He's Back

One of my great pleasures over the last couple of seasons was watching Jon Weber play baseball. Overlooked in the “National Championship” hoopla is the fact that for three years running the Durham Bulls won the Southern Division of the International League and went to the playoffs every year. Jon had a lot to do with that.

And besides it was just plain fun to watch him play the game. He was obviously having a good time (mostly, except when tossing bats into the first base side of the stands). He was a master of the Blue Monster. Only rarely would a runner make it to second if Jon was playing left field.

We here at WDBB failed in our attempt to get him called up to the Rays in September of 2009. However, Jon did play in the World Cup for Team USA. He had a lot to do with bringing home the trophy to the United States.

He played winter ball in Mexico and, apparently getting no love from the Rays, signed with the Yankees for 2010. He had an extraordinary spring with them, but was left off the 40-man and sent to Scranton/Wilkes-Barre at the end of spring training. He’s had a terrible start in the regular season, probably the worst of his professional career. Particularly odd is his lack of extra base hits, a category he excelled in last year. On the other hand, he hit his first double Tuesday night in Norfolk.

All of this is a long preface to noting that Jon will be back in the DBAP Thursday morning. He deserves a cheer from all of us for the pleasure he has given us for years. And he should take with him our hopes that sometime after next Sunday he gets his batting eye back and has a great season, (except for May 31 to June 3 when the Bulls play the Yankees in their home park). Maybe he will even get some time on the field in Yankee Stadium. We sure hope so.

Come On Home

Game 27: Durham Bulls 10, Rochester Redwings 7
Season: 17-10
This trip away: 3-5
Wrap, Box

Heath Phillips steps to the mound in the bottom of the 1st inning. Mid 60’s, stiff wind blowing out to left. He’s got a three-run lead on a Hank Blalock two-run double, and a single from Chris Richard that scored Blalock. Walk, single, single, walk, home run, five runs scored. This does not look good. Bulls are 1, 2, 3 in the top of the 2nd. In their half the Redwings have another fly ball get carried over the wall. Now it’s 6-3 and the game is only two innings gone.

In the 3rd things get a bit more weird. Three out of the first four Durham batters hit home runs (Dillon, Blalock, and Dan Johnson). so now we’re tied at 6. It stays that way until the top of the 6th when small ball prevails and we score two more runs (although we did leave the bases loaded).

Chris Richard’s 2-run homer in the 8th is icing on the cake. Nice to see Chris hitting again.

Lots of life in this Rochester series. Not a great road trip, and we haven’t come close to solving our starting pitching problem. Maybe a day’s rest will help.

Bench: Jennings (12), Ruggiano (2), Colina (1), Chavez (3), Luna (2),

Fan alert: If you are a New York Yankees fan, their Triple A team, the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Yankees, are in town for a four game series starting tomorrow. This is the only time they will visit this year. If you are a Yankee’s hater, this is the only time you will be able to boo.

Return to the DAP

One of the really big deals this year is the game next Monday between the Durham Bulls and the Toledo Mud Hens at the renovated Durham Athletic Park.

The Bulls have just put up a link with parking info under the "events" menu choice. Expect more.

In the meantime, if any of our readers would like to put up a DAP story (limit 500 words or so) just put it up as a comment here and, if I can figure out how, I'll start a series of posts. Or send as an email. Best address is probably jchriswise@nc.rr.com.

Durham Bulls Return to Form

Game 26: Durham Bulls 10, Rochester Redwings 2
Season: 16-10
Wrap, Box

All it takes for a win is great pitching and timely hitting. If only it were that simple all the time.

Really nice to see the 2010 Durham Bulls back in form, though.

After the one-hitter we had against a knuckleballer in Buffalo, and then a three pop-up first inning against the Redwings knuckleballer Charlie Zink, the leadoff Redwing hit a home run. Things did not look good. But the Redwings didn’t score again until the 7th.

In the meantime, Fernando Perez hit a three-run homer to cap a five-run second inning. For the numbers-minded, that was Perez' first home run of the year, his 6th in two Triple A seasons, and he had 3 in his 23 games with the Rays in 2008. Elliot Johnson and Joe Dillon had good days as well. Elliot (playing short) was 2 for 4, with two doubles, a walk, 2 RBI, and he scored a run. Joe Dillon (playing second) was 2 for 3, with a home run, 2 walks, 1 RBI, and scored four runs.

The Bulls drew 6 walks last night. An interesting feature of this team is their plate discipline. The Bulls have drawn 111 walks this year and lead the International League in that category. That’s a lot of folks on the bases (and trying to steal in our case).

Jeremy Hellickson is really something. Sure hopes he stays with us for a few more months. We really need him. He pitches extremely well and gets deep into games (and efficiently, only 92 pitches in seven full innings last night). Unless or until the Rays get us at least one more starting pitcher, the more rest the bullpen has the better.

A look at the bench:

Angel Chavez (hamstring) is reported to be at 80%. The Bulls have Wednesday off, so he should be ready by Thursday morning’s game.

Desmond Jennings (shoulder) got a little bit of playing time in the 9th last night, but hasn’t had an at bat since April 22.

Justin Ruggiano had a twinge in his left bicep in an at bat in Sunday’s game. Out for an unknown, but probably short, period of time.

So, a young utility player from the Charlotte Stone Crabs named Omar Luna has joined the Bulls. I say “utility” since he’s seen time in left field, shortstop, second and third this year, although he seems to be mostly an infielder. Not stellar at the plate (1 for 18, .056). So obviously brought in for his defense. We may need that if anyone gets dinged today.

Carlos Hernandez is off to Hudson Valley, surely to return by his next turn in the rotation.

Tomorrow is the Bulls first day off of the season — 27 straight days of baseball. These kids work really, really hard.

Webworld: Stacy Long is doing a poll on who should get Rays minor league honors for April.

Charts

Click on chart for a larger image

Time to update my charts. Here are two old ones and two new ones. First is how we stand in the Southern Division of the IL. We are still two games ahead of Gwinnett, but you will note that as we’ve been losing, they’ve been winning (five in a row). Charlotte has stopped its long slide as well. So the division looks to be, as usual, competitive.

Second up is the runs scored/runs allowed chart. That shows that, for what it’s worth, although we’ve been losing, we haven’t been getting blown out. Previous chart is here.

Third up is the wOBA (remember wOBA?) chart. Previous chart is here. What this appears to be showing is that the decline in our offensive performance (the green line) has been the key factor in our recent losses. The defense (red line) is holding its own, although it has certainly been better. Note that this is showing the last 20 games. As plate appearances go up, we are up to 996, these curves should vary less and less. Our interest is really in the gap between them.

Last is a new chart that plots team FIP. Fielding Independent Pitching is another one of those new sabremetrics stats. It deals with the problem that a pitcher can’t influence what happens when balls get into play. Another way to say it is that FIP strips out the vagaries of a scorer’s opinion regarding “earned” runs. From a purely statistical approach the numbers plotted here have a problem in that the “constant” for the International League has not been computed (or if it has, I haven’t found it). For this chart, that doesn’t matter since we are looking at team FIP and we are only concerned with changes in FIP, not the actual number. What this shows is that our pitching has really slipped in the last week (the larger the number the poorer the pitching).

Especially with the last two charts the small sample size caution applies.

Awww

Game 25: Durham Bulls 6, Rochester Redwings 7 (11 innings)
Season: 15-10
Wrap, Box

I was able to listen to most of the game yesterday. I accumulated a whole bunch of clever notes, but in the bottom of the 11th most of them really didn’t seem to mean much.

As a general rule, I give Charlie Montoyo a pass when I think he’s made a mistake. I have a couple of reasons for that, but the major ones are that he knows the players and the game much, much better than I.

However, leaving Winston Abreu in for another inning was surely a mistake. Not that we almost didn’t get out of it. After all the game did go down to 2 outs and a 3-2 count. But was this really the game to try to get a second inning out of Abreu? Until last night Abreu had never pitched more than one inning on at least two days rest. So he had not even gone back to back days, much less back to back innings. Should that be? Probably not. But that’s the way it’s been this year for Abreu. I think it was the wrong time to change. Winston gave up three doubles and that was more than enough.

Have to mention Perez’s error in the 5th. It was huge and opened the door to several runs. On the other hand, it did look for a while that the Johnson and Johnson home runs were going to make the difference.

Wasted a good start by Carlos Hernandez.

And if someone up there could maybe slash Redwing shortstop Trevor Ploufe’s tires or bribe a taxi driver to get lost with Trevor in the back seat or somehow make sure he doesn’t show up for the game today, we’d appreciate it. That guy is killing us with brilliant fielding and timely hitting.

Benchwatch: Justin Ruggiano apparently hurt something either during his at bat in the top of the 10th or earlier. He finished his at bat, but left the game with Desmond Jennings coming in for him. Jennings did not get an at bat. We are running out of depth.

Elsewhere:

DRaysBay has a “Starting Pitchers Watch” going for players in the Rays system. Two Bulls are on the list.

Get a Hit!

Game 23: Durham Bulls 7, Buffalo Bisons 12
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Game 24: Durham Bulls 0, Rochester Redwings 1
Wrap, Box
Season: 15-9

What’s going on here? The Bulls have been skunked twice in three days after none at all before now.

Oh, what the heck, let’s just talk about trivia.

Such as: The Louisville Bats were out of town yesterday (in Buffalo). Was that deliberate choice to avoid the Derby or just happenstance? Inquiring minds want to know.

What in the world happened to Richard De Los Santos? Too bad his first AAA start didn’t work out with a win, but he pitched a terrific game. And he had a terrific outing in relief a few days ago. We can hope.

We need to hope since we’ve been short two starters ever since Jeff Bennett disappeared and Virgil Vasquez crashed his scooter.

Benchriders last night: Jennings (10), Colina (1), Richard (1), Eldridge (1)

Over at Rays Index he’s surveyed some of his fellow Rays bloggers to evaluate who might be traded this year. Current Bulls Hank Blalock, Justin Ruggiano, Dan Johnson, Fernando Perez, Aneury Rodriguez, Carlos Hernandez, Winston Abreu, and Dale Thayer all made the list. Sort of like living in a meat market, seems to me. Must work on the heads of our players.

Today we’ve got a day game (1 pm). Again I’ve got to ask how come we don’t have those in Durham? Anybody know?

Inquiring minds mind would also like to know how come the Minnesota Twins’ Triple-A franchise is in Rochester, New York? They are almost 1000 miles apart. Could be that a Twins executive thought he was placing the team in Rochester, Minnesota, but that seems a bit implausible. We made an effort to understand this back in the Spring, but didn’t succeed. Maybe it has to do with learning how to play cold, especially with the Twins new park.

The Tobacco Road Cafe is open. Might be an interesting place for a before or after game meal. Not sure it will be a good place to watch the game from, though.

If you happen to be into contests/sweepstakes and stuff like that, minor league baseball has a couple going on: here and here.