Friday, April 20, 2012

On to Rhode Island

Game 15, Thursday, April 19, Knights Stadium
Charlotte Knights 6, Durham Bulls 2
Season: 6-9; This Trip: 1-7
Box, Herald-Sun

What a refreshing start to a game. For a change, the Bulls had a non-struggling starting pitcher on the mound. After a long, long, long layoff (9 days), courtesy of our great good friends down in St. Petersburg, Alex Cobb was back in a Durham uniform. His line doesn’t look all that impressive, especially with the 6 walks he gave up. But as near as I could tell from the radio, he was doing just fine until he walked the first batter in the 7th. At that point, with 90 pitches thrown, Dane De La Rosa came in.

Even then things looked OK. De La Rosa struck out the first two batters he faced even though Cobb’s runner made it to second base on a steal. But then he walked the bases loaded and John Gaub came in and gave up a bases clearing double and then another double.

If you are into statistical trivia, of the four runs scored in the 7th inning, the first run was charged to Cobb, then next two to De La Rosa, and the last to Gaub.

As long as I’m feeling grumpy, let me point out that the Bulls haven’t hit a single home run on this road trip. If fact, the Bulls last homer was back on April 9, ten games ago, by Brandon Guyer.

Off to Pawtucket, Rhode Island. This trip is half over!

Outside the game:

  • If you want to see some beautiful, beautiful baseball photos by the Magnum service, take a look at these.  ( I will sneak one in at the bottom. I can always delete it later). 
  • The Rays have claimed a first baseman, Brandon Allen, off waivers and outfielder, former Bulls shortstop, B.J. Upton, is due to come off of the disabled list. Even with the Rays skill at manipulating the roster rules, the likelihood is that two position players are going to have to get off the 25-man roster bus. Stephen Vogt thinks he may be one of them. The other?
  • By the end of this trip, the Bulls will have put on roughly 2,100 miles. If they had spent it all on the bus that would be something like 38 hours just on the road.

Magnum Photos, Slate Magazine


5 comments:

  1. Buddy in St Pete said Reid B. is coming to Durham. Possible available options squeeze between him and Elliot J?

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  2. There's a good bit of buzz coming out of the Rays blogging world (and even locally from Indy Week). I lack confidence in my understanding of the rules of the game, but the current consensus is that Stephen Vogt is sure to be sent down. Then the Rays will choose between Elliot Johnson and Reid Brignac (what your guy is saying). Because Brignac has "options" he can be sent without interference by other teams, whereas Elliot Johnson would have to be passed through waivers.
    Since my interest is in the Bulls, the question for me is: who gets pushed off the Durham bus to make room for two players? Here's where not knowing anything about the actual wording of these minor league contracts confuses things. I'll probably make a couple of guesses tomorrow.
    Thanks for the heads up on Reid. If it's either him or EJ, I'd guess that Shawn O'malley would be heading for Montgomery. And maybe Abernathy with Vogt going into a fulltime catchers' slot.

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  3. G-master: You were right. Brignac is coming.

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  4. Abernathy? That's how you treat your favorite catcher? :)

    I'm confused about the Bulls roster at the moment since it was mentioned that we have a "few" pitchers on the way. Pendleton was there last night, right, but who's the other?

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    Replies
    1. The only "other" I can think of would be Augenstein coming off the DL. But my guess had been that they signed Pendleton because Augenstein's injury was more than anticipated. A mystery ...

      See my solution to not sending Abernathy ... Dump Miranda ...

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