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Cinderella Wins the World Series
Cinderella just won the College World Series. In an impressive showing, the Fresno State Bulldogs have won the National Championship. Yes, a Bulldogs team that was ranked 89th in RPI! Fresno State has been the underdogs throughout the NCAA playoffs and never stopped, even when faced with elimination multiple times they’ve stepped up.
Justin Wilson’s effort in the game was outstanding. The lefty was making every Georgia Bulldog left-handed hitter look ugly. None of the team’s left-handers had decent swings against him. When approached after the 7th inning by the coach, he refused to be taken out, even after over 110 pitches.
Then there’s Tommy Mendonca. The third-bagger was absolutely amazing during the series with the bat. Although he had some ugly swings against the left-handed Georgia starter, he was an absolute vacuum on defense. Even with four dislocated fingers in his throwing hand, he was stellar at the hot corner.
But the story of the game definitely has to be Sean Detwiler. The hustling right fielder has been playing with a complete tear in a tendon of his glove hand for the past seven weeks. Yet he was on fire during the finals of the CWS. He had three homers, including two in the final game. But it didn’t stop there, he also had a double and a single. He was absolutely amazing, accounting for all six of the Fresno State runs on the night.
Congrats, Cinderella, you were amazing and you deserved it.
Rookies to Look For: Chris Lambert
Heading into this season, the Detroit Tigers’ starting rotation looked pretty formidable. But age, ineffectiveness, and injuries have ripped the rotation apart. The Tigers have lately tried some young pitching like Armando Galaraga out as replacements. The next pitcher that the Tigers may try could be Chris Lambert.
Chris was a first round selection of the St. Louis Cardinals in 2004. He went on to put up pretty decent numbers in the minors until he moved up to Double-A, when he carried a 6.35 ERA in 18 starts for Springfield. In 2007 the Cardinals switched Lambert to relief and he didn’t fare to well, getting knocked around to the tune of a 7.49 ERA for Triple-A Memphis. He was then traded to the Tigers for starter Mike Maroth.
When he was drafted, Chris touted a 92-94 mph fastball. But while in the minors, it only topped out in the high-80’s. Recently he’s recovered some of the speed on his fastball, but he still isn’t hitting 94 like he once could. His command has been a problem as well.
He does have a couple of other offerings though that are pretty decent when controlled. Chris sports a decent curveball and a plus changeup that can make him a good starter if he has a good feel for them.
If Chris makes some good strides in his control, he could be a decent bottom of the rotation starter, but he will likely end up in the pen. Chris may become a decent option out of the pen with some good tutelage.
“Where are we runnin’?”
After a brief look at the standings on ESPN.com today I couldn’t help but think of a Lenny Kravitz song.
There are some interesting things that I found out when I looked at the run differential column (runs scored minus runs allowed).First, the Cleveland Indians have a 35-41 record despite a +15 run differential. That’s 17 points higher than their rival Minnesota Twins, who by the way, sport a 40-36 record.
Probably the most noteable difference though is the Oakland A’s. Even though they sit in second place, five games back of the division leading LA Angels, their runs scored difference is +63. That figure is 49 points higher than the Angels and third in the American League, barely behind the Boston Red Sox.
In fact they have allowed the lease amount of runs in the majors (279) this season, with the next closest being the White Sox at 293.
Rookies to Look For: Jeff Niemann
Standing at 6’-9”, Jeff Niemann may look the most imposing of the Tampa Rays’ pitching prospects, but he is just one of many good looking hurlers in the Rays’ system. Taken with the fourth overall pick of the 2004 First-Year Player Draft, Niemann was expected to be a start pitcher for them in a short time. But injuries besieged the tall right-hander and his timetable was set back. He didn’t really put in a full season until last year for Double-A Montgomery.
The fact is, he was used and abuse in college and it didn’t really show up until he started pitching professionally. But now he has the stigma of being frail and prone to injury.
But that stigma doesn’t hide his 95 mph fastball. At his height it also makes it rather easy to put a good downward plane on the ball, and he does. He also has two decent breaking balls in his repertoire.
It is his changeup that may be the only thing holding him back from being a top tier starter at this point. He needs to refine the pitch a little more to be a truly dominating talent.
Once he does that, Niemann could be a number two or number three starter for the Rays in a short time.
Mariners Manager John McLaren Fired
In what has become a major shakedown of the Mariners organization, the team has released Manager John McLaren.
McLaren’s failure has somewhat been a
Former Padres and Cubs Manager Jim Riggleman steps in for the rest of the season. He hasn’t seen that much success in the majors, but a change was probably needed. Jim definately has his work cut out for him as it sounds like there’s not only performance issues with this team, but also some clubhouse problems.
Bill Bavasi Fired
Finally!
Darrin Beene wrote out all of Bavasi’s transactions. Many of them are of the obvious type. From Scott Spezio to the Horacio Ramirez transaction, they were not that pretty. Even the Adrian Beltre signing didn’t look that good. He had one truely great season in L.A. before signing with the Mariners. But it wasn’t just the signings and the bad trades, the Mariners didn’t really handle young talent that well (see Clement, Jeff)
The Mariners are likely to start cleaning and Richie Sexson will likely be packing his bags soon.
Assistant GM Lee Pelekoudas will take over on an interim basis and the Mariners have stated that he is a candidate for the permanent position. But lets face it, a team that spends money like the Mariners isn’t going to have a relative unknown face in the position. They are going to want either a veteran GM or an up and coming assistant GM that is rumored by many to be a good candidate for such a position.
Immediately rumors floated around about his possible replacement. MLBTR listed off numerous possibilities, including:
Tigers Assistant GM, Al Avila
Indians Assistant GM, Chris Antonetti
A’s Assistant GM, David Forst
Yankees GM, Brian Cashman
Padres GM, Brian Cashman
Former Reds GM, Wayne Krivsky
U.S.S. Mariner goes into depth on the whole situation and reviews possibly every candidate that the team will look into. They seem to be leaning towards the Mariners bringing Antonetti on board. There’s even a logo that looks like a presidential election pin.
Rookies to Look For: David Purcey
Toronto Blue Jays starter David Purcey is on the verge of joining an already talented Blue Jays rotation. The Jays already have perennial All-Star Roy Halladay, oft-injured but talented A.J. Burnett, future star Dustin McGowan, and control artist Shaun Marcum form an impressive top four. But Purcey may be joining them in a short time.
The 6-foot-5 left-hander from the University of Oklahoma has a 91-93 mph fastball with good movement, a plus curve, and a changeup that is in the works. After he was drafted (for a third time) in the first round of the 2004 draft, David pitched well in his first two seasons in the minors. But his peripheral stats were not that impressive.
But in 2006 and 2007 he struggled, putting an ERA well above 5.00 along the way. Much of his problem was rooted in his lack of control. In 2006 alone he had 82 walks in 142 innings. He was also pitching in the upper levels of the minors where it is tougher to be a starter with just two viable pitches.
But this season David has displayed the potential that he’s lacked. In 72-2/3 innings this season for Triple-A Syracuse, he’s posted a 2.41 ERA while keeping his walks down (24) and not giving up many hits (59). He’s also struck out 80, showing an ability to strike out more than a batter an inning at the upper levels. An article on The Batter’s Box discusses his control problems a little more and how the Blue Jays were working with his mechanics that could be the reasoning for this improvement.
If he’s truly improved his control and his changeup, Purcey could possibly be a number three starter in the majors. But it is more likely that he’ll be a fourth or fifth starter.
Over Spilled Milk: 2003 Draft
With the annual MLB draft coming up soon I felt it would be good to look back on a previous draft. Essentially, most of the players that will be regulars in the majors will be up within five years of when they are drafted. So I decided to do a review of the 2003 draft.
Reviewing every draft pick by each team would take forever and would consist of a large amount of, “….didn’t work out”, or “….is out of baseball”. So I’ll just review the picks of the first three rounds for each team and notables from each team’s later rounds.
Now we’ll look at how the National League teams drafted.
2008 Rule 4 Draft
With the first pick in the 2008 draft, the Tampa Bay Rays selected shortstop Tim Beckham. The Rays continued to stock up their already good farm system with more talent. Beckham has the best chance of the players in the draft to be a star.
There is some decent talent in this year’s draft, but not as good as what’s been available the past few years. But there’s a few players that could be very, very good.
There were a few steals. Justin Smoak fell all the way to the Texas Rangers at number 11. Also the Kansas City Royals took Tim Melville, a pitcher who many felt would go in the first round, with the 115th pick.
Also, the draft saw some head scratchers. The Astros took catcher Jason Castro with the 10th overall pick. Many experts had him going late in the first round. They passed up Justin Smoak and Jermile Weeks for him.
The Twins second pick, number 27 overall, was pitcher Carlos Guitierrez. Carlos was expected to go in the third round and end up a reliever.
It’ll be interesting to see how these picks turn out five years from now.
“Over Spilled Milk – 2003 Draft”
Over Spilled Milk is a new feature at Baseball Opinion where we will look back on previous drafts and trades to see how well the teams involved fared. Essentially, we will rehash issues like the Scott Kazmir trade to the Devil Rays that are still making Mets fans ‘cry over spilled milk’.
With the annual MLB draft coming up soon I felt it would be good to look back on a previous draft. Essentially, most of the players that will be regulars in the majors will be up within five years of when they are drafted. So I decided to do a review of the 2003 draft.
Reviewing every draft pick by each team would take forever and would consist of a large amount of, “….didn’t work out”, or “….is out of baseball”. So I’ll just review the picks of the first three rounds for each team and notables from each team’s later rounds.
First we’ll look at how the American League teams drafted.
