Game Thread, Las Vegas at Tacoma
Dave · July 20, 2006 at 5:57 pm · Filed Under Mariners
The Las Vegas 51s bring their prospect-a-thon to Tacoma to face suddenly effective Cha Baek. Baek has a 3.02 ERA, but he’s basically become the Triple-A version of Jamie Moyer at this point – crafty enough to let guys get themselves out through very little skill of his own. Beats last year’s Cha Baek, though.
But seriously, this Las Vegas line-up is crazy: James Loney, Matt Kemp, Andy LaRoche, and Joel Guzman are all future major leaguers, and Delwyn Young might be. Should be a fun test for Baek.
As always, you can catch the greatness of commentary that is Mike Curto streaming live online.
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Dave:
Have any thoughts on why the Rainiers have been platooning Snelling? I’ve looked for his past numbers, but it’s my strong impression that he historically doesn’t have much of a platoon split. Is this a strategy that could be harmful to his major league prospects? (Seems to me they did the same thing with Reed  decided he was a platoon player because he fit some pre-cast image of one, rather than basing such an assessment on his actual record.)
Hello?
Brundage had Doyle in San Antonio, right? so he should know him, and what he can do….
Snelling’s never had problems hitting lefties. I can understand the desire to give him periodic days off, but I echo Jim’s concerns that he’s going to get labeled as a platoon player with no reason.
I think there was a lot more basis for platooning Reed, and I disagreed with that decision.
And then there’s Wilson Valdez, who is NOT a future major-leaguer. Or even a past one.
Snelling is not being platooned. Where did this idea come from? He’s played 6 of 7 games since the break, all in the OF. He’s hitting .304 vs. LHP.
He’s sat quite a bit all season since he came back … arbitrarily, as far as I can tell.
Choo! Way to shake off being dissed by Hargrove.
I thought Matt Kemp was tearing it up in LA (?). Whats he doing back in Las Vegas?
I thought that Snelling’s playing time has been dictated by the Mariners doctors.
Okay, if his off days have been arbitrary and not based on the side of the mound the pitches are coming from, I can live with that.
I just have this dream of the M’s finally realizing Snelling’s capable of playing in the bigs. Against everybody.
I can’t usually listen to games at work, so I go by minorleaguebaseball.com. And by that measure, it seems like he’s sat against a number of lefty pitchers.
Snelling’s not being platooned. He was on a pretty strict play-two-sit-one regimen after he returned, but that’s mellowed a bit. They still rest him occassionally, but there’s no platoon.
Thanks Dave.
Thanks. Now that I’m going back through minorleaguebaseball.com game reports, I’m seeing he’s sat against about as many righties.
and Curto just told us about the cycle the catchers are on, swapping off their catching & DH days, so they must have to fit Doyle’s rest days in there, somehow, too
Funny they couldn’t make room for Quiroz in that rotation … for the crime of hitting .300 with power, he was shipped out to San Antonio.
Damn. How does Baek do it?
Hey look it’s our old friend Wilson Valdez.
Great story about the kid playing for the aquasox (I thought he was Dutch, not Australian, or am I confusing him with someone else?)
Man, this is like the first game against the Yankees — except the Rainiers are actually scoring on the 51′s errors.
God, they’re murdering them.
While we’re on the minor league prospect topic, I went to the Aquasox game last night.
Centerfielder Greg Halman looks like a real stud in the making. He homered his first two trips to the plate, the third time up, he was thrown a brushback pitch and then plunked. Starred down the pitcher, walked out to the mound a little bit, benches emptied but nothing happened. Can’t really blame the guy.
He also doubled, walked, and made his only out on the hardest hit ball all night, one that had eyes for the left field corner that was snared by the third basemen.
He’s a player.
You’ve gotta like Choo … he really does his job, within his limitations. You have to think that if he had had Carl Everett’s job all year, he might have hit .270/.350/.490. Maybe 10 HRs, with 10-15 stolen bases, and the ability to play left once in a while.
Doyle out twice in this inning.
that’s our boy, never does anything the standard way…
#23: that was the story I was referring to. Apparently the pitcher got ejected, so something happened. And Halman is a teenager (one can imagine that converstation– pitcher: you trying to show me up? Halman: Nope, just showing I belong in double-A)
Of course it’s not that unusual to look like a worldbeater in your first few at-bats (or look like a total loser either, naturally). And it’s not like he’s facing dominant, MLB-ready pitching. We’ll see how he develops. Hell of a start, though.
Jim, you really think Choo would slug .490 in the bigs right now?
I think that in the upper limit of his ability, yes. He’s got fair extra-base-hit power, with 36 of his 116 hits going for extra bases (20 doubles, 3 triples, 13 HRs) and I think his bat may be nearly as well-suited to Safeco’s alleys as Raul Ibanez’s is.
Remember its AAA pitching and if you have seen any games in tacoma it isnt very good pitching!
That’s only 31%. If he’s going to slug .490 he going to hit for a lot better average than .270. There’s no way kid is going to have an ISO of .220, that’s almost better than C-Rex and Sexson’s BA.
Did anyone see that Luis Gonzalez got in the game, our former rule 5 guy. To be honest I’d rather have him right now than Woods, although his numbers are pretty poor in AAA.
Yeah, 31% XBH really isn’t very good, especially for a corner OF. You’d like that to be up around 40%.
Especially in the PCL.
Choo’s a .430-.450 SLG guy. It’s part of the reason he’ll never make it as a major league regular.
So Curto just dubbed Bavasi’s philosophy “push up the prospects.” Works for me (the name, I’m still reserving judgement on the philosophy).
Is Atchison going to be September call-up material? Baek, even?
So much for the shutout.
Nice win for the Rainiers and for Baek. Seriously, this is a damned impressive run for Cha Seung, lowering his ERA to basically 3 even in the PCL and going 7 shutout against the best line-up in the conference. He’s gone 7IP with 1H and 0R against Portland (another fairly tough line-up), been solid in Las Vegas, and given the Rainiers a heck of a lot of consistency, ALL while his BB/K is pretty bleh. It’s amazing, but it sure is welcome.
At this rate, he’s got to get a ‘congrats’ promotion in September; he’s done everything the Rainiers have asked. It still looks like smoke and mirrors, but man, it’s been going on for quite a while now.
Is sustained smoke-and-mirrors still smoke-and-mirrors, or at some point does it represent real improvement?
That’s the question, isn’t it Jim?
The Rainiers had two guys metaphorically asking that question, and have received two different answers. Cesar Jimenez got torched (although he was unlucky) in that TV game against Portland, and then got beat up again in his next start. Meanwhile, Baek has kept it going.
Jimenez’ run was more impressive – allowing 1R in 38IP – but it really seems to be over. Emphatically.
And that’s the deal with these pitch-to-contact guys; it’s tough to tell when someone’s made a developmental leap as opposed to just getting lucky. I keep thinking that Baek cutting down on his HRs is a key to this, but every time I see him, he’s getting outs on the tacoma warning track that would’ve been way, way out of most PCL parks (or Seattle). Of course, he then goes on the road to some place like Las Vegas and gets the same deep fly outs. Weird. But cool.
Just got back from the game. A few things to note.
Choo made a really great catch against the fence in center. Surprisingly good.
Dan Rohn was down watching the game, sitting with the scouts.
And for all those folks who hate the aggressive baserunning…you people would adore Dave Brundage, who won’t send guys even when they’ll clearly score. (Yesterday he tried a squeeze play, and I thought I would die of shock). Tonight, Bryan Lahair, rounded third, and Brundage did one of those Dave Myers moves (go, stop, go) and it was sort of an ugly get-back-to-third-without-injury moments for Lahair. But all worked out as he scored on the next batter. Still, I don’t know what he did in San Antonio as far as baserunning, but it’s a night/day difference in that regard between he and Dan Rohn.
#41, it seems one thing people forget with Dan Rohn is from all indications he’s as much a proponent of aggressive baserunning as Hargrove is this season. So while replacing Hargrove with Rohn might give us improvements for lineup and bullpen management (might), it almost certainly wouldn’t change the way the Mariners seem to run themselves out of innings occasionally.
As for Baek, impressive game and it looks like he induced a ton of groundballs today (11 groundballs today). I’ve never heard Baek described as a groundball pitcher, but it seems like he’s had a few games during this run where he’s induced a ton. Is there some trend here due to some improvement or has Baek just gotten some luck?
Was at the game tonight as well. Looked like Choo took a horrible route to that great catch in center but the winds are also very strong in Tacoma tonight. He adjusted on the fly very well!
Was there yesterday afternoon also, terrible bunt on that squeeze play!
Baek pitched well tonight and pushed through being tired his last inning of work.
Personally, I do think Baek has turned some kind of corner. He’s been very solid this year. I suck at recognizing mechanics or even pitch types, but he just looks different out there than years prior. I don’t know whether it’s mechanics or confidence or maybe a little of both.
God yeah, that bunt (by Ismael Castro) was horrible. Poor Rob Johnson was what, 5 feet from home when he had to try to get up and run back to 3rd. I just sat in shock and disbelief that Brundage had tried something, anything, so daring. That’s so not like him.
curious to see what’s going to happen on the next homestand. Petagine is reporting to the Tacoma club on Saturday, and I wonder what that’ll do to Lahair’s playing time, which then, what, in turn bumps Rob Johnson into playing more games in the outfield just to get some AB’s? And I’ve got a sneaking suspicion Balentien is coming up. We’re short outfielders, and he’s been tearing it up – but if that happens, it almost seems crowded. If it were both he and Petagine, then you’re trying to get Choo some experience in center, and you end up with only 1 outfield spot to rotate between Snelling and Nelson, and Johnson when Clement is catching and somebody else is at DH. We’ll see, I just think something is going to happen before the next homestand.
and in related news. headline story in the tnt says the rainiers have finally been sold, but that they’ll stay in tacoma (at least for another 2 years).
They’re short outfielders and infielders
Any news on Bohn, Brown or Nomar_2.0? Thought I heard Bohn & Garciaparra are in Arizona taking cuts.
LaHair’s been hitting solid, now just needs find (develop?) a power stroke. 1 home run in just over 100 at bats.]
Yea for staying in Tacoma!
Tacoma Rainiers Sold! To an out-of-town ownership group!
Except they won’t be moving the team…
http://www.thenewstribune.com/sports/story/5969259p-5249160c.html
In the same article, you can also learn that the franchise was once affiliated with the Yankees, and called the Tacoma Yankees, for a year in 1978.
Tacoma Rainiers Sold! To an out-of-town ownership group!
Luckily for us, Oklahoma City already has the Redhawks.
So what sort of new staium are the new owners asking for? A 40,000 seat retractable dome with a view of Commencement Bay?
“Any news on Bohn, Brown or Nomar_2.0?”
They’ve been in Peoria, playing with the new draftees and working through injuries. Garciaparra’s been tearing it up (as he should, really), while Bohn’s been so-so (though it’s all in like 10-15 ABs or something).
“So what sort of new staium are the new owners asking for?”
It’s not just the new owners. PCL President Branch Rickey’s said Tacoma needs a new stadium for years. Everyone loves those downtown jobs like they’ve got in Memphis or Nashville or wherever, but I just don’t know where they’d put it in tacoma. It’s weird, but if they’d wanted the stadium to anchor downtown, they could’ve bought some land cheap 10 years ago. Now, they’ve gotta fight 10000 new condos and high-end apartments. I think everyone’s focusing on improving the existing stadium, which may be less than ideal, but hey: the team is actually profitable. They’ve got a shoestring operation to go with their poor revenue, and they make it work.
yup, it’s been a topic of discussion for a decade, at least, especially as the roof really isn;t all that code in an earthquake anymore…. this was a proposal back in ’99:
“In the Cheney Stadium Development Study, the DLR Group architects envision an $18 million renovation that would leave much of the seating bowl in place but surround it with a three-story brick-and-concrete structure housing new concession stands, restrooms, offices, locker rooms, a press box and a row of about 16 suites.
The plan has the enthusiastic backing of Mike Combs, Tacoma’s director of public assembly facilities.
“Triple-A baseball has been in Tacoma for over 40 years,” Combs said. “But if you don’t maintain your facilities you diminish their chances of being successful. Cheney Stadium is a beautiful stadium … there’s not a bad seat in the house. But it needs so many upgrades.”
I love Cheney Stadum. Well, not the concessions or restroom areas. and the player and press facilities definitely need upgrading.
But there’s no place in downtown Tacoma that you’d be able to find a site large enough to accomodate parking and stuff like Cheney has, and if you did, what happens to the every-Friday fireworks?
Also, I’m unconvinced that adding suites and luxury boxes would be a good idea. I’ve been meaning to do some research on this for a while now, but I’m thinking proximity of AAA to major league club, especially if they’re affiliated, lowers attendance at AAA park. And Tacoma isn’t exactly brimming with businesses that would fork over for suites to entertain their clients at Cheney instead of heading to much more glamorous Safeco.