7/03/19 spare change

[texasdave]

It's nice to see Louisville picking up some wins, 3 out 4. It's a start. Some transaction news: Rob Refsnyder has been activated from the IL. Scott Schebler has been been put on it. Louisville pitchers have issued just 6 walks during this 4-game stretch.

Keury Mella (5.09) will the game off for the Bats. Mella is striking out less, and walking more in 2019. Time to start thinking bullpen with Keury. He has been bitten hard by longballitis this season. In the International League, he is not alone. His home run rate is over double his career rate, from .068 to 1.45 per 9 innings.

For qualified hitters in the I.L. last season, the OPS leader stood at .870. That same number would not rank in the top 20 this year. Last year 4 hitters topped the .300 mark in average. To this point in 2019, 12 hitters are bettering .300. Last year, as a team, Indianapolis led the league in OPS at .753. In 2019, Indy has that same OPS, but is ahead of only team. Yep, the ball is juiced.


Third of July Fireworks tonight! The advertisement says that it will be an 'Extravaganza'. Who doesn't love that word? The word first appeared in the Italian language in 1754. It referred to peculiar behavior. By 1794, they had polished the word up, and it meant a fantastic type of performance or writing. Quite the upgrade. Its meaning has not changed much over the years.

[texasdave]

Chattanooga has reversed its fortune with a 2-game winning streak. Ibandel Isabel 'slammed' the door on any potential Jumbo Shrimp comeback. Incidentally, that is Isabel's third grand slam in 2019. FYI, I don't like coconut shrimp. How did that ever get to be popular? Refocus. Tyler Jay is back on active status. To make room, Victor Payano was released.

Ryan Lillie is the man in charge on the mound today. Lillie will be making just his second start for the Lookouts. He went 5.1 scoreless innings in his first start. Lillie has not been pitching all that long; he caught in high school. He features a mid-90s fastball, and a solid slider. Long-term, Ryan is most likely to evolve into a late-inning reliever. That's my uneducated guess.

Taylor Trammell is OPSing a hefty .918 since coming off of the IL. Last night he cracked his first home run since May 26.

Over his last 32 games, Alfredo Rodriguez has failed to hit safely in exactly 2 of them. Rodriguez has been like a metronome at the plate. Very consistent.

Ibandel Isabel is leading the Southern League in home runs, runs batted in and strike outs. Isabel is well on his way to winning the Double Crown.

[texasdave]

Daytona got routed 9-2 last night. Not much good to report from that game. Shake it off. One more game left on this homestand, before the Tortugas embark on an 8-game road adventure. Dylan Harris is on the shelf.

Wendolyn Bautista (4.60) will take the ball today, and try to erase memories from his last time out. His 30/7 K/BB is fine. The rest of the numbers not so much.

Andy Sugilio upped his hit string to 8 in a row last night. Two years ago in Billings, he batted .345. Good times. Maybe it's coming back. Sugilio was born on October 26, 1996. What does that mean? He is a Scorpio. Scorpios like fast balls up and in. He has been alive for nearly 12,000,000. Telling him to wait a minute does not mean a thing to him. His birthstone is Opal. "Opal" gets it's origins from the Greek word "Opallios", which means "To see change in color". The reason for this being that the opal comes in a wide variety of colors, ranging the entire spectrum. 95% of which come from Australia, after seasonal rains drench the outback and carry silica deposits underground, where they go on to harden in the dry season. Leaving deposits of the beautiful stone. Are we gonna have a quiz on this stuff? Things that happened on October 26, The Erie Canal opened. Telegraph service was inaugurated in the U.S., numbering the days of the Pony Express. The Shootout at the Ok Corral took place. US savings bonds first went on sale. The first transatlantic air service took place. Thanks, PanAm! Doonesbury comic strip began. Baby Fae gets a baboon heart transplant. She would live for 21 days. And so much more. As far as dates go, B-.

Come enjoy the biggest fireworks show in Central Florida on July 3rd presented by Wawa! In addition, the first 1,000 fans in attendance will receive a patriotic Red Wawa t-shirt!

[JaxRed]

Chattanooga has reversed its fortune with a 2-game winning streak. Ibandel Isabel 'slammed' the door on any potential Jumbo Shrimp comeback. Incidentally, that is Isabel's third grand slam in 2019. FYI, I don't like coconut shrimp. How did that ever get to be popular? Refocus. Tyler Jay is back on active status. To make room, Victor Payano was released.

Ryan Lillie is the man in charge on the mound today. Lillie will be making just his second start for the Lookouts. He went 5.1 scoreless innings in his first start. Lillie has not been pitching all that long; he caught in high school. He features a mid-90s fastball, and a solid slider. Long-term, Ryan is most likely to evolve into a late-inning reliever. That's my uneducated guess.

Taylor Trammell is OPSing a hefty .918 since coming off of the IL. Last night he cracked his first home run since May 26.

Over his last 32 games, Alfredo Rodriguez has failed to hit safely in exactly 2 of them. Rodriguez has been like a metronome at the plate. Very consistent.

Ibandel Isabel is leading the Southern League in home runs, runs batted in and strike outs. Isabel is well on his way to winning the Double Crown.

Will be scouting/attending this game......

[texasdave]

Dayton has been having a lot of trouble scoring runs lately, being held to 2 runs or less in 5 of their past 8 games. Last night they got zero. Tonight's game is the second of their mini-homestand. They go on the road to face these same Hot Rods for 2 games. And then it is back home for 9 games.

Ricky Salinas drags his 3.65 ERA to the mound. Salinas calls Houston, Texas home, along with about a gazillion other folks. We all have our crosses to bear. I don't think people realize how big Houston is area wise. The city proper area of Houston is listed at 637 square miles. To put that into perspective, the city proper area of Cincinnati is 75 square miles. So, roughly 9 Cincinnati-sized cities could fit into Houston. If we wanted to include the entire Metropolitan area - forget about it. Houston has 3 loops encircling it. The first is Loop 610. It is roughly 40 miles in length. The second is Beltway 8 which is roughly 88 miles. The third loop is the recently-completed Grand Parkway, the longest beltway in the U.S. at 193 or so miles. A fourth loop is already in the planning stages. Perspective once again: I-275 is 83.7 miles long. Enough about that.

Connor Bennett has finished 27 of the 30 games in which he has appeared. He has earned saves in 10 of them. In 36.1 innings, he has given up a lone home run. His K/9 is 14.1.

Brian Rey seems to have changed his hitting philosophy this season. Last year, he homered twice in 171 at-bats. This season, it is 6 homers in 135 at-bats. His OBP is down (.347/.313), but his SLG is way up (.345/.481).

[JaxRed]

Jacksonville is the largest city by Sq Miles in the US at 874. But we had to cheat a bit to do that. The county and city merged so the entire county is Jacksonville.

[texasdave]

Billings completed a 2-game sweep of Great Falls. They next take on Great Falls in a 3-game set. Huh? They are playing Great Falls 5 straight, 2 at home, 3 on the road. To me, they would have to win all 5 to say it was a sweep. In any case, they have won 3-straight. That's good news. And the have pushed Great Falls into the cellar. More good news.

Ricky Karcher works for the Mustangs tonight. Karcher has given up just 5 hits, while striking out 14 in 9.1 innings. Unfortunately, he has also walked 9 over that same span. It all adds up to a 5.79 ERA.

Miguel Medrano has excellent numbers across the board. Medrano, 21, is taking no Pioneer League prisoners in 2019. 18.0 IP, 20K/3BB, 9 H, 0 HR, 3 ER, 0.67 WHIP, 1.50 ERA. In 3 of his 4 starts, Medrano has gone at least 4 innings, while surrendering just 1 hit.

Edwin Yon had a .900 BABIP over his last 6 games. It went up after last night. He is on a 7-game hitting streak.

Reniel Ozuna has 3 consecutive multi-hit games to his credit.

Matt LLoyd recently joined the team. He has hit safely in all 4 games in which he has appeared. He has already jacked 3 home runs. He is from Toronto, Canada, and went to Indiana.

- - - Updated - - -

Jacksonville is the largest city by Sq Miles in the US at 874. But we had to cheat a bit to do that. The county and city merged so the entire county is Jacksonville.

The shame must be unbearable.

[texasdave]

Greeneville is spinning out of control, losers of 5 straight. I don't mean to pick on anyone, but Greeneville manager, Gookie Dawkins, played in parts of 4 major league seasons. Okay, small parts. His lifetime big league line is this: .163/.241/.204/445. Reds' management thought it might be a good idea to hire him to be a hitting coach. That, to me, is a headscratcher.

JC Keys will make his second seasonal start for Greeneville. His ERA of 4.91 is one of the better ones on the team.

Tyler Garbee has done a remarkable job out of the pen. He is unscored upon in 2019 (9.2 IP).

Danny Lantigua has struck out 28 times in 46 at-bats (61%). Yikes!

Justin Gomez has completed his seasonal cycle in just 16 at-bats. He has 4 hits, a single, double, triple and home run.

[texasdave]

AZL Reds sandblasted some poor team last night, 8-0. They are no longer in last place in their division. Bad Trivia: The AZL Reds have given up 12 or more runs in 6 of their 8 losses this season. That makes their shutout all the more remarkable.

Someone will start for them tonight. But whom that will be is still a mystery.

Rylan Thomas started a rehab assignment last night. He made his way to the plate twice and went hitless. He did draw a walk.

Jefferson Lopez's status changed from Active to Temporary Inactive.

Ruben Nunez has faced 33 batters in 2019, 23 of which did not need to bother bringing a bat. He has 12 Ks and 11 BBs.

Caleb Van Blake is in the zone, 11 for 19 (.579). Each of his last four games have been of the multi-hit variety.

[texasdave]

The DSL-Reds vanquish another foe, this one 8-4. The win lifts their record to 18-10. They trailed heading into the bottom of the 8th, until they crossed the plate five times.

On the pitching side, all you have to know is Gabriel went 5 innings and faced the minimum 15 batters. He fanned 4, and, generally speaking, was the man.

Jose Acosta walked and homered (1). His batting average sits at an even .400.
Darlin Guzman smacked his 10th double of the season. That leaves him 2nd in the league in that category.
Junior Melo singled and doubled.
Elly De La Cruz also singled and doubled.
Esmil Torres singled, walked and stole a base (5).

[texasdave]

Minor League Player of the Month for the Southern League:

Chattanooga Lookouts (Reds) infielder Mitch Nay led the Southern League in RBI (29) and total bases (61), was second in runs scored (19) and hits (37) and finished fifth in batting average (.356), slugging percentage (.587) and OPS (.985). He posted 13 multi-hit games and hit safely in 21 of 27 games. Nay, 25, was originally selected by Toronto in the first round of the 2012 First-Year Player Draft out of Hamilton High School in Chandler, Arizona.

[M2]

Come enjoy the biggest fireworks show in Central Florida on July 3rd presented by Wawa! In addition, the first 1,000 fans in attendance will receive a patriotic Red Wawa t-shirt!

The greatness of Wawa cannot be overstated. Someday Wawa will be all, and we will be glad for it.

[texasdave]

Nick Lodolo article:

"As a pitching coaching, I'm going to look at some of the top pitchers coming into the Draft," Ebert said. "We were really fortunate to land him. From what I've seen -- he's only thrown [three] starts here and a couple bullpens -- between the work ethic, his aptitude to take in formation and apply it on the mound, the sky's the limit."

https://www.milb.com/milb/news/cinci...gs/c-308685734

[JaxRed]

Jefferson Lopez's status changed from Active to Temporary Inactive.

Getting ready for power nap. Please change my status to Temporary Inactive.

[texasdave]

Interesting factoid: Louisville has played Indianapolis 17 times this season. Each team has scored 73 runs in the series. Indianapolis is 11-6 in those 17 games.