striking out 5.
- Robert Stock, who has been assigned longer outings lately, went 3.2 scoreless innings, walking 2 and striking out 1.
- This game was postponed (hence the tie)
- The younger Jesus Montero hit a double.
- David Washington was 1-3 with a home run.
- Ryan O’Shea had an abbreviated start, going 4 innings and giving up 3 runs on six hits in that time.
- Bruce Caldwell was 2-3 with a pair of doubles.
- Lance Jeffries was 1-3 with a pair of walks.
- Cesar Valeras was 2-2 with a double and 2 BB.
- Dutch Deol was 2-4 with a triple.
- Cory Jones was disastrous, giving up eight runs in his one inning and forcing the bullpen to carry on the rest of the way.
Entries (RSS)
It’s amazing that Memphis scored 24 runs and Matt Adams didn’t play a major role.
Yeah, when I saw the score I expected Adams to have smashed his 16th-through-22nd homers, breaking the all-time professional single-game tater record.
But no. Sigh.
Last I checked, Matt The Bat had an OPS around .980 versus lefties…and roughly .940 when *behind* in the count. Heckuva stick.
Q: If Matheny feels like he can’t even trust T. Greene to be the primary backup to Furcal, isn’t it time to call up Ryan Jackson and trade or flat-out release Tyler? The man is 30 freakin’ years old, and whether he’s actually earned it or not, shouldn’t he be given more of a chance *somewhere*?
Greg Garcia has been tearing up Double A pitching in his past 10 games .400 AVG/.571 OBP/.633 SLG/1.205 OPS 12-for his last-30 2 HR 4 RBI 12 walks.
What is it with the plethora of bat L throw R middle infielders? Skip, Descalso, Wong, Garcia. Not a MI but Cox as well. There is some sort of tear in the baseball universe that has caused this anomaly or somebody in the scouting department has a man crush on Ken Oberkfell.
You have to throw right-handed to play any infield position besides 1B. Otherwise you’d have to make throws from some weird, no leverage positions (think of a second baseman trying to throw to first left-handed). So any natural lefty who plays infield will have to learn to throw righty.
Joking? No “natural lefty who plays infield learns how to throw righty.” Rather, guys who throw righty (the vast majority of baseball players) either learn to bat from the left side or do it naturally. Throwing righty and batting lefty is pretty common.
jjray,
I know what you mean. It seems like there has been an increase over the years. I think its because there is less of an effort to convert guys to switch hitting. It really shows up in the middle infield.
Nobody has a sense a humor these days with a tongue in cheek comment. :)
There really has been a proliferation of the B L / T R on the infield though. Didn’t see it 20 years ago.
Sure there were. Looking back to 1992, there were guys like DeShields, Offerman, Whitaker, etc., in the middle, and tons of third basemen, led by HoFer Wade Boggs. Best just to accept the tongue-in-cheek explanation. :-)
Xavier Scruggs is an interesting prospect has a lot of power potential (.213 ISO .362 wOBA 126 wRC+) he just strikes out too much 25.1% K rate but a 11.7 walk rate and doesn’t hit for a high enough AVG still like the power bat.
Agreed, gotta think he gets a shot at AAA once Hamilton is no longer in Memphis
Might be a role for him as trade bait for those GMs who thought that Jack Cust had what it took to be a major-league ballplayer — if there are any that still have jobs.
You know, we’re just about a week away from the trade deadline. I have to imagine that Mozeliak will try to include fringe guys in AAA in any trade(s) to create space on the 40-man. I’m thinking guys like Mark Hamilton, Brandon Dickson, Chuckie Fick, John Gaub, Steven Hill/Bryan Anderson, and maybe Shane Robinson.
I’m sure if Mo can “throw-in” any of these guys, he will.
Agree. Though I think Shane might be less of a throw in because he is a back up CF and I don’t think they want to add Oscar to the roster yet.
Looks like Lee Stoppelman continues to pitch well. He had two scoreless innings for Batavia…1 hit and 2 BB (looks uncharacteristic). He has now given up 1 earned run over 16.2 IP, pretty good groundball rate and good SO/BB ratio.
Does anyone know what he is being clocked at? I would guess around 89-90, but I don’t know for sure. I would like to see what he can do moving up.
Stoppelman sits in the high to mid 80s on his fastball his delivery has been described as funky which gives him lot’s of deception. He’s got a solid slider that has late break his arm slot helps that slider become effective. He’s an intriguing prospect.
I saw him pitch last summer. I never saw a gun reading on him though. I don’t remember his motion being funky or strange, but I can see where he may hide the ball well – I don’t recall his arm slot being high.
As with other Lefties that don’t have a big arm, I would just like to move them through and see what better hitters do against them. All we know is Lee is pitching pretty darn good in short season ball. Doesn’t tell us much.
So is Greg Garcia a better prospect than Wong?
While Greg Garcia, as of today, has past Wong in the OPS/SLG/AVE/OPS I’m guessing the organization still holds Wong in a higher regard; particularly, for trade talk purposes. imho, Wong is just getting very tired playing in this heat. Springfield is in a stretch of 26 straight games without an off-day (July 12 thru Aug 6th.) Plus Wong had All-Star game duties prior to the start of the 26 straight games, while Garcia had an opportunity to get rested during the four day all-star game break.
A plus for Garcia is that he can play 2B and SS, while I believe Wong is limited to 2B.
Garcia made be working himself into a minor trade chip, if MO puts together like a 3 for 1 type deal during the balance of July.