As I read through the comments of a post on The Big Lead late this afternoon, three in a row caught my eye: Jason Heyward CRUSHED BY HEYWARD Oh boy. That’s gonna be a big deal. Heyward may be in The Show, but his preseason top prospect status means we are obligated to follow him at a careful distance for…well, for as long as we like. Those comments told me he had done something...
The Indians are planning to call up top prospect Carlos Carrasco, obtained from the Phillies in a trade deadline deal for Cy Young Award winner Cliff Lee, to make his major league debut on Tuesday: It’s no surprise that the Indians, who have taken major heat from their fan base for dealing Lee and catcher Victor Martinez before the deadline, are anxious to show off some of the talent they got back. Marson will also join the Indians, and chances...
White Sox prospect Gordon Beckham made his highly anticipated major league debut on Thursday, going 0-for-3 with a strikeout in Chicago’s 7-0 loss to the Oakland A’s. He was also 0-for-3 in his second game, a 6-0 loss to Cleveland on Friday. Two games, no hits in six at-bats, his team has been outscored 13-0. Clearly the Gordon Beckham Era in Chicago is destined to be a failure. Okay, so I’m clearly kidding. Beckham,...
Former Brewers prospect Matt LaPorta was recently called up by his current team, the Cleveland Indians, which meant that it was only a matter of time before Milwaukee dug deep and recalled their remaining Wonder Mat(t). Because if one WM is in the majors, the other one must be there as well. Don’t ask me to explain why. It’s science. As noted by Extra P in the Z-Meter, Mat Gamel was promoted from AAA...
Highly touted prospect Matt LaPorta was called up by the Indians on Friday. He made his major league debut on Sunday, batting eighth and playing rightfield in Cleveland’s 3-1 loss to the Tigers. It did not go exceptionally well. LaPorta, the seventh overall pick in the 2006 draft, was 0-for-4 with two strikeouts against Justin Verlander. He stranded four runners, leaving the bases loaded in the seventh, and popped out to end the game....
Been awhile since I’ve done one of these… About six weeks ago, I watched Travis Snider crush pitch after pitch after pitch – something like ten in all – over the right field wall at Manchester’s Merchantsauto.com Stadium. It was obvious the kid, who I rechristened “Wayne” after realizing that he wore number 99, could hit the ball a long, long way. Shortly thereafter, Snider was summoned to Syracuse, where he played eighteen games,...
J.R. Towles is the number one prospect in the Houston Astros organization, following in the footsteps of Lance Berkman, Roy Oswalt and Hunter Pence, but for the first 42 games this season, he was awful. Towles hit .145 for the Astros before being sent down in early June. He rebounded somewhat in Round Rock (AAA-Pacific Coast), hitting .279 with 5 homeruns and 11 RBI. The improved performance might not have earned him the callup when...
I’m a couple of days late on this (that’s what I get for not checking me email more often), but it must be noted that the Pittsburgh Pirates called up outfielder Steve Pearce, the organization’s third-ranked prospect, to replace pitcher Matt Capps. Capps is expected to be out for eight weeks or more; it’s not known how long Pearce will occupy his roster spot. One article that I ran across suggested that he could...
Prior to the season, I noted at One More Dying Quail that as a Red Sox fan, the Tampa Bay Rays scared me. This was immediately before I compared them to the 1969 Mets, a historically awful team that rode a bunch of young talent to the World Series. The common response to the post was something along the lines of, “Oh, silly OMDQ – you know the Rays will never actually be good.” Jeez,...
Wow, quite a week for our friend NaturalMevs over at Diamond Hoggers. First he wins the Jay Bruce nickname contest, then he gets to see The Deal’s first official at-bat as a major leaguer. Since we’re in full-on worship mode, we’d be remiss if we didn’t direct you to this excellent recounting of the big event: The last thing in the world I ever expected to see was Bruce, before the biggest game of...
2012 05 14 Scranton Wilks Barre/ Empire State Yankees vs Pawtucket Red Sox
