Future Redbirds

Happy Mother’s day. Sorry for the delayed post, WordPress had some maintenance issues last night.

Moves confirmed: Isaias Garcia and Steve Hill were sent to AA, Luke Gorsett, Josh Dew and AJ Van Slyke are on their way down to Palm Beach.

How’s Trey Hearne been doing in Mexico? Well, tonight he threw 7 innings of one hit ball. He struck out 8 and walked 4. In 41 innings, he has 43 K’s and is yet to allow a HR. He has a 3.29 ERA and allowed 28 hits. Uncharacteristically, he’s walked 24 (5.27 per 9 innings). So what does that mean? They say the Mexican League is a AAA league, but my understanding is the competition is more like somewhere between A+ and AA. Clay Davenport included the Mexican League in his translations, Hearne’s translated Peripheral ERA is 3.22, for whatever it may be worth.

The farm bounces back tonight, going 3 for 4.

Memphis 7, Tucson 2

• In one of the more inspiring stories of this early baseball season, the Memphis Redbirds went up against cancer survivor Doug Davis, who just had surgery April 10th.
• PJ Walters allowed 7 hits over 6.1 innings. His only run came on a solo HR. He struck out 3, walked 1 and had 2 WP. 12 of his outs came via the groundout. While that’s a nice line by Walters, but the 1.5 HR per 9 between AA and AAA is troublesome.
• Colby Rasmus went 1 for 4 with a walk. No K’s. Hurray.
• Brian Barden went 4 for 5 with 2 triples and a SB. I know Aaron Miles has his fanclub for whatever reasons, but I’d like to see a utility infielder who can actually play three positions get a chance someday.
• Jarrett Hoffpauir homered.
• Nick Stavinoha went 2 for 5 with 2 doubles. He’s now hitting .368/.402/.547 in 117 at bats.
• Jason Motte allowed a hit and struck out a batter in his lone inning of work.
• Mark Worrell allowed his inherited runner to score but also stranded the bases loaded, walking one and striking out one.

Springfield 2, NW Arkansas 10

• Too much, too soon for Adam Ottavino. He probably is not ready to come off the DL judging by his night. He allowed 5 runs on 6 hits over 2.1 innings. He was charged with only 2 earned runs thanks to three errors from his defense. He walked 1, struck out 2 and one of the hits was a HR against former S Card Juan Richardson.
• I’d mention the numbers about the bullpen, but I’ve really had it with talking about crummy bullpens for one week.
• Steve Hill, meet AA. AA, meat Steve Hill. He homered in his debut, but also struck out twice and was dinged with an error for a missed a catch.
• Shane Robinson and Mark Shorey both went 2 for 4. Robinson is now hitting .434. One of Shorey’s hits was a double.

Palm Beach 9, Dunedin 2

• Daniel Descalso walked, doubled, homered, scored 2 runs and was part of three double plays.
• Daryl Jones hit 2 doubles in 3 at bats and drew a walk. I’m excited because he’s still just 20 years old and is hitting .323/.406/.462; by far the best he’s ever hit in his pro career. Despite all that, these stats stick out like a sore thumb: A .458 BABIP, and a 30% strike out rate.
• Arnoldi Cruz is slowly but surely coming around. He went 2 for 5 with 2 doubles, and is batting .310/.310/.500 in the month of May.
• Brandon Buckman went 2 for 5.
• Nathan Southard went 2 for 4.
• David Kopp was on the beat tonight. He really handcuffed the Jays tonight. He put Jays hitters on lockdown. How many other stupid cop puns can I think up here? He struck out 5 over 5 innings, allowing no runs on 4 hits, a walk and a HBP.
• Kyle Mura lasted only 1.1 innings, allowed 2 runs on 4 hits with 2 K’s.
• Fransisco Samuel threw a hitless inning, striking out 1 and walking 1.

Quad Cities 4, Kane County 1

• Pete Kozma snaps his mini-slump, going 1 for 3 with a BB.
• Jose Garcia went 2 for 4.
• Charlie Kingrey, Andrew Brown and Domnit Bolivar all doubled for their only hits.
• Former draft and follow Mark Diapoules allowed no runs on 4 hits and a walk, striking out 3 and inducing 10 groundball outs. He’s allowed just 2 ER on 18 innings, with 17 K’s and a groundout to flyout ratio of 2.5. Pretty impressive so far. Digging around a bit, all I could find on him is a scouting report of him during his junior year in high school at PG Crosschecker. They said “Mark
  Diapoules is a 2006 RHP from Martin County HS in Palm City, FL, with a 6′3″, 190 lb. frame. Strong body, high 3/4 arm slot, nice and easy armaction, heavy fastball, late run and sink, good mechanics, short arm on back side, hard and tight SL at 77 mph, works quickly with good tempo,induces many groundballs, good stuff, great upside, good student as well.”
• His fellow DFE Nicholas Additon went 3.1 innings, allowed 3 hits, 3 walks and struck out three. He allowed the Kane County’s only run.
• Pete Parise picked up the save, getting the last 2 outs.