The W.P Kinsella League Random Update Thread

[BirdWatcher]

Originally Posted by Sizeman21

Boy, Welch's career is a head scratcher for sure. Looks like he could be a better NASCAR driver than a pitcher. Git er' dunnn!

Yeah, I think it's fair to say that expansion had quite a bit to do with him having a more significant big league career than he probably deserved. Chicago needed arms in their first season in the league and then after a year not pitching in the WPK he started just 9 games for a bad Seattle club, then the following year had 10 starts for Chicago's fellow expansion club Houston. And now a mostly horrific 22 starts for the woeful Speed Devils. Prior to that 1975 season he had a total of 10 big league appearances over 4 seasons, starting just 3 games.
In fairness to Welch, he is reportedly quite intelligent (though one has to question that a bit since he hasn't yet figured out it might be time for a career change) and he is an innings eater with good stamina and four decent pitches. But at this stage he combines average stuff and movement with really, really poor control.

Interestingly this is a guy who was a first round draft pick, #9 overall, out of Old Dominion in 1966. At his peak as a prospect he was considered the 35th best prospect in the game. That didn't quite pan out very well, though I guess anyone who can stick around in the game this long has done something right.

Edit: Oh, and I should probably add that being a left-hander helps a bit too.

[BirdWatcher]

Let's take a quick look at the Denver Brewers starting rotation this season:



So, just based on this would you call Jim Atwell the Brewers best pitcher, as I did recently in the pennant race summaries here?
Probably not, right?
And okay, in fact, things have changed a bit since I posted that and the Brewers reigning 2-time MGL Pitcher of the Year, Sadahige Kawasaki, probably edges out Atwell at this point and there is a strong chance he gets his third straight Pitcher of the Year award.
But the reality is that although Atwell has the worst record in the rotation, he's still arguably the best pitcher on the team.

Look at a few other numbers:



As you can see, Atwell is now slightly behind his teammate Kawasaki in rWAR and ERA+. But Atwell remains at the top of the MGL in FIP and by a significant margin over Sadahige. He is also #1 in K/BB, WAR, and is 2nd in the MGL in K's and K/9. He just can't seem to get the breaks- or the run support- this season.

Oh, and that kid Bond just keeps impressing. Definitely becoming one of my favorite players.


I'm a bit remiss in reporting on this, but Antonio Acuna has reached the 30 home run and 30 stolen base mark this year to become the first Brewer to join the 30-30 club, and is just the 6th player in WPK history to do so (two players- Bud Lindsay and Justin Vargas- have done it twice, so Acuna's 30-30 season is the 8th in WPK history). Acuna's been in a mini-slump lately, well at least he was until he went 4 for 6 in yesterday's 11-1 victory over St. Louis (complete game win for young Mr. Bond). But perhaps the most impressive thing about Acuna's 30-30 season is that along with his 35 stolen bases he has only been caught trying 6 times.

[BirdWatcher]

Val Guzman is starting to display a trend- saving up his home runs for late in the season. Not only did he hit 3 in yesterday's 12-9 victory over St. Louis (Eric Maisch got his first big league win in this one) but 9 of his 14 bombs this season have come since July 10th.



With his 3 homer game Guzman becomes just the third Brewer to accomplish this, the most recent being Brett Taranto just last season. The other is the now retired Tanner Yurek, who had a 4-home run game in the Brewers inaugural 1965 season- the only WPK player yet to have done this- and also had a 3-homer game two seasons later.

[BirdWatcher]

The Pittsburgh Roadrunners first baseman (sometime second baseman) Nick Johnson, at the age of 25, is well on his way to superstardom in the WPK. He is already a fan favorite with the local faithful, with his strong work ethic and reputation for team loyalty. And yesterday he set a new single-season hit record when he went 3 for 5 against El Paso to get to 245 base knocks on the season, breaking the record of 244 set by Lazaro Lowndes in 1977.



Johnson's 3 for 5 game was his second in a row (the first coming against San Antonio) and in the game three days ago he was simply 4 for 4 against the Keys. He will almost surely win the batting title in the SJL this season. He has scored 133 runs with 29 doubles and 13 triples while also stealing 58 bases. Sure, he only has 2 home runs- power hitting not being his game- but he also has walked 77 times while only striking out 39 times. If it weren't for his teammate Matt Van der Heyden (also likely to set some single-season records this year) with his 11.1 WAR Johnson would likely be the front-runner for league MVP.

Don't rule out at least one of those in his trophy case before his big league career is over.

[BirdWatcher]

Yesterday the Denver Brewers earned their 100th win of the 1980 season. This makes it seven straight seasons in which they have won at least that many games. (Yes, I have mixed feelings about this- I am both simultaneously pleased and somewhat embarrassed to report this reality.)



In winning their 100th, they also saw rookie left-handed starting pitcher Austin Bond improve to 17-6 with a 3.44 ERA. Coming into Spring Training this year Bond wasn't even expected to crack the 25-man Opening Day roster. Obviously he has exceeded expectations by a bit. Veteran closer Tim Shore earned his 25th save (in 27 opportunities) and has a 1.15 ERA. Shore's next save will be the 300th of his career, which has a chance to land him in the Hall of Fame someday.



The day before another young Brewer starter got the win. Bryant Cox, who was 3-7 with a 4.53 ERA in 1979, his first extended stay on the big league club, improved to 18-6 with a 3.58 ERA with his win on Wednesday. He was mostly quite good in this game, although he did groove a pitch to Baltimore center fielder Mike Schimmel, who did this:


Wait, what? Okay, that's a bit silly but whatever. (EDIT: I should probably have highlighted the relevant portion here- but check out the distance on Schimmel's homer and you will see what I am talking about.)

The Brewers now have an 8 1/2 game lead over San Francisco with 16 games remaining.

[Sizeman21]

Mike Schimmel? More like Mike Schmidt! I don't think a 600 ft HR is possible even from the likes of players today. He must be juicing...just kidding.

[stevem810]

I guess it caught a pretty big breeze or landed on the back of pretty big bird on its exit path.

[BirdWatcher]

Originally Posted by Sizeman21

Mike Schimmel? More like Mike Schmidt! I don't think a 600 ft HR is possible even from the likes of players today. He must be juicing...just kidding.

One of the odd things (I mean, the length of the bomb is odd enough, obviously) about this is that Mike Schimmel isn't exactly known as one of the sluggers of the WPK. He is a great fielder- a 3 time-Gold Glove center fielder. And he possesses great speed and base stealing ability.
And granted he is starting to show some over-the-fence power as he heads into the peak years of his career but as you can see below he only got into double digits in home runs in the past two seasons (including the current one).

If you were making bets on who would hit an historically long homer in the WPK, you would probably pick someone like veteran sluggers Devin Schwisow or Ju-au Ju, or a young slugger like Mike Lovett (or, of course, the man with the most home runs in WPK history, Nate Bennett, except he spent this season languishing in AAA and has now retired, something I hadn't realized until I just looked him up), but you wouldn't likely put money down on Schimmel.

[BirdWatcher]

Originally Posted by stevem810

I guess it caught a pretty big breeze or landed on the back of pretty big bird on its exit path.

I wish I had taken a screenshot of the PBP, but I was a bit too exasperated by the context of the bomb in that particular game (erasing a 2-0 lead to give the Lords a 3-2 lead in the bottom of the 5th, although the Brewers would go on to win 9-7), but as I recall the wording was rather fitting.
If I remember correctly, it said something about Schimmel having launched the ball into orbit around Community Stadium (home of the Lords).

Edit: Also just checked and the wind was blowing out to left, which is where he hit this (over a tall warehouse that is right behind the left-field wall) but only at 9 mph.

[BirdWatcher]

...leaving behind so many what if's and could have been scenarios.




Jesse Cibula, at the tender age of 18, put up a 5.3 WAR season for the San Francisco Velocity back in the inaugural WPK campaign of 1965. And that was just the start for the kid out of Cortez, Colorado who looked like a sure future Hall of Famer by the time he won the MGL MVP award in 1970, still just 23 years old. Cibula combined great power and much more speed and running ability than one expects in a third baseman and although he was never defensively gifted his offensive skills were so prodigious that it hardly mattered. He was well liked, there was no hint that durability would be an issue, and it appeared he was on a path to be one of the greatest ever.
And then he suffered a freak injury, a broken kneecap, in late July of the 1971 season, and was out of action until early in the 1972 season. And when he came back he was still a fine ballplayer and ended up with a respectable 4.3 WAR in 1972. But in hindsight, it is clear that something had changed, that he was never quite the same again. After putting up another solid, if not up to his previous levels, 4 WAR season at age 27 in 1973, his career started to plummet from there. Although he never again sustained a serious injury- and even few minor ones- until this August, while playing in the low minors, when he was out for a month with a sprained knee- he just didn't have his previous talent any longer. And once he fell off the cliff, the plunge was steep and swift, and merciless.
Cibula, who loved the game and was willing to do whatever it took to prolong his career, knocked around the minor leagues the past 4 seasons, and other than a 56 game stint in A ball in 1978, in which he hit 15 bombs and put up 2.1 WAR, he mostly floundered there too, ending up by hitting .219/.285/.423 at single A this season with just 0.1 WAR in 151 plate appearances.

Even with all of that, the 8-time All-Star should receive some Hall of Fame votes and will very possibly appear on more than one ballot. But oh what could have been for the ultra-talented but star-crossed young man.

[BirdWatcher]

We are at the point of the schedule (well, a bit past it now, actually) where we get a glimpse into the future of the league in the form of an initial identification of two players who will enter the league at some point in the future (from as soon as next year in the WPK universe to decades in the future) who are related to current WPK players.

These players might be in the same generation- brothers or cousins- or in the next generation- nephews, sons and son-in-laws- or the generation after that- grandsons.
I won't go into great deal about the process now but will mention that it is almost entirely random (and largely analog) and that I don't interfere except perhaps in making sure that the name chosen doesn't displease my ear too much. What is identified is which current player will have a relative who is also a professional ballplayer, what the nature of the relationship will be, what the date of birth of that relative is and what draft class they will enter the WPK universe through, and finally what position they will play and which of the several player types/archetypes they will fit into.

In other words, if they are to be a pitcher they will fall into one of ten categories, which mostly describe their approach or style or strengths or tendencies as a pitcher. So there is a category for power pitchers with poor control and one for power pitchers with poor movement. And a category for junk balling control artists and one for corner-painting control artists. There is at least one that has more impact on their personality than their actual skills- the Lifer- someone with high leadership skills and adaptability and intelligence who could likely end up being in the game as a coach or manager well into the future. And if they get the lucky number 20 in a 1-20 number draw they get the superstar distinction and the likelihood of being a very high draft pick and top prospect. (None of these have been identified yet.)

Similarly with position players, after their primary initial position has been identified, they can fall into one of nine categories. Most are pretty self-explanatory: Defensive Whiz, Speedster, Slugger, the Walking Man. These are mostly about the existence of a particular area of strength in their game (often paired with some great weaknesses in other areas). Some are again more personality trait oriented: again, the Lifer, but also the Scrapper, Mr. Steady, and the utility-man designation which is a combination of several things. (To be fair, every category has some elements of skill sets, personality trait tendencies, and even durability tendencies.) And, always, the rare Superstar designation. (Again, none yet.)

My original approach was to create multiple templates of each player type for each position and then randomly identify which template was used for each new player. Eventually I decided that this was overly labor intensive and not the best way to create randomness in the areas where that was more appropriate. So now- and this is a work in progress- I am using spreadsheets that provide ranges of potential ratings for everything that needs to be addressed in the editor for each position and type of player. I then use a random number generator to identify where each player falls within the range they qualify for under each rating. This makes for a slightly longer process at the point of actual player creation but given that I am usually creating only 1 or 2 players for each draft, if any, that isn't an issue.

In the upcoming draft (the 1981 amateur draft) two players will be entering the league from this process and for the first time one of them will be the son of a former player. Madden Carr is the son of now retired former WPK relief pitcher John Carr who pitched for eleven season in the league, compiling a record of 48-32 with 81 saves and a career ERA of 2.72 for 10.7 WAR. Young Madden profiles as a starting pitcher of the Workhorse variety (as you would guess, high stamina, very durable). We will also see the younger brother of current Detroit Falcons middle infielder Phil Martin, himself only 24 and in his first year on the big league roster. His brother Hunter profiles as leftfielder who is a utility man (in this case then largely a 4th outfielder type who might also be able to play and infield position or two).

In addition to Hunter Martin the other future player identified recently is an interesting first for this process, as for the second time now (again, totally random) a future grandson of current WPK starting pitcher Victor Lugo has been identified as a future professional ballplayer. Previously we had learned that Axel Lugo would enter the draft as a corner-painting control artist pitcher in 2019 and now we learn that in 2033 his much younger cousin Zachary Lugo will also emerge as a utility-man type second baseman. Whether either or both of them will ever make it to the big leagues like their grandfather remains to be seen.

So some observations about the process thus far and a look at how it has worked out for some of the players who have already entered the WPK universe through it.
One of the early observations is that I need to dial back the defensive prowess of my defensive whiz category and even my utility-men to an extent. One of the very first players that was created was Curtis Horah, who is the younger cousin of now retired starting pitcher Dan Simmons. Horah was supposed to be a defensive whiz, and he certainly has been that, and then some. He has become, as well established in the WPK threads previously, the best defensive player thus far in league history. And largely because of that, and probably because I gave him some other traits that were a bit too developed to start, he has become pretty much a superstar without that having been the intention. He's likely a Hall of Famer, though he is wrecked now at age 31, having racked up 87.7 WAR in his career up to this point.
The other example is catcher Elvis Iniguez who is the brother of the now-retired former left fielder Jose Iniguez (5.9 career WAR). Elvis was supposed to be a utility-man type catcher- in other words, a good backup with solid defense but not a star or even a starter. But he is actually probably the most gifted defensive catcher in the game and good enough offensively that at age 27 he has already put up 30.1 WAR at the big league level.

Pitchers, on the other hand, have not fared as well through this process.
Nathanael Alvarez, the younger brother of Julio Alvarez (who had 78 career WPK saves with a career 2.86 ERA and retired in 1973), entered pro ball through the 1969 draft and retired in 1976 having appeared in just 6 WPK games. (He was a corner-painting control artist, but apparently not that good at actually getting hitters to bite or make weak contact.)
Owen Ballin, the brother of former WPK shortstop Fernando Ballin (retired 1975 with 14.9 career WAR), has done a bit better and currently is a member of the Pittsburgh Roadrunners bullpen, but only because he was called up on September 1st as a 29 year old submariner with good control but not much else. He has managed to pitch at the big league level for parts of 9 seasons but is just 10-16 with 18 saves and a 4.09 career ERA and it appears his best days, as unimpressive as they were, are in the past now.

Back in 1974 the Brewers drafted outfielder Darian Burdzy in the 2nd round. Burdzy is the cousin of former outfielder Kenny White, who had a brief and unsuccessful big league career and is still hanging on in the minor leagues but unlikely to make it back to the WPK. Burdzy profiled as fourth outfielder (utility-man type) with good speed and strong defensive skills but not much of a bat. Those things have all come true but in addition he is very injury prone, has never made it to the bigs even for a cup of coffee and at age 24 finds himself languishing in A-ball with little hope for a path to the WPK.

Lucas Hernandez, younger brother of now retired relief pitcher Angelo Hernandez, has just recently been promoted to the big leagues for the first time as he has joined the Portland Wild Things bullpen but has yet to pitch for them in a big league game. He is only 24, has an excellent fastball and good stuff and could develop his control a bit more (low movement type flamethrower, so home runs will be an issue), so some sort of big league career is still possible. Stardom? Almost surely not.

Slugging outfielder, now converted to first base, Toby Noguchi, the cousin of now retired relief pitcher Tetsuhiro Noguchi, is also for the first time on a WPK roster and has appeared in 5 games thus far this month with Pittsburgh and in 7 plate appearances he has a pair of hits including his first big league homer. Noguchi has game-changing power and a decent eye but he's also very slow, both in terms of foot speed and baseball smarts, is very prone to the swing and miss and likely will see this limit his big league success. Still, the power is elite and with his size he is a capable of first baseman in spite of limited range so some sort of big league career is likely.

And finally, Quincy Schultz, a defensively gifted center fielder whose older brother Josh is a star first baseman with Milwaukee, was drafted 9th overall in last year's draft and has risen to the ranking of #35 in the top 100 prospects list. He's still a few years away from the bigs, but it appears that I still have some work to do on not making defensive whiz outfielders better than intended. There is a decent chance that the Schultz brothers will become the best brother tandem in the game before long, though Josh is heading into the decline phase of his fine career.

[BirdWatcher]

With the regular season winding down, let's take a look at the current standings in the WPK:





As you can see we have a great pennant race going on in the SJL West between last year's SJL champs, San Antonio, and the 1979 WPK champs, El Paso. At the moment neither are playing particularly well and the oddsmakers give the advantage to San Antonio with 11 games remaining for each team, but its what happens on the field that matters. In case you are wondering, the two teams do face each other one last time in a three-game series that starts in just a few days time.

It looks like the Pittsburgh Roadrunners will take the SJL East, though Philly is still trying to fight their way into the picture. They also have one series left against each other at the end of the month, the penultimate series on the regular season schedule for each.

Over in the MGL, it appears that the expansion Montreal Royals will in fact make the playoffs in their first ever WPK season. They might even manage to do it with a winning record, even if only slightly. Brooklyn is their nearest competitor and time is running out fast for that perennially under-achieving club.

And in the MGL West, well, yeah, the Brewers are pretty much there, with their magic number down to 2 with 12 games remaining on their schedule. Sadly for the San Francisco Velocity this will probably be a season where they finish with the second best record in the WPK and don't make the post-season.

[BirdWatcher]

The Brewers took another step towards their fifth straight post-season appearance with an 8-1 win against the Phoenix Speed Devils in Phoenix. And it was appropriate that they moved to within one win (or San Francisco loss) of clinching the pennant behind the arm of rookie left-hander Austin Bond. Having watched fellow young hurler Bryant Cox get demolished by the Speed Devils (and remember, this is the best hitter's park in the WPK) the day before (Cox gave up 7 runs on 12 hits in just 4 innings pitched), Bond shut down the home team on 5 hits in an impressive complete game victory, the only run allowed being of the unearned variety.
(EDIT: Oh, and I just realized that our next series, starting today, is against San Francisco. So a Brewers win is synonymous with a San Francisco loss, at least for the next three games.)



Brewers 4th outfielder Eric Hammock led the way offensively with a 5 for 5 day, hitting a pair of doubles to get to 12 on the season and also hit his 14th home run. We haven't talked about Hammock much here. He's a conundrum. On pretty much any other team in the WPK he would be the starting right fielder and likely hitting cleanup in the lineup. His offensive numbers aren't a fluke or the result of a small sample size. He has a reasonable .316 BABIP and all scouting indications are that he is a gifted batter, possessed with near elite contact skills, gap power, home run power, and even ability to avoid striking out. His on-base skills, his eye, is at least above average. And this coming off-season he will probably find himself traded to another team, where he will probably become a force and even an MVP candidate. There is just no place for him in the Denver outfield. And not only because it is a talented and crowded outfield, but because he doesn't play Brewers baseball. He isn't a horrible defensive right fielder, but his range is merely average (-2.7 ZR), he is prone to sloppy play (7 errors), although he does have a strong arm. He's a slow runner, though a bit above average on the base paths. He's reportedly smart and certainly not a bad clubhouse presence. He's just not a Brewer. (Basically, he is another Mike Lovett. Like Lovett it will be best if the Brewers can at least find him a nice home in the SJL.)



On the other hand, young Matt Catlett is a Brewer outfielder. Catlett went 3 for 5 in this latest win, hitting his 16th double and 6th home run. Catlett is an excellent defensive left fielder and an above average center fielder, though his arm is merely average at best. He has even better contact skills than Hammock, but far less power. He's a fast runner and has elite base stealing and base running savvy. He's a sparkplug and profiles as durable. In 264 plate appearances this season he is hitting .363/.391/.524 and has put up 3.0 WAR. (For comparison, Hammock has 2.4 WAR with 241 plate appearances.) And while veteran center fielder Joe McPhillips has had another fine season (.307/.389/.536, 4.3 WAR) with Joe's propensity for injury, it will be valuable to have a player who can step in and start in center with very little drop off in production, if any. The trick in 1981 will just be finding enough playing time for four talented outfielders, including Catlett, McPhillips, Val Guzman, and MVP Antonio Acuna.



Speaking of durability and injuries, the Brewers 29-year old first baseman Brett Taranto is considered an Iron Man and up until now has never suffered any injury, of any length or severity, in his professional baseball career. That ended in yesterday's game when he had to be pulled from the game in the first inning. The diagnosis is a sprained elbow and the injury is considered day to day with a moderate effect on his throwing but in an abundance of caution the team will be placing him on the 10-day IL and he might not be back to full-strength until the second round of the post-season, if the Brewers make it that far. Fortunately the team has some good options in his absence, primarily Ben Flynn but also third baseman Jake DiCesare (Jose Figueroa can take over as the third base starter). Taranto was having a somewhat disappointing season well into the month of August, but he's had a surge here late in the season and he will be missed in the lineup.

[BirdWatcher]

By most advanced metrics, Jim Atwell has been the best pitcher in the MGL this season. And yet, he has the least impressive win-loss record on his own team. It has just been that kind of season, with the team so often failing to provide their young hard-throwing righty with run support.
They didn't give him much in yesterday's game either, but then again he didn't need much, tossing a 1-hit shutout over the San Francisco Velocity to help his team clinch the MGL West title.




Having watched his teammate Sadahige Kawasaki get denied his 22nd win of the 1980 season in a game 1 loss in San Francisco, Atwell simply dominated, allowing a 1-out single in the bottom of the first and nothing more after that.
Veteran catcher Kirk Patnode provided most of the offense in this one, going 3 for 4 and driving in 2 runs. Patnode is best known for his excellent defensive skills and is having a poor year at the plate (.236/.312/.272) but when it mattered most the veteran leader came through for his teammates and was behind the plate to guide Atwell through his near no-hit masterpiece.

[BirdWatcher]

The Brewers veteran closer Tim Shore is the first WPK pitcher ever to collect 300 saves in his career, and he got #300 in a tight win over San Francisco yesterday.



Next after Shore on the career list is now retired great, and almost sure Hall of Famer, Jamel McNeil at 280, and third is 31-year old Ben Bakeman, who has 211.

Given the impressive numbers that Shore continues to put up in his mid-30's it is certainly possible that he will be the second relief pitcher (assuming McNeil gets in once he is eligible, which is almost guaranteed in spite of how hated he was during his time in the league) to enter the WPK Hall.

Shore is signed with the Brewers through the 1982 season.

[BirdWatcher]

With another strong showing in what will surely be his last start of the 1980 regular season (7 innings pitched, 7 hits allowed, 2 runs allowed but only 1 earned, 7 strikeouts, and no walks), 23 year-old (he turns 24 in two days) left-hander Austin Bond earned his 19th win of the season and was named both the Pitcher of the Month and the Rookie of the Month in the MGL for September.




Bond is by far the most pleasant surprise for the Brewers this season and all indications are that he will play an important role in the rotation for years to come.

[BirdWatcher]

With only a small handful of days left in the 1980 WPK regular season we now know who three of the four teams competing in the first round of the post-season will be.

In the SJL West, the El Paso Dawgs chose a bad time to go into a team slump, handing the division title to San Antonio, the reigning SJL pennant winners, though give some credit to the Keys who overcame a small slump of their own to win their most recent six games.


They will be taking on the Pittsburgh Roadrunners, who led the way in the SJL East for most of the second half of the season, led by their sure league MVP right fielder Matt Van der Heyden.




The only question that remains is which team from the MGL East the Denver Brewers will face in the first round. The expansion Montreal Royals hold a narrow lead over their only challenger at this point, the ever under-achieving Brooklyn Aces. Montreal has 3 games remaining, all away versus the Charlotte Sting, while Brooklyn plays 4 more at home versus Oklahoma City (though one of them, technically, is a make up away game.)

Denver, meanwhile, has now won 109 games (the most recent win giving Sadahige Kawasaki a 22-8 record to end the regular season), two wins shy of the franchise record of 111 wins set in 1978.

[BirdWatcher]

And the Montreal Royals, with just two days left in the regular season, have done something normally unthinkable for an expansion club in their first season- they have moved on to the post-season by winning the MGL East division.
And thankfully for WPK fans, they are also guaranteed to finish with a winning record (even if not by much.)
Their reward is a best of 7-game series against the powerful Denver Brewers.

[BirdWatcher]

Yesterday the Brewers top prospect (#6 overall in the WPK) Eric Maisch pitched his 4th big league start and although the Brewers lost the game to Portland 2-1, he pitched a respectable 6 innings, giving up 2 runs on 6 hits with the big blow being a 2-run first inning home run by former Brewer John Flores.

Having received a taste of the big leagues Maisch is expected to be in the rotation during the 1981 season and big things are expected of him going forward.



He also learned yesterday that he had earned the Pitcher of the Year award in his AAA league as a member of the Chester Big Stick.

The latest scouting report from Ulrik Berthlesen and his team continue to be very encouraging and they report an uptick in his average velocity from 89-91 mph to 90-92. The long ball is likely to be his biggest challenge but with stuff that looks like it will top out as elite (an amazing changeup to go along with an elite level curveball and excellent fastball) and still developing but likely excellent control at his peak, this shouldn't hold him back much at all.