June 18, 1928
It has been a couple of sim weeks since my last update but during that time not much has changed for the Kings, at least as far as the Continental Association standings are concerned. Brooklyn remains in 3rd place in the CA, 3 games back of front-running Cleveland and 2 behind the second place New York Stars. Philadelphia, which took 3 from us a couple weeks back, is also right in the mix.
This is a big week for the Kings as today we make the short trip to Riverside Stadium to start a 4 game set with the Stars before finishing the week with two in Baltimore and then a return home Sunday for a brief 1 game visit to Kings County Park from the Montreal Saints. However, it is the New York series that is most important in the minds of Kings fans and players alike. We had a rough start to the season series with the Stars but have improved our record against them to 5-6 so far this year in the battle for local bragging rights.
There have been a couple of significant roster moves since my last update. I finally promoted Mike Taylor, the much talked about 22 year old who had recently moved up to #2 on the league top 100 prospects list. Taylor, converted recently from catcher to first base so I could play him in Brooklyn, had quite the debut. He was named Continental Association player of the week in his first go around at big league pitching, batting .440 with 4 doubles, a triple and 7 rbi's in his first 7 games. I think it is safe to say he has, at least for the short-term, relegated Lou Garman (.302,3,33) to a backup role.
I also called up 23 year old outfielder Gus Powell. I have not written much about Powell, who was an 9th round pick out of Lincoln College (formerly Illinois before the commissioner fictionalized the school names to tie in with a future football and basketball online Figment League). Powell was very good at Class B Tampa a year ago, belting 30 homers in 103 games while batting .297. This season he was promoted to AA Knoxville, where he hit .303 with 7 homers in 37 games before moving up to AAA Houston. He was on fire with the Bulls, hitting .382 with 13 homers in 18 starts and got the call to Brooklyn because backup outfielder Clarence Hall and starter Bud Rogers were struggling off late. I sent Hall down to AAA to get some AB's and find his game. Kings Manager Wally Grant decided to bench Rogers for the week and put Powell in the starting lineup. He homered in his first FABL at bat but struggled the rest of the week and ended up going just 4-for-24 (.167) in his 6 starts. Grant has indicated he will stick with Powell in leftfield at least to start the series with the Stars.
Powell has been completely overlooked so far in his career. Despite hitting 29 homers in 143 college games and batting .350 he lasted until the 9th round of the draft. Despite a 30 homer season in Tampa he was never mentioned on the top 100 prospect list and to this day is still not ranked on the Kings top 30 prospect page (neither is Lynn Randall for that matter) so he has a real chip on his shoulder and something to prove to the league. Riverside Stadium would be a great place for him to make a statement, don't you think.