EL Awards:
Batter of the Month:
Jacksonville C
Rich Crews(24, 4.5*) .360-10-30 1.137OPS 1.3WAR
2020 EL All-Star, 2nd in batting average in EL
Pitcher of the Month:
Toronto RHCL
Ron Palovich(30, 3.5*) 2-0 12SV 0.00 6K 13.1IP 0.8WAR
Second closer to win Pitcher of the Month...
Rookie of the Month:
Boston C
Elias Mendia(23, 3*) .299-7-18 .975OPS 21G 0.9WAR
We got -0.3WAR in return for him. The trades I make.
WL Awards:
Batter of the Month:
Portland 1B
Willie Chacon(26, 4*) .410-8-28 1.227OPS 2.3WAR
2x All-Star, leads WL in RBI’s and hits.
Pitcher of the Month:
Las Vegas SP
Jesse Bahena(24, 4.5/5*) 5-1 2.35 47K 6GS 46IP 1.3WAR
Leads WL in K WAR
Rookie of the Month:
Las Vegas SP
Chris Harkless(23, 3/4.5*) 5-0 2.38 26K 41.2IP 1.3WAR
Pitcher of the Month and Rookie of the Month, but different arms…
We followed up a 7-12 month with a 8-20 month, so in other words, we are bad. Our Pythagorean Record is 13-34 so we are even worse than we stand, however, the last 10 games we are 5-5. Having
Hinton back will surely help us, but we are lacking comparable talent. Trading
Bill Smith was a ‘little’ panic move to shake things up, but so far he allowed 5ER in 7.1IP with
Vancouver. We got little more than a bag of balls, but well…
We are preparing for the First Year Player draft and will monitor the trade market, but so far we plan to stand mostly pat until the All-Star break unless we get a good offer from another player of a opportunity arises that we can not pass up. It is another month of pain until the draft, so may the suffering continue.
Around the league, we had our run-in with the
Las Vegas Gamblers and we learned the hard way why they are first in the WL and second in all of baseball. Their 1-2 punch with
Jesse Bahena(24, 4.5/5*, 8-2 2.86 80K) and
Chris Harkless(23, 3/4.5*, 5-2 3.88 49K) is still developing but strong nonetheless, and RF
Trevor Wolthuis(28, 3*, .263-17-31 1.032OPS) is on his way to lead the WL in home runs and strikeouts for the third straight season… how can someone strike out 284 times???
Pitching:
DL: RHRP
Chris Ball(22 2.5/3*)
forearm tendinitis unknown 0-0 4.09 16K 22IP -0.4WAR
NMBL Montreal Expos Players on the leaderboard:
RHSP
Danny Sandoval 10.8 K/9 – 3rd
RHSP
Sam Griffin 1.8 BB/9 – 3rd
RHSP
Sam Griffin 6 losses – 3rd
Shuffling our pitchers around helped some the last weeks, but we are far from good.
Sandoval recovered with a 3.74ERA month and
Sam Griffin was at 3.73.
Adrian Hilscher is on the hot seat right now as he got lit up badly lately, but I can not pull the trigger on putting
Marquardt into the rotation.
And I’m not recalling
Victor Lopez. We also have
Juan Miranda on the 40-man, and while he is 3-3 2.92 in 7 starts in AAA, we want to keep him in AAA for the season to make sure he gets the development time he needs as Dave G. officially sees him as a 3* prospect.
Our bullpen… we will see what we can do here.
Rasbach,
Leone,
Rudolph and
Nelson are save, every other reliever is in danger to see Spring Valley soon…
Some interesting news from your scouting department. AAA Closer
Kevin Cowden was rated up to a 3.5* potential reliever and seems to be a good trade acquisition AND is not on the 40-man yet. He is unfortunately having a 6.38ERA so… he needs some time.
Position Players:
DL: C
Kevin Craddock(24 2.5*)
fractured thumb 3-4 weeks .158-0-1 .449OPS 16G/10GS -0.2WAR
NMBL Montreal Expos Players on the leaderboard:
none
Let’s open that can of worms, shall we. With
Fitch,
Quiros/
Reyes,
Robles and
Messer we have four lineup positions where we post a zero or sub-zero WAR right now, and it was five before we axed
Alfonso Flores and his -0.8WAR. Of those guys,
Messer is the one where I expected more and where our scouts believe in an improvement as his contact ability is better than what we see.
The others… are replacement level players with a “standout” tool, and for most of them, it isn’t enough. We won’t be able to move
Fitch out of the way unless someone is willing to take on $11.8M this season and next season, and we don’t have a good replacement around.
Kevin Craddock is the best of the replacement level catcher bunch, and he is out for the next month anyway so.
As for middle infielders, we have a ton of those in AAA that can hit a bit better than
Robles,
Quiros and
Reyes, but they are all worse on the defensive side, and that is one area where we also suck… happy days huh.
Cody Kerzner has been a little bright spot between a lot of darkness, but .323 in nine games is not (yet) enough sample size to get excited about. The secret about him is, while he is 26 and won’t develop much, there is a lot of power potential in his old scouting reports. Dave Gomez feels that there is some untapped potential that can be worked out in a offseason development routine… that is if we don’t trade him away for a better bag of baseballs.
Karl Ferguson was on his way to capture my heart… until he went ice cold and batted .212 in May, and
Vinnie Roman also is making a strong bid to be traded. We won’t get much for him, but there are teams that want him for a prospect or two. Not yet tho.
Prospect Watch:
AAA SS
Julian Hernandez .240-5-17 .647OPS 43G 1.2WAR
AAA RHRP
Kevin Cowden 2-3 12SV 6.38 21K 18.1IP -1.3WAR
A LHSP
Brett Asselin 0-7 4.53 37K 9GS 45.2IP 0.5WAR
R SP
Matt Porter 2-1 0.57 48K 47.2IP 9GS 1.5WAR
R 1B
Joe Townsend .250-3-5 .790OPS 12G 0.9WAR
broken bone in elbow 6-7 months
R LF
Santiago Rodriguez .226-9-17 .747OPS 42G 3.5WAR
Hernandez picked up some pace with a .252 month but his contact ability and is power is ways away from where he needs to be, so no rushing here. Our single A team is an absolute dumpster fire this season and
Brett Asselin unfortunately has to cover that a bit, but he has done some good despite those losses he amassed, but has work to do in every category from movement, to control, to all his five pitches.
Nothing here that will help us out this season, and we won’t trade any of those kids away unless we have a 22-0 June.