Looking at 2010 — 5 — Pitchers (cont)

Let's see if we can wrap this up.

Mike Ekstrom (26). RHP. Reliever. 58 Innings (3 2/3 postseason). 39 Games (1 start). 6-1. 6 holds, 1 save. ERA 2.79. On Rays 40-man.

• Ekstrom started the year in Tampa Bay and came to the Bulls in a swap for Joaquin Benoit in late April. He went back up to the Rays for a couple of weeks in early August, again in early September, came back for one round of playoffs, and went back to the Rays. Not quite sure why he was around all year given the somewhat erratic quality of the Rays bullpen, but nice to have him with the Bulls and he did a good job. Seemed to handle the back and forth better than most we’ve seen around here. He’s young. He’s only got two years of AAA under his belt. If he doesn’t stick with the Rays he might be back next year.
  
• Stats.

Winston Abreu (33). RHP. Reliever. 55 1/3 innings (3 1/3 postseason). 40 games. 0-4. 2 holds, 23 saves. ERA 2.28.

• A great deal of the Bulls’ success over the last two years can be attributed to Winston Abreu. If his number of saves seems a bit low (tied for 3rd in the IL), remember that in the early months of the season there were few save opportunities with the Bulls on a record-setting run scoring pace. Very, very important to the Bulls to know that if they had a lead going into the last inning, Abreu was there. At a guess, it’s up to Abreu whether or not he wants to put in another year with the Bulls. Certainly the team (and this fan) would love to have him back.
  
• Stats.

R.J. Swindle (26). LHP. Reliever. 55 innings (5 innings postseason). 40 games. 2-4. 12 holds. 2 saves. ERA 2.79.

• There was not a pitcher on the crew that was more fun to watch this year than R.J. Swindle. He got a late start on the season, not showing up with the Bulls until May 10. Impressive control right out of the gate. He didn’t walk a single batter until his eighth appearance. R.J. is famous for his slow curve that loops across the plate at much less than 60 mph, while his “fastball” barely approaches 80 mph. No pitcher on the Bulls staff could mix it up as well as he could. One or two inning guy, real asset to the team. Still young. He could be a real help to the Bulls in years to come if Rays want to keep him around.
  
• Stats.

Darin Downs (25). LHP. 40 1/3 innings (5 1/3 postseason). 23 games (1 start). 6-2. ERA 4.46.

• Downs joined the Bulls from the Montgomery Biscuits in late June. His numbers with the Bulls were much less impressive than his 1.67 ERA at AA level. On the other hand, this was his first visit to AAA baseball and he seems fully recovered from his injuries. Pretty sure that he’s going to be on the Rays “Let’s wait and see” list. Maybe Biscuits, probably Bulls next year.
  
• Stats.

The next several pitchers were in the 20 inning range, so let’s try to wrap this up with some one-liners.

Bobby Livingston (27). LHP. 27 2/3 innings (5 postseason). 5 games, no decisions. Livingston filled in some gaping holes in the Bulls starting lineup on August, and did a pretty good job for us. He’s been banging around AAA for the last couple of years — Indianapolis, Columbus, Norfolk, Buffalo, and Albuquerque — so have to think there’s a story there we don’t know about. Still, liked what we saw in August and September. Stats.
Heath Rollins (25). RHP. Started the season with the Bulls and appeared in 13 games (23 innings), but did not do well. Was sent down to Montgomery where he also did not do well. Stats.
Jake McGee (23). LHP. Started the season with Montgomery as a starter. Came to the Bulls in August to work as a reliever (17 innings) and did very, very well. Went to Tampa in mid-September. On 40-man. Likely to start 2011 with the Bulls. Stats.
Ramon Ortiz (37). RHP. 17 innings. 4 games. Much like Bobby Livingston, brought in at the end of the season to fill some holes in starting lineup. Less successful than Livingston. First time we’ve ever seen a pitcher tossed from a game for something he apparently said, not something he did (August 30). Did not appear in the postseason. Stats.
Brian Shouse (42). LHP. Reliever. Signed in mid-August to fill some holes and possibly back up the Rays bullpen. 10 games, 12 innings. Was of little help to Bulls. Stats.
Jeff Bennett (30). RHP. Starter. Started the year with Durham. Pitched one game, faced two batters in his second start and went on DL. Had one more start on May 11 and was released. Total of 10 2/3 innings. Stats.
Paul Phillips (26). RHP. Came up from Montgomery and got in 3 appearances (10 2/3 innings) before the end of the season and two in post season (6 1/3 innings). We like Phillips, but he’s running out of time. He could easily come out of spring training on the Bulls roster. Or just as easily disappear. Stats.
Joaquin Benoit (33). RHP. Likely to become a trivia question if he keeps up his terrific performance as a Rays setup man. He did spend a couple of weeks with the Bulls at the beginning of the year, making 8 appearances for 9 2/3 innings, 2 saves and a loss. Swapped out for Mike Ekstrom. Stats.
Jason Cromer (29). LHP. 8 innings. 4 games. A favorite of WDBB, Jason could not get his arm/elbow working right this year. He did show up for four games in late May/early June. He on the books as pitching a couple of games/innings in mid-August down in the Gulf Coast League, so we can hope. But have to say that it doesn’t look well. Jason’s running out of time. Stats.
Justin Garcia (24). RHP. Reliever. 4 2/3 innings. If you been reading this far, this is the punch line. Justin Garcia, as far as we can tell, has never been to Durham, NC. He came up from Montgomery and pitched two games in relief against Indianapolis, then went from there to the Charlotte Stone Crabs. Obvious candidate for the Moonlight Graham Award. Stats.
Alex Cobb (22). RHP. Starter. Alex did not play for the Bulls in the regular season. He did come up for the postseason and took a loss in his first appearance. Nevertheless, he is a very, very promising young pitcher, one of two on this year’s Biscuits squad on the Rays 40-man (Jake McGee being the other one). If we’re lucky, we’ll see a lot of him next year. Stats.

Bullpen Lets Six Get Home

Game 65: Durham Bulls (Tampa Bay) 2, Gwinnett Braves (Atlanta) 7
Season: 39-26; Last 10: 7-3
Wrap, Box, Gwinnett Daily Post

Last night’s game can be looked at in a couple of different ways, most of them not good.

We’ll just point out that the game was one of the very rare times this year that the Bulls’ relievers have lost a game. To date they have only been charged with six losses and three of those six were from pitchers no longer with the Bulls. Benoit (1) has gone to the Rays and Rollins (2) has gone to the Biscuits. Winston Abreu, R.J. Swindle and Dale Thayer have the other three. Another indication of the strength of our bullpen is that they have only had two blown saves, Bateman (1) and Ekstrom (1). One of the blown saves was last night (Joe Bateman) as was the loss by Dale Thayer.

Going into the 7th inning, the Bulls were leaving a lot of runners on base, but they still had a 2-1 lead. Then Bateman came on and gave up a tying run. That was followed by what was probably Dale Thayer’s very worst outing as a Durham Bull: Single, hit by pitch, single, double, walk, single, couple of ground outs and another single — five runs. Following as it does a rough outing June 6th, I’m wondering if there’s something wrong with Dale. Or is he simply not getting enough work?

We’ll also point out that the Bulls left 17 men on base and outhit the Braves 13 to 10.

Moving right along …

Desmond Jennings has attracted a flurry of attention by being named IL Player of the Week and in a pretty good article in today's News & Observer.

Elliot Johnson and Jason Cromer were put on the disabled list. Joe Dillon came off (hooray!). Rehabbing Tampa Bay shortstop Jason Bartlett is playing a couple of games with us on his way back to the Rays.

Eight!

Game 16: Durham Bulls 5, Gwinnett Braves 4
Season: 13-3
Wrap, Box, Herald-Sun, Indy Week

That’s eight wins in a row. Can’t ask for more than that.

All the links lead with Jeremy Hellickson’s woes in his 3+ innings, so let’s skip that and jump right to Justin Ruggiano and the 7th inning. By that time the Bulls were behind 1 to 4. The Braves were on their third pitcher, Scott Proctor, and he’d gotten two quick outs before giving up a single to Elliot Johnson. By my count Ruggiano stood in for at least seven pitches, with Johnson stealing second base somewhere along the way. Then he whacked one off the pitch speed sign in left center. That two-run homer got us to 3-4 and cracked Procter. It was followed by a Blalock single, a Dan Johnson walk, a Joe Dillon single, and a RBI Chris Richard single. If Dan Johnson hadn’t tried to score, we might still be playing. But the game was tied. In the next inning Justin was back at bat with Alvin Colina and Elliot Johnson on base. A double scored Colina, and that was enough.

Did I mention Justin’s throw to the plate that cut off a run in the 3rd? Should have. Five Braves were put out after they got on base last night. In addition to Ruggiano’s peg, Colina threw out two who were trying to steal, one was called out on interference when he couldn’t dodge a ground ball, and a fifth over-ran second and was tagged out.

This is one tough team to beat. A truly awful start didn’t hurt the Bulls nearly as much as it could have because good defense kept us in the game. Then we got 4+ terrific innings from Brian Baker to keep the Braves in check. Finally we just hammered Scott Proctor in the 7th with some solid batting. Nevertheless, Gwinnett looks to be our competition in the Southern Division. I’m betting at the end of the season it will be the Braves and the Bulls who are in contention for the title.

Almost left out Joaquin Benoit and his save. His pitch speed was up to 94 and he looked really, really good. Possibly ready for prime time.

Lonely Are the Brave

Game 14: Durham Bulls 6, Charlotte Knights 5 (12 innings)
Season: 11-3
Wrap, Box

Not only a terrific movie, but a good description of the seriously die-hard (or maybe there’s another adjective?) Bulls fan. Those who know where I usually sit will notice that I am not in the picture. Note that Wool E. Bull stuck it out, though.

Did I miss anything by leaving in the middle of the 8th after the rain had been pouring for a while and the temperature had dropped at least 15°? As a matter of fact, I did. But I would have had to wait a couple of hours until the bottom of the 12th when, instead of the sheer power of the last five games, the Bulls won their sixth game in a row through guile, speed, stubbornness, and a bit of ineptitude on the part of the Knights.

The Bulls opened up with what has become a signature power display: a three-run homer by Hank Blalock in the first and a two-run homer by Dan Johnson in the 3rd. Then things got awful quiet to the bottom of the 8th, a 1 ½ hr rain delay, and another four innings before Fernando Perez singled his way on to first, then scrambled second and on to third, and then came home when the Charlotte shortstop let Hank Blalock get on base.

We used six pitchers. The starter, Virgil Vasquez, simply wore himself out. He threw 98 pitches in only 4 ⅔ innings and that’s just too many. Joe Bateman had a fine two innings. Joaquin Benoit got through 1 ⅓ without giving up a home run. Winston Abreu, Dale Thayer, and Brian Baker kept us in the game. Baker got the win. We really need Carlos Hernandez to go deep tomorrow, though.

A win.

Here’s hoping none of the Bulls got the chilblains.

As for the dedicated fans, I raise my cup of Irish coffee to you!

A Fan’s Lament

Game 5: Durham Bulls 4, Gwinnett Braves 2
Season: 3-2
Wrap, Box

I wasn’t able to listen to the game last night, so hadn’t planned to say anything about it. But a closer look at the box score led me to put these comments together — more for those who may be new to either the Bulls or minor league ball than to say anything special about the game.

Just to set the stage: The Bulls scored four runs in the top of the seventh inning to go ahead 4-2. Brian Baker, in his first appearance of the season, had a 1-2-3 6th and followed it up with a 1-2-single-3 bottom of the 7th. (Baker got the win.) Joe Bateman came on for the bottom of the 8th, his second appearance of the season. A single, a double play, and a ground out, and he’s out of the inning.

Joaquin Benoit came on to close it out in the 9th. Where’s the logic in that you may ask? The night before Benoit came on for the last out of the 6th inning and pitched all the 7th inning. So why would he come on in the 9th inning on the next night in a 4-2 ballgame?

Well, we have not way of knowing for sure. We don’t have access to Charlie Montoyo’s cellphone records or his email accounts. However, it sure looks like Tampa Bay isn’t very happy with their relievers. [Tampa Tribune] So the guess has got to be that the only reason Benoit was in the game was because the Rays want to see if he could go back-to-back.

Gotta tell you that, as a Bulls fan, I would much prefer to see if Joe Bateman can go two innings than find out if Joaquin Benoit can go back to back, particularly in a close game where the outcome is obviously not a sure thing.

But that’s the way it goes. Charlie doesn’t always have a choice and, mostly, the last couple of years the Bulls have been able to win games even with the occasional not-very-helpful dictat from St. Petersburg.

It was a near thing. men were on first and third with one out before a shallow fly-out and a ground out finished the game with the Bulls still ahead.

Grumble, grumble, grumble ...

Elsewhere: Stacy Long brings his unique (some might say somewhat bent) sense of humor to the Biscuits Monday night game. [Stacy Long]

Coolray Field & the Gwinnett Braves

The Durham Bulls should be arriving soon (that’s if they didn’t drive all last night). Three games there and then, finally, home.

The Gwinnett Braves have renamed their field since the last time I looked, but Google still hasn’t gotten around to getting an overhead shot. It’s only a few miles from downtown Atlanta. Rumor has it that the Braves have a truck with a really long bed that’s got a pitching mound at one end. That way they can have a reliever from Gwinnett warming up on the back of the truck while they are getting the paperwork done to officially call him up. A really forward-looking prospect can just rent an apartment midway and plan on staying there the entire season.

In the meantime, Brian Merzbach doesn’t think much of the park.[ballparkreviews] Here’s a link to some photos. [GwinnettBraves]

The Braves split their opening games with the Charlotte Knights: 8-6, 1-3, 5-1, 2-8. The Braves are apparently starting out with a 4-man rotation since the listed starter is the same pitcher who pitched on 8 April.

Update: Well, I got that wrong. Venters is the Braves fifth starter. I figured that since he got the win that he had started the game on 8 Apr. Not so. He came in for a couple of innings in relief, just to keep sharp, and ended up with the win.

Something of a homecoming for our catcher, Alvin Colina, who played for the Braves last year.

Here’s the IL’s preview commentary on the Gwinnett Braves:

Probable Starters: 1B – Barbaro Canizares; 2B – J.C. Holt; SS – Brandon Hicks; 3B – Wes Timmons; C – Clint Sammons; LF – Matt Young, CF – Gregor Blanco; RF – Brent Clevlen; DH – Mitch Jones.

Key Pitchers: Starters – RH Todd Redmond, RH James Parr, LH Scott Diamond, RH Kyle Cofield, RH Ryne Reynoso. Relievers – RH Craig Kimbrel, LH Mariano Gomez, LH Mike Dunn, RH Jeff Lyman, RH Vladimir Nunez. RH Luis Valdez, who led the IL last year with 27 saves, is still home in the Dominican Republic because of visa problems. He is expected to miss at least the first month of the season.

Strengths of the Club: The bullpen again looks strong even without Valdez to start the season and the team should be better offensively with the addition of Jones, who hit 35 homers last season for Albuquerque. A key will be how quickly CF Jordan Schafer and SS Diory Hernandez get into the lineup. Schafer is recovering from wrist surgery and Hernandez from shoulder surgery.

Weaknesses of the Club: The rotation, the team’s strength at the start of last season, goes into 2010 as a question mark. Three of the potential starters are up from Double-A and none are considered prime prospects.

Top Prospects: RHP Craig Kimbrel, Atlanta’s closer of the future, is making a bid to stick in Atlanta...... RF Jason Heyward, who played three games for Gwinnett towards the end of spring training, made it impossible this spring for the Braves to send him back to the minors. He will be opening the season with Atlanta.

Other Organizational Prospects: 1B Freddie Freeman may start the season at Double-A Mississippi, but he is sure to make it to Gwinnett by mid-season. He may be Atlanta’s first baseman as soon as 2011.

Veterans to Watch: 3B/2B Joe Thurston, who spent all last season with St. Louis, was battling Brooks Conrad for the final roster spot in Atlanta. It is likely one or the other will open the year with the G-Braves...... C/1B J.R. House, who has MLB time with Pittsburgh, Baltimore and Houston, was signed as a free agent, as was former New York Yankees first-round pick (and former SWB Yankee) 3B/1B Eric Duncan and 2B/SS Luis Bolivar, who played at Louisville last year...... 1B/DH Barbaro Canizares has been an All-Star in the International League in each of the last two seasons. In 2009 he was 3rd in the League with 149 hits, 4th with 79 RBI, and 6th with 130 games played.

Items of Interest: North Johnson takes over as General Manager, replacing Bruce Baldwin, who retired after a tenure of 23 seasons with the organization. Johnson arrives from Myrtle Beach of the Carolina League. Previous to Myrtle Beach he was General Manager of Kinston in the Carolina League and Rancho Cucamonga in the California League...... The home of the Gwinnett Braves, formerly known as Gwinnett Stadium, is now known as Coolray Field. Coolray Heating and Cooling signed a 16-year agreement with the Braves.

Webworld:

At least one writing thinks the Rays need Durham reliever Joaquin Benoit right now. [RaysIndex]

Goerge F. Will waxes philosophical about baseball and democracy. [Wall Street Journal]