The season is winding down and Quad Cities finds itself eliminated from the playoffs.
Memphis 5, Nashville 4 (10 innings)
- Matt Young was 2-for-5.
- Eugenio Velez was 1-for-2 with 3 walks.
- Memphis’ roster, especially on the position player side, has been absolutely devastated by callups this year. It’s hard to label anyone outside of Ryan Jackson as a prospect. The infusion of players like Greg Garcia, Kolten Wong and Oscar Taveras will radically alter this team’s composition next year. There’s plenty of pitching coming up through the minors but the Cardinals suddenly look thin on position players.
- Brandon Dickson struck out 8 in 7 innings of work. He allowed 4 runs on 9 hits.
- Barrett Browning, Maikel Cleto and Victor Marte all pitched a scoreless inning of relief.
- Kolten Wong was 2-for-4 with a walk.
- Oscar Taveras was 2-for-4 with a walk and a double.
- Chris Swauger was 3-for-5.
- Greg Garcia was 2-for-3 with a walk.
- Seth Maness pitched 5 shutout innings allowing just 3 hits.
- Carlos Martinez pitched an inning of relief (his start the day before was cancelled due to rain). He walked 1.
- Deryk Hooker, Eric Fornataro and Keith Bulter all pitched scoreless relief innings.
- James Ramsey was 1-for-4 with a double and a walk. Ramsey hasn’t exactly lit the world on fire in Palm Beach. It will be interesting to see where he starts 2012 at.
- Alan Ahmady was 2-for-3 with a walk.
- Todd McInnis struck out 4 in 6 innings. He walked 1 and allowed 5 hits but kept Jupiter scoreless.
- Nick Martini was 2-for-4 with a double.
- Quad Cities recorded 8 hits but only one for extra bases. They walked twice and struck out 10 times.
- Hector Hernandez struck out 5 in 6 innings. He allowed 3 runs on 7 hits and 1 walk.
- Robert Stock allowed 2 unearned runs. He walked 1 and allowed 1 hit.
- Steven Ramos (CF-RF) was 2-for-6.
- Patrick Wisdom (3B) was 3-for-5 with a double and a triple.
- David Washington (1B) was 1-for-4 with his 8th home run of the season and a walk.
- Matthew Young (CF) was 2-for-3 with a double.
- Both pitching staffs were lit up in the course of the game. Kevin Jacob, who pitched a scoreless inning of relief striking out 1 was the only Muckdog to escape unscathed.
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Batavia won its 8th straight, but found itself another game closer to elimination, since the teams ahead of them for the division and wild card keep winning.
They’re 3rd or 4th in the league in most offensive stats, but, interestingly, they lead the league in total bases but are 12th of 14 teams in walks. The combination leaves them tied for 4th (with 2 other teams) in OBP.
The pitching staff, appropriately, is last in the league in walks given up, but otherwise their pitching stats are like their hitting stats: third or fourth best in most categories.
Dickson has really increased his strike out rate over the last seven games. Not that last nights game was anything great, but the improved K rate does hint at some sign of progress.
He only regresses when he gets to the majors!
Oscar Taveras’s violent controlled swing has now produced 66 XBH this season for Springfield.
In regards to the comment that there is not a lot of position players coming up in the system there is not a big need for position players on the Cards mlb team in the next few years and Cards have top prospects ready or near ready in the minors for all those positions they need help at sans the ss. Also, they drafted position players 5 of the top 6 picks this year and focused upon it in last years draft also. If anything they need to focus on young high upside pitchers in the next draft.
GIven how thin the OF is in the high minors, I wonder if they see O’Neill in Memphis if he succeeds in the AFL.
He hasn’t been at Springfield long at all, though he’s torching the Texas League in that small sample.
Someone tell me something good about Greg Garcia. Legit?
Shelby Miller promoted to big leagues per Joe Strauss
Wacha strikes out three in his one inning. Wonder how they will deal with him in 2013
My prediction: Starts the season in the SPFLD rotation, moves up after about 2 months to the Memphis rotation, and finishes 2013 in the STL bullpen. He’s in the 2104 starting rotation. Needless to say, I’m entirely sold on this guy.
Looks like Taveras is up to his old tricks with 3 hits on this Sunday afternoon. Now hitting .323, 23 HR, 94 RBI.
Wacha: 1 IP, 3 K, 0 BB.
3 for 5, including a double, and his OPS is still within reach of 1.000. It’ll probably take an even bigger final game to eclipse that mark. Something to keep an eye on.
AZ, in light of what they have at the major league level, I would not be suprised if Adams, Wong and Taveras play the first part of next season at AAA. Add that to SS Greg Garcia, Catcher Perez and 3b Curtis that is not overly thin. Again that does not count Scruggs, Jackson (if they don’t want him on the bench) and O’Neill (maybe a bit too early). In total I do not think that is particularly thin at AAA, and I see a reasonable flow of players below them.
They have graduated a large amount of offense to St. Louis in the last couple of years.
Arzu acknowledged the influx of position players Memphis will get next year. His point was on the system as a whole, which I agree with.
Not trying to be argumentative but what about OF Ramsey, C Stanley, 3b/OF Piscotty, 3b Kelly, 3b Wisdom, C Bean, IF/OF Walsh, 2b/SS B Valera, 2b S Rodriguez, 1b J Rodriguez, C J Castillo, OF Garcia, SS Williams, OF Tilson, OF McElroy, C Erhlich, OF Capellan, SS Peoples-Walls and 2b L Perez? O’Neill will probably start at AA.
I am not saying all of those guys will be excellent, but I am also sure that I have either missed someone and there are always guys that suprise that I did not list, but I certainly don’t think the system is thin on good prospect position players below AAA. When you include the players that will start at AAA due to the small number of needs at St. Louis, I think the system is excellent overall vis-a-vis position players and very good or better at AA and below going into next season, not “thin”.
Some other positional prospects that could contribute in the system or in the majors Alex Mejia SS (if healthy, Lance Jeffries OF (not counting him out yet he’s only 18 years old), Illdemaro Vargas 2B recently promoted to Batavia, Jacob Wilson 3B has some power potential, and Rowan Wick C (very raw but has some upside short and simple swing will help him.
Frankly, you’re just listing guys. I agree with azru. There is a void after the almost-ML position player talent, like Taveras, Wong, and Adams. Other than A. Garcia, and maybe a couple of this year’s draft picks who have played a half year at best and none of whom have really excelled, no one looks like a top prospect.
I would say 3 or so “top prospects” from the group listed by me and DT, plus “x” number of prospects that can ultimately make the major league roster or be used as a trade chips, makes a “deep” not a “thin” position prospect system below the AAA level.
I realize we are quibbling about words, “deep” versus “thin”, but when considering the few openings at the big league level, and the excellent prospects and depth at AAA, I am not worried about what the Cards have in the way of postion prospects below AAA, particularly in light of the group suggested by me and DT (keeping in mind that there is always a good chance for another player or two to come out of nowhere and be thereafter considered to be a “top prospect”, particularly so with the Latin American players, not well known to this point , e.g. B Valera).
I expect them to be one of the few teams that have more than one first round pick next year (offering Lohse the requisit one year contract seems likely). That will give them one of the better opportunities to further add to the system.
I don’t see any top prospects in that group. I see a lot of guys still in low A ball, several of them old for the league, some raw guys with several issues, and some decent major league filler (e.g., Stanley’s ceiling is probably a backup catcher).
I think you’ll see Wacha start in Palm Beach and if he cruises thru the first three starts I could see him heading to Springfield rather quickly. Everything I’ve read has made his stuff sound quite good. If Wacha has a great year in 2013 I could see him being at the back end of the 14 rotation
With the plethora of young arms the cardinals have accumulated over that past couple of years, who do you think the team keeps (even of it is for a backup starter role) and who is traded to help in some of our weaker areas (I.e. middle infield, catcher)?
I look for Wacha to be at Memphis to start things off next year. And, in the Cardinal rotation at some point of next season.
I look for Taveras to force his way into the Cardinal lineup with a great spring, much as Pujols did, and for Wong to arrive around mid-season, if not sooner.
If a dog’s mean, it’ll bite you when it’s a pup.
These are mean pups.
Wacha’s not even at Memphis this year. He’s only thrown in relief in the pros so far, not started. The highest he’ll start next season is probably Springfield, where he is now and only appearing in 7 innings in 3 games at that.
Absolutely no need to rush any pitching prospect in the Cardinals’ system. To get to the Cardinals’ rotation next year, Wacha will have to leapfrog at least Miller, Rosenthal, and Kelly. That’s not likely.
It seems likely that Wacha starts in Springfield but I think Cards trade from starting pitching surplus this offseason