For those of us who care about such things, the first year player draft is next Tuesday. The Mariners first pick is 37th overall and then they will select 19th in rotation in each round after that. I’ll go ahead and post a preview next Monday with the names that I’m hearing and some possibilities for future Mariner farmhands. I’ll post an analysis Tuesday afternoon after the first day has been completed.
In somewhat related news, the Mariners top draft-and-follow candidate, RHP Brad Rose led Walters State into their regional playoffs and prevented the Mariners from having an opportunity to sign him before the deadline last night. Rose was the Mariners 37th round pick last summer but has a chance to go in the top ten rounds next week.
The Mariners did sign 6’5 outfielder Bryan LaHair, who was their 39th round pick, and have assigned him to Everett.
Minor League Highlights for Monday, May 26
Tacoma 5, Tucson 2. RHP Rafael Soriano showed why he’s the top pitcher in the system with a dominant outing (7 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 10 K) in which he carried a two-hit shutout into the 8th inning. According to Corey Brock of the News Tribune, Soriano’s fastball averaged 93 MPH was clocked as high as 96. SS Mickey Lopez, RF Kenny Kelly, 3B Luis Figueroa, LF Jalal Leach and C Julio Mosquera each had two hits including a double for Lopez, who also stole a base and scored thrice. Kelly added two steals, giving him nine on the year. RHP Aaron Taylor worked a perfect 9th (1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 2 K) for his 10th save.
El Paso 13, San Antonio 11. The Missions lost a slugfest Monday, though they made it close by scoring five runs in the top of the 9th. LHP Bobby Madritsch (4 1/3, 7 H, 5 R, 4 ER, 2 BB, 7 K) was rocked once again, but it was RHP Chris Wright (1 2/3 IP, 4 H, 6 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 1 K) who took the loss in relief. Wright recently lost his spot in the rotation to LHP Matt Thornton, who’s working his way back from Tommy John surgery a year ago. C Jim Horner led the offense with a 4-5 day which included two doubles, a homer, three runs scored and three RBIs. Horner is now hitting a ridiculous .407/.448/.570 on the season. DH John Lindsey added three hits while SS Luis Ugueto, 1B A.J. Zapp and LF Jaime Bubela each had a pair.
Inland Empire 9, Lake Elsinore 7. The 66ers fell behind 5-1 after two innings, but then exploded for seven runs in the bottom of the 4th to pick up the win. LHP Glenn Bott (4 2/3 IP, 7 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 1 K) got the victory in relief of RHP Juan Done, making his second one-inning start (2 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 2 BB, 1 K) since coming off the disabled list last week. C Luis Oliveros was the top offensive performer with four hits in four at-bats, though 3B Hunter Brown (HR), RF Cristian Guerrero (HR) and LF Shin-soo Choo (3B) provided the pop. After weeks in the lead-off spot, Choo hit 5th on Monday. RHP Mike Steele closed things out (1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 1 K) to pick up his 11th save.
Fort Wayne 10, Wisconsin 7. RHP T.A. Fulmer’s run of greatness came to a crashing halt, as he was knocked around and failed to escape a five-run 4th inning (3 1/3 IP, 8 H, 7 R, 6 ER, 1 BB, 2 K). The Timber Rattlers did manage to tie the game at seven with five runs of their own in the top of the 7th, but the bullpen allowed one in the 7th and two more in the 8th to snatch defeat from the jaws of (possible) victory. LF Dustin Delucchi had three hits for Wisconsin, and CF Gary Harris and 3B Matt Hagen each homered.
Useless Information Department: The farm system’s catchers combined to go 11-17 yesterday with four doubles, a homer, four runs scored and four RBIs, for a robust .647/.647/1.059 line.
A few weeks ago Dave mentioned LHP Ryan Ketchner, an M’s farmhand who was born deaf. I didn’t realize that the Mariners had another player, Tacoma 3B Luis Figueroa, who lost 90% of his hearing as a child following a very serious illness and fever which caused nerve damage. John McGrath of the Tacoma News Tribune wrote this feature on Figueroa in Sunday’s paper.
Series Preview: M’s at KC
Tue, 5:05p, RHP Garcia vs. LHP George
Wed, 1105a, LHP Moyer v LHP Affeldt
Maybe we’ll see Colbrunn play first on Wednesday — day game after a night game is traditionally a rest-the-regulars day, and they have to head out to Minnesota for the next series. Tuesday’s game could be uuugly, George’s 5-3 record conceals a 5.11 ERA, 8 HR and a runner-and-a-half per inning… he’s a left-handed Franklin. Aaaaaaaaaand then there’s injury candidate/head case Garcia to face off in this pitching duel. On Wednesday, Moyer missed KC in the last homestand, but I think he’ll carve the Royals up. Affeldt’s nothing special, so the M’s should get at least one out win out of this series.
The A’s reverse the M’s roadtrip, heading first to Minnesota for two and then KC for three. It’ll be interesting to watch Halama and see if he gets bumped from their rotation shortly — they’ve got some quality options sitting around and they’ve never been afraid to shake up the rotation when they felt thre was a need.
Some interesting Memorial Day notes:
The Mariners have a lower team ERA on the road (3.74) than they do at Safeco Field (3.96). Before you go assuming that Safeco’s reputation as a pitchers park is undeserved, remember that the M’s are scoring 4.74 runs per game at home with a team OPS of .749. When they leave Safeco, they are averaging 6.04 runs per game and have a team OPS of .843.
Hitters versus:
Joel Pineiro: .266/.347/.407, .753 OPS allowed (29th among 51 AL pitchers)
Freddy Garcia: .252/.332/.435, .767 OPS allowed (30th among 51 AL pitchers)
Somehow, people have managed to overlook the fact that Pineiro’s been consistently mediocre all year long. His BB rate is up, his K rate is down, and he’s pitching more like a #4 starter than a #1.
Kyle Lohse didn’t just look good against the Mariners on Saturday. He’s looking good against everyone. The AL is posting a .266 on base percentage against him. He’s turning every hitter he faces into Neifi Perez. Gil Meche isn’t the only young AL hurler enjoying a breakthrough season.
Edgar Martinez hasn’t had a multi hit game since the 16th of May. Over his last 8 games, he’s 5-29 with 1 extra base hit, 4 walks, and 7 strikeouts. He’s how hitting .276/.387/.434 at home, but he’ll become a terror on this road trip. His .347/.455/.708 numbers away from Safeco give light at the end of this tunnel.
Minor League Highlights for Sunday, May 25
Tacoma 5, Tucson 2. RHP Ken Cloude got his first win of the year with 5 innings of solid work. He gave up just 4 hits, 2 runs (1 earned), no walks, and 3 strikeouts. RHP J.J. Putz ran his scoreless innings streak to 10 with 3 innings of shutout baseball. Aside from his one hit batter, Putz was perfect, and hasn’t allowed a run since May 10th. RHP Aaron Taylor picked up his 9th save of the year with a shutout 9th inning. SS Mickey Lopez went 3-5 and C Pat Borders went 2-4 with a double to lead the offense.
San Antonio had the day off. LHP Bobby Madritsch will take the hill for the Missions today.
Inland Empire 5, Visalia 1. The Ryan Ketchner Show continued as he took a perfect game into the 6th inning and earned his 6th win of the year. The southpaw tossed 6 shutout innings, gave up 1 hit, walked 2 and struck out 8. His ERA is now 2.77 and his BB/K is now 8/61 in 48 2/3 innings. He’s 4th in the league in ERA, 1st in wins, and 3rd in strikeouts. Ryan’s parents and girlfriend flew from Florida to attend the game, and it was nice that they saw him at his best. RF Cris Guerrero provided the offense with a 2-3 evening, scoring 2 runs, and 1B Jason VanMeetran had 2 hits to raise his average to .250 for the season and 2B Ismael Castro went 2-2 with a walk and a double.
Wisconsin 5, West Michigan 1. LHP Bobby Livingston moved to 7-1 with another solid performance, going 7 innings and allowing just 1 run. He gave up 6 hits, walked 1, and struck out 4. Livingston’s command continues to be impeccable as he’s now walked just 14 men in 10 starts. RF T.J. Bohn hit his 6th home run of the year, 1B Jon Nelson went 2-4, and SS Michael Garciaparra went 2-4 and raised his average to .217. He did, however, make another error, giving him 19 in 43 games.
Minor League Highlights for Saturday, May 24
Tacoma 8, Tucson 3. OF Kenny Kelly came within a single of the cycle and added a walk for good measure, leading the Rainiers offense with a 3-4 evening, scoring 3 times and driving in 4 in his best game of the season. 3B Luis Figueroa and SS Mickey Lopez each had 3 hits as well as the Rainiers got 16 hits the night after getting shut down by the same ballclub. RHP Brian Sweeney earned the win with 6 strong innings. He gave up 6 hits, 2 of which were home runs, and allowed 3 runs, but didn’t walk a man and struck out 5. RHP Scott Atchison got the 3 inning save by striking out 5 of the 10 batters he’d face and allowing just one baserunner.
Round Rock 1, San Antonio 0. RHP Rett Johnson continued to make his case for a promotion to AAA with another dominant outing, but his teammates gave him no run support and he got saddled with a loss. Johnson worked 8 1/3 innings, giving up just 2 hits, 1 unearned run, 1 walk, and 5 strikeouts. After some early season struggles, Johnson has been lights out in May and should get the bump to Tacoma before too long. The Missions managed just 4 hits, all singles, and no one had more than one hit.
Inland Empire 3, Visalia 2. RHP Manny Ulloa continued to shine, giving up just 1 run in 5 innings, walking none and striking out 6. It was RHP Brian Strelitz who got the win in relief, however, with 2 2/3 shutout innings. RHP Mike Steele ended the game with his 10th save, despite giving up a run and making things interesting. 2B Evel Bastida-Martinez made news by actually getting a hit and raising his OPS to a whooping .482. A fine draft pick he was, indeed.
West Michigan 1, Wisconsin 0. 1B Jon Nelson’s 3-4 evening with two doubles wasn’t enough to put a run on the board as the T-Rats were shut out, wasting a good performance from RHP Juan Sandoval. He worked 6 1/3 innings, gave up the lone run in the game, walked 1, and struck out 3. After getting lit up early in the season, Sandoval has turned a corner and tossed some effective games. Wisconsin can take solace in the fact that everyone is getting shut by Jon Connolly this year, as the lefty now has a 0.75 ERA in 59 2/3 innings.
Minor League Highlights for Friday, May 23
Tucson 8, Tacoma 0. C Pat Borders had both of the Rainiers hits in the game and RHP Jeff Heaverlo’s struggles continued as the Sidewinders blanked the Rainiers. Heaverlo gave up 5 runs on 8 hits and 1 walk in 4 innings of work, but he did strike out 4. RHP Aaron Looper gave up 3 more runs in mop-up work before and OF Jacques Landry finished the game with 1 scoreless inning. When you go 2-27 as a team, there are clearly no hitting stars.
San Antonio 7, Round Rock 2. 3B Justin Leone continued his torrid pace, going 3-3 with a home run, a stolen base, and a walk. He scored twice and drove in 3 to pace the offense. SS Jose Lopez also had 2 hits including his 13th double of the year. LHP Matt Thornton made his return to AA a success with 6 innings of 1 hit baseball. He allowed 2 unearned runs, walked 4, and struck out 5. RHP Josue Matos got a 3 inning save by giving up just 1 hit and striking out 4 of the 10 batters he faced.
Visalia 4, Inland Empire 3. The 66’ers continue to provide no run support for great pitching performances, as LHP Troy Cate’s 7 inning, 1 hit performance failed to lead to a win. Cate relieved rehabbing RHP Juan Done in the second inning and allowed just 1 unearned run, walking 2, and striking out 4. RHP Mike Steele took the loss by giving up a run in the 10th inning. OF Cris Guerrero hit his first home run with the organization and the 66’ers racked up 13 hits but couldn’t drive the runs in. Manager Steve Roadcap continued his pace for a world record by managing to say something negative about every player on the club for the 34th consecutive day.
Wisconsin 7, West Michigan 3. 2B Corey Harrington went 3-5 to spark an offensive explosion by the T-Rats standards as they put away the Whitecaps with 4 runs in the 9th inning. RHP Tanner Watson pitched 5 2/3 innings and gave up 2 runs, walked no one, and struck out 6. Relieving LHP Ryan-Rowland Smith got the win, however, as he pitched 3 1/3 innings, gave up 1 run, walked 1, and struck out 4. In other impressive news, SS Michael Garciaparra did not make an error.
Boy, Loshe looked great against the Mariners. That game could have easily been a shutout with a break in the Twins direction. As Tacoma Raniers announce Mike Curto said, “Loshe was dealing tonight.” Another highlight: Mateo came in and I turned to Mike and said “How long before Tateriffic Mateo gives up a home run?” and as Mike started to answer, Mateo gave up a home run.
Garcia Watch 2003
Bob Finnigan, apparantly unable to find a story lying around the pressbox he could pick up and run, asked Garcia about the rumors he parties too much and used it for the basis of an article. Headline is “Garcia denies off-field rumors” but in the story, Garcia says “Yes, I go out,” he said. “I can go out. I can go out if I want. Why not? I’m 26 years old. I’m single.”
Umm, so you do go out then.
“I’m not out every night,” he said, showing a touch of anger for the first time. “You don’t see me out every night. I stay home a lot, but people don’t see me at home. They see me when I go out, so they think it’s too much.”
Some days, after all, are travel days when the team is on a charter flight at night.
Garcia pointed out that he has gone out to clubs since he has been in the big leagues, now five years.
“I’ve always gone out, and all the years I’ve done good, it’s no problem,” he said. “I don’t do good for a few games, and now it’s a bad thing?”
Lemme see… a few games. How about a year’s worth of games?
“People can talk about my performance on the field, but the other stuff is my life,” Garcia said. “You know me. You know if I have a big car. You know about my nightlife. To go out every night, to be drinking too much, would be stupid for me. My velocity would be down, but it’s not. I’m throwing the ball 93, 94, 95 mph. That’s me. That’s always been me.”
There’s an important point here: he doesn’t say that he’s not out on the town every night, he says “it’s not so bad, I’m still throwing fast.”
Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that I make widgets and I smoke a lot of crack every day. And for a while, I do really well. I manage to come into work enough that it doesn’t show up on my reviews, I keep life relatively in order. If things started to fall apart — I came into work later and later, when I was there my head wasn’t in the game, I was moody and erratic, I still made widgets as fast but they weren’t as good, and frequently defective — would the crack be a valid subject to talk about? Or would the fact that I could still crank out widgets of much worse quality be an adequate defense?
Derek’s Wacky Fun Series Preview
M’s face the Twins for a three-game series at home here at the House Griffey Built and then Left. The Mariners head into the series with the best record in the AL.
Fri @ 7pm, LHP Moyer v RHP Radke
Sat @ 7pm, RHP Pineiro v RHP Lohse
Sun @ 5pm, RHP Franklin v RHP Reed
Sunday has a chance to be an ugly game, as Franklin’s hittability may set the Twins bats on fire, while Reed has been roughed up and injured this year. Saturday looks to be the best matchup, but it also has a chance to be an ugly game: there’s a bunch of Prospectus folks getting together before the game, and that means there’s a non-zero chance I’ll end up in the pokey by the end of the day.
The Mariners have been hitting much better than the Twins, their rotations are having like years (with Joe Mays playing the role of Garcon Garcia, and Loshe as Meche), but with the recent collapse of the back-end M’s bullpen, the Twins have surpassed them in bullpen strength.