Daily Farm Report 4/28/08
The Memphis Commercial Appeal catches up with Motte for this edition of:
”They were like, ‘we’re going to turn you into a pitcher now,”’ Motte said. ”Not that I didn’t expect this, but I’ve never pitched in my life. I didn’t really know how it was going to work, or how I was going to do.”
I’ve been making a point to check out a Motte’s outing’s on video when I can this year. His command isn’t as good as I thought it was although it’s still above average for the fastball. There’s not a ton of movement on his fastball but the combination of velocity and good command is more than enough to make him a league average reliever at this point. He still has nothing more than some show-me pitches for his secondary offerings.
Saber-scouting has some draft buzz. As much as I want the Cardinals to pick the best player available, I hope they don’t end up with a 1B/LF.
Colby Rasmus says hello as the organization goes 4-for-4.
- 2-for-4 with a pair of solo jacks and a walk. Rasmus continues to get back on track. In his last 10 games he’s hitting .270 with 4 HRs and 5BBs vs 5Ks.
- Josh Phelps went 3-for-4.
- Jarrett Hoffpauir went 2-for-4. He hasn’t shown the power that he did last season and, although his batting average is at .305, I’m beginning to question how much he can sustain at the majors if he can’t lace a double every now and again.
- Hugo Castellanos goes 6 innings allowing 5 hits, 1 ER and 1 walk against 2Ks. If I was a major league team with a thin bullpen and no internal options, I’d be giving the Cardinals a call about Castellanos. He’s got the deception to be a useful arm out of the pen in middle relief.
- Jason Motte retires all 4 batters he sees: 2 on the ground and 2 by strikeout. Be sure and look at his K% (click his name). It’s at 40% tonight but it’s only going to rise with this outing. I’d like the walks to come down a touch but still he’s just dominating right now. Can we dump Flores and try Motte out?
- Chris Perez pitched a scoreless frame walking 1. The walk rates are down this year and batters continue to not be able to hit him (.190 OBA). Can we dump Flores and try Perez out?
- Also, the pitchers were facing a very good Salt Lake team that features 2 MLB ready players (Reggie Willits, Kendry Morales) and one nearly ready MLB caliber prospect (Sean Rodriguez) of the Angels organization.
- Shane Robinson goes 2-for-4 with a walk, a double and his 4th stolen base of the season.
- Jon Jay goes 2-for-5. He’s suddenly hitting .326/.394/.517 with 3 HRs and a nearly 1:1 K:BB rate.
- My man Allen Craig goes 0-for-5. He’s not hitting well right now at all. Walk rates and strikeout rates are fine but everything is a groundball. Elevate, Allen, elevate.
- Mark Hamilton goes 0-for-2 with 3 BBs.
- Luke Gorsett foes 2-for-3 with a double, HR and a walk.
- Clayton Mortensen got roughed up. In 4 innings, he allowed 7 hits: 3 singles, 3 doubles and a HR. He struck out 3 and walked just 1 but the damage amounted to 5 ER.
- Luckily the pen was up to the task as they put up zeros for the rest of the game. Zach Zuercher picked up the win, Bob Zimmerman and Luke Gregerson got holds, and Josh Dew picked up his 3rd save.
- Just looking at the batting lines you wouldn’t think the team would score 9 runs but a handful of doubles and some timely hitting did the job. PB had 11 hits and 1 walk but 5 doubles and 1 jack.
- Tommy Pham contributed the 2-run shot as well as the walk in his 2-for-3 night.
- Donovon Solano went 3-for-4 with a double.
- Nathan Southard went 2-for-4 with a double.
- Kyle Sadlowski and Jess Todd continue to get the job done although tonight wasn’t their best outings. Sadlowski went allowing 2 ER on 5 hits, 3BBs and 2K. Todd made it 3.2 innings for 3 runs (2 earned) on 5 hits, 1 walk and 6 Ks.
- Justin Robinson was 2-for-4 with a double.
- Pete Kozma was 1-for-3 with a triple and a walk.
- Domnit Bolivar was 3-for-4.
- Eduardo Sanchez only lasted 2.2 innings allowing 3 runs (2 earned). Matt Spade followed up by retiring 4 batters, 3 by strikeout.
- Thomas Eager finished the game with a very nice 5 inning, 4 hit, 1 walk, 4 K performance.
Filed under: Daily Farm Reports
erik
azruavatar
fewgoodcards
roarke49
Did Rasmus go 4-4 or 2-4?
Sorry, I see what confused me now. I mistook the system going 4-4 as Rasmus going 4-4.
Mortensen must have been missing up in the zone- he had twice as many fly outs as ground outs.
Whats goin on with Shane Robinson? High babip but insane ld% at the same time.. Is it a fluke?
Shane Robinson is now one of my favorite players. I caught Springfield the other night when they came through NW Arkansas and I was commenting on how Sugar Shane was the smallest human I’d ever seen in the batter’s box. I was kind of amazed and in the back of my mind I was saying to myself “he’ll never make it in the show, they’ll knock the bat out of his hands every time. Right in the middle of a snide remark Shane screamed a foul ball just over our heads, then on the next pitch promptly laced a double. He ended up going 3 for 4 and by the end of the game I was like “See you guys, I always knew Shane was going to be special.”
Dump Flores - he of the 0.00 ERA? and .208 BAA? So we can “try someone out”? Whatever.
Really carioca? ERA is the justification you’re going to use here — do we need to have the discussion of how bad that metric is. Last night was a great example of that if you watched the game. Not to mention the .208 BAA is pretty misleading when opponents have a .355 on base percentage against.
How about his 1:1 K:BB ratio or the fact that he’s allowing almost 2 baserunners an inning. Or better yet we can remember that he’s been very poor over 90 innings for 2006-2007 rather than his decent showing in 6 innings of 2008 because the former is far more representative than the latter.
At the start of this season I thought Flores had his old slider back but that’s gone again. He’s not a good pitcher.
Calm down Killer, let’s not turn this into one of “those” sites.
Anybody notice D’Marcus Ingram threw out *two* baserunners–one at home and another at third. Gotta like that.
Which Flores brother will be the first to allow a run in 2008?
With Ankiel & Schumaker’s OPS’s both hovering around .800 (OK, but not really “good” for a starting MLB outfielder), I wonder how hot for how long Rasmus needs to be before he gets the callup….
http://www.news-leader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080429/SPORTS02/804290371
I thought this was an interesting article, especially in light of yesterdays conversation about the number of pitches Garcia has been pitching.
Kozma better keep his bags packed, I see a trip to Palm Beach in his near-term future.
ingram did have two outfield assists, but you have to give jose garcia and pete kozma some credit for those as both were relay throws.
i think we might now know why garcia was left in so long, apparently dyar miller wants to stretch the pitchers at springfield and memphis out to 120 pitches per game.
http://news-leader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080429/SPORTS02/804290371/1002/SPORTS
he…uh…wha?!?! I don’t think Luhnow will allow that. I may have to ask him about that.
Why isn’t Mather playing 1st base for Memphis? You already have Marti, Haerther, and Stavinoha in the corner OF spots. DUMP PHELPS NOW!
No mention of Tyler Greene’s HR? I think that was his first hit in about 3 weeks.
Salt Lake was 21-1 before their loss to Memphis last night.
What do you all think the Cardinals do with Garcia for the 2009 season? Bring him along as a starter or a reliever ala Wainwright/McClellan, assuming he makes the 25-man roster.
shaneo69:
My guess would be that Mather has a better shot at playing a corner OF spot in the majors than any of the three guys you mentioned and has almost no shot of playing 1B in the majors (for the Cardinals, at least), so they want him to get experience out there now.
I’m thinking there will be a few openings in both. The only guarantees you have for 2009 are Carpenter, Wainwright, and likely Pineiro because I doubt Mo will jettison him out of town even though I’d like for him to be. The bullpen should have a few openings as well with Izzy, Springer, Villone, etc.gone (and Franklin too if I’d have any say).
I’d like to see Mortensen and Garcia both fill out the rotation, and let Worrel, Motte, and Perez fill out the bullpen.
Will McClellan be converted back to a starter? Has anyone heard anything from the coaches or front office about his future?
Drop villone if anything. Flores is a lefty specialist but LaRuncan continues to use him to face righties. Keep flores around until we at least know if Tyler Johnson will be able to pitch again (and considering our medical team is looking at him, thats a slim possibility.)
Swirls — I think it’s too early to pencil either Garcia or Mortensen in for 2009. They’re going to need some time at AAA most likely.
cdb - who knows with the Cards. He’s got the pitches to be a starter but the real quesiton is whether his arm holds up through the season.
bwit - check out Flores’ splits for 2005-2007, they aren’t pretty. He’s not much of a specialist and Villone has been considerably better over that time period. Until Flores finds that slider again, he’s a fringe major leaguer.
LHB vs. Villone - .608 OPS
LHB vs. Flores - .701 OPS
Check out what Randy Flores’ little brother has done to MLB lefty hitters: a career sub-.300 slugging % if memory serves. (Small sample size disclaimer implied.)
Free Ron Flores!
I seriously doubt the Cardinals want only one left-hander in the bullpen. Flores and Villone aren’t going anywhere, until Johnson gets back at least.