Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Clip Joint Second String
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| Cord Phelps |
I would not classify Corey Kluber as a bum, but anyone toting a 8.04 ERA is likely pitching a level too high. Kluber, still in search of his first win of 2011, went out and threw four excellent innings, allowing a run on five hits. Then he regressed to the mean. He recorded three more outs before being pulled and allowed five more runs. He was relieved by Eric Berger, clinging to a 7-6 lead.
If that was all the regression, I would not have led with it, now would I? Berger (5.06 ERA) is a gamer, but he'll never be a big leaguer and AAA is probably even a stretch. Still, Berger had thrown effectively in a handful full of games for Columbus this season. Tonight he did not. Berger got out of the sixth then proceeded to put the first two men on in the seventh before Carlton Smith was called upon.
Carlton Smith is a bit of retread, a unknown never-will-be. Smith (2.35) had, however, been unscored upon in his first 14.2 innings of 2011. Not anymore. In true regression, Smith allowed four hits and a walk before the inning ended. Although Berger was officially tagged with the loss, it was certainly Smith that allowed the game to get out of hand.
The offense did its part as Cord Phelps, Ezequiel Carrera and Travis Buck all launched solo dingers and Lonnie Chisenhall added a 3-run double. Phelps, playing amongst rumors that the big club is watching him closely to replace Adam Everett as the utility infielder, singled as well and is clipping along at .311. Buck, a simple casualty of the numbers crunch, has done nothing since his demotion but crank .340 with 18 RBI. How much longer can Austin Kearns warrant a roster spot? Were the Indians a losing club this season, Carrera (.324) would be licking his chops and awaiting a promotion following the inevitable trade of Grady Sizemore. Chisenhall (.291) might already be on the lake. As it stands, neither is likely to appear at the Jake until September at the earliest.
Also of note, Jason Donald left in the top of the 6th inning after injuring his left knee. This is the third separate debilitation (hand, quad) that has afflicted Donald this year, not to mention the excellent play of Jack Hannahan. The string of bad breaks ;-j for JD is an outstanding illustration of how not only talent, but timing and luck, are necessary to get a big league job.
Wednesday would be Jeanmar Gomez's normal day to start, thus I would assume him to be taking the pill tomorrow for the Clips in another 6:35p first pitch.
Other Minor Points of Interest --
Speaking of bad breaks, Jared Goedert has been assigned to Akron on a 20-day rehabilitation assignment. Goedert entered spring training as a viable candidate for the third base job before straining his oblique during the first week of camp. The conclusion of the rehab aligns exactly with the end of the 60-day disabled list period, so one would expect Goedert to be activated at that point. The problem is that Jared was rostered to the 40-man last fall and, when he is activated, someone, possibly Goedert himself, will have to be DFA'ed. It's still 3 weeks off, so we shall see. He was 0-for-4 with a walk, a strikeout and an RBI in his first game back.
LeVon Washington continued an odd trend in his fourth game for Lake County. Washington has produced a hit in all four, but only one hit. In fact, he has been 1-for-4 in each. Tonight, his hit was a double, his first of the season.
The next step for St Edward's graduate and Pirates 2010 second round pick Stetson Allie has been decided. Pittsburgh GM Neal Huntington explained why Allie will be headed to the short season A State College Spikes next month to make his professional debut instead of joining others at low-A West Virginia.
"It's unfortunate that Jameson [Taillon] and Stetson have been so closely linked. As excited as we are about both of them, they're very different. Jameson has pitched his whole life and is very advanced for a 19-year-old on the mound because of all the inning he has thrown. In Stetson's case, he has come on late. He has a great arm but hasn't pitched his whole life. He has actually more of prospect as a position player going into his junior year then really burst onto the scene in his senior year of high school as a pitcher in terms of maturity on the mound and delivery and feel for pitching, so there will be some separation there."Cheers.
Marooned On A Lonely Island
Isn't dressing Michael Bolton like Captain Jack an exercise in redundancy?
Return To the Clip Joint
Jason Donald hit his second home run to lead the offensive charge. Donald (.290) added a single and scored 3 total runs. Travis Buck, batting clean-up and playing first, supplied a first inning RBI single and a 3rd inning sac fly then walked and scored in the 8th. Lonnie Chisenhall doubled to extend his hit streak to 8 games as Columbus won 5-2.
Corey Kluber faces the Knights tomorrow at 6:35p.
One Other Minor Point of Interest --
We'll see how conservative the Nationals want to be with 2010 #1 overall pick Bryce Harper who is riding a 13-game hitting streak and has raised his season OPS to 1.155. Harper (.376) has batted .449 with four home runs and 10 RBI during the streak. Remember that Harper is at low-A Hagerstown (Lake County level) and would move next to high-A Potomac.
Cheers
Monday, May 9, 2011
While I Was Sminking
Jess Todd was claimed off of waivers by the Yankees. Todd, who was DFA'ed when the Tribe added Alex White to 40-man roster, was acquired in the Mark DeRosa trade along with Chris Perez. Todd had an outstanding spring camp and nearly made the club in a role eventually filled by Vinnie Pestano. The best of luck to Jess with his new organization, except, of course, against the Indians.
Jeanmar Gomez was today optioned back to AAA Columbus. While a corresponding addition was not announced, the assumption is that Carlos Carrasco will be activated to pitch on Wednesday against the Rays. Carrasco made a rehab start on Friday in Akron that is being described by some as "successful." Four runs on four hits and three walks over 3.2 innings does not sound successful to me, but I did not see the man pitch. As with a spring training outing, rehab games are primarily about testing endurance and command. While the numbers do not reflect positive results, if he is pain free, and it seems that he is, I would much rather have him in the rotation than Jeanmar.
Prospect Nick Hagadone (1.45 ERA) surrendered his first three runs of the season in taking the loss for Akron on Saturday. Hagadone loaded the bases in the 7th on two hits and a walk that was suspect enough to get both the Akron manager and pitching coach ejected. Matt Langwell relieved and got a force play and a striekout to nearly escape the inning before a single brought in the decisive runs. Hagadone is still in line for a promotion with the opposition batting a meek .193 against him.
Over two weekend appearances for the Aeros RHP CC Lee (2.84) struck out 8 over 3.2 perfect innings, including all five he faced on Friday. Over his last four games, CC has thrown 9.1 hitless, scoreless frames, striking out 18 and allowing just a single baserunner on a walk. He picked up his first win of the season and has righted the ship after losing his first time out and racking up a 5.58 ERA before the streak.
The Clippers split a 4-game set with the Lehigh Valley IronPigs as top prospect Domonic Brown (asshole) knocked around the staff pretty good. Brown was 7-for-13 with two homers and 5 RBI and six runs scored. I think that I might send him some hate mail. Anyway, the starting pitching did not put together a very good showing despite lasting at least five innings in all five starts and earning all of the decisions. Although the quartet (Kluber, Martinez, Huff, Barnes) struck out nearly a batter per inning (21 in 21.2) the 7.89 ERA, .345 OBA, and 1.75 WHIP are simply unacceptable. Both Kluber (7.63) and Barnes (6.23) are pitching as if they are in over their heads, but, fortunately, the organization has the luxury of patience.
Cord Phelps (6-for-13, HR, 5 RBI, .313 season), Lonnie Chisenhall (7-for-15, 3 RBI, .294, 7-game hit streak) and Jerad Head (4-for-7, HR, 3 RBI, .385) all had great series and Wes Hodges (.208) finally broke Mendoza with a 3-for-4, HR, 3 RBI effort in Sunday's second game.
Oh, and Carlton Smith threw a couple more shutout innings and is now unscored upon in 14.2 innings this year.
Drew Pomeranz (1.27) notched his first pro win on Saturday with five scoreless innings. Pomeranz allowed 3 hits and 3 walks while fanning eight. Pom is dazzling hitters to the tune of a .162 OBA and 13.34 K/9. Tick tock, get ready Akron.
Yesterday, not only did Adam Miller (9.00) throw another clean inning, but Giovanni Soto continued his excellence out of the gate. Soto (2.67) was not around for the decision (1-3 this year) but surrendered just a run on four hits in six innings. He walked one and struck out five. Keep your eye on this kid.
2010 2nd round pick LeVon Washington made his season debut over the weekend. In each of three games for the Captains, Washington singled and walked. Over those three, all of them in center field, Washington is batting .250 with a run scored and a stolen base.
Steven Wright (2.75) showed continued improvement with his knuckler, tossing a six inning start on Saturday, five hits and two earned the damage. Wright walked five and struck out six, numbers that one would expect from a man learning the most nuanced of all pitches. Still, Wright's overall numbers seem good and his progression has been encouraging to the organization.
Friend of the blog and all around good guy, Tyler Tufts (2.25) had an up and down weekend for AA Frisco of the Texas Rangers organization. Ty threw well on Thursday, tossing three perfect innings with four K's to grab his first career AA win. Sunday was not quite as enjoyable. Tyler let in the game losing run among four base runners in an inning and a third. His overall ERA (between A+ & AA) sits at 1.84 along with a .212 OBA. Good stuff.
What did we learn?
On Friday we learned that Justin Masterson (7 IP, 9 H, ER, 5 K, 2.11) is still awesome, Vinnie Pestano (IP, H, K) is still nasty and Justin Germano is worthless. Germano (5.00) had a streak of 5 consecutive scoreless appearances snapped (6 IP) in surrendering four straight hits to give Anaheim the walk off win. Justin, pitching for the first time in eight days and just the 7th time all year, was as rusty as one can be and did not retire a soul. If Manny Acta cannot trust Germano on a more regular basis, the roster spot needs to ceded to someone more useful.
On Saturday, we learned that Alex White (6 IP, 7 H, 3 ER, 2 BB, 6 K, first MLB win) is here to stay, Chris Perez is probably over his swoon (perfect 9th, 10th save), and, yep, Vinnie Pestano (IP, H, K, 1.32) is nasty.
And on Sunday we learned that the team can actually go deep on the road (Grady left the yard, the team has 8 in 712 road PA's), the Tribe can allow unearned runs (Adam Everett's gaff allowed 3, they have 8 on the season) and sometimes shit just happens (Choo misplay + two "Anaheim" chops + Austin Kearns playing a deep shortstop = loss).
Still the starting pitching was excellent and Carlos Santana (5-for-13, RBI, 3 R, .218) is starting to show some signs of life, raising his batting average by 22 points in the series.
Breathing now. I know that losing happens. Yesterday, a wise man mentioned to me that, excluding the first two games of the season, the Tribe has been in every contest. I thought that there might be one more (they lost 10-3 to the Twins on April 23). Other than that, the Indians have not lost a game by more than two runs this season. If you're going to contend, you need stay in games and, even with the two losses to the Angels, they sure are doing that.
For those of you that made it to the bottom of the post, I'll reward you with a quick peek into the world of sminking. It involves copious consumption of intoxicating liquors on either one or two of the weekend nights. This invariably leads to the whole locomotive to chest sensation, but that's not the issue. More problematic are the crippling depression and palapable anxiety that accompany the hangover. It's a lot like borrowing from Peter to pay Paul. And the blog belongs to St. Peter. Alas. Working on it, kids.
P.s. This also happened ...
God save the queen.
Sunday, May 8, 2011
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