Sal, the Barber Presents . . .

[Sal, The Barber]

This report was written a while ago, but I never posted it. It's the bridge between the old posts and the next one.


1 May 2011
Cheyenne, WY

To say the start of the 2011 season in Cheyenne has been a challenge is understatement. Our Cowboys sit in last place in the Pacific Division, one game under .500. The division leader is Oakland even though they lost a lot of valuable players this offseason. The division lead over us is 4 games.

We’ve had injuries this season. Currently, Francis Trujillo is on the DL. So are starters Jeff Racine and Jose Gomez. The offense has struggled, although we’re doing better lately. It’s hard, though, to know if we’re getting better or if we just got lucky. We had lost 5 games in a row and then Topeka came to town. Topeka has distinguished itself already as the worst team in our league. We swept the Owls which, I’m afraid, just makes our stats look better.

Andrew Hicks is hitting .232. Tim Nicholson is batting under .200. Frank Hankins has 3 hits on the season—in about 50 ABs. Pelletier has become our primary catcher. Joe Martin took the starting job away from Nicholson but then Trujillo got hurt.

Our pitchers have been striking out everyone. Jack Lee fanned 11 in 5 innings yesterday. Albert Dominguez has 34 Ks in 30 innings. Jose Vincent is averaging one K per inning. But these guys are lucky to go 6 innings, and our bullpen is having to eat a lot of innings. Racine started the season at AAA and is now hurt. He usually gives us innings. He and Curt Clark. We need longer starts from our starters.

And we need to be patient. It’s a long season, but we haven’t wakened to it yet.

[Sal, The Barber]

8 July 2011
Cheyenne, WY

NOTE: You’re reading dates correctly. I haven’t posted in ages. I have kept playing—slowly. Pardon the long “catch-up” post.

If you went back and read the couple of posts with a 2011 dateline, you’ll remember that we started the year poorly. We sat in last place for a little while and suffered through a number of injuries to important players. We are still plagued by injuries. But, at the All-Star Break, our record was 50-30. We were back in first place in the division, 2.5 games ahead of Oakland.

Here’s the news as it relates to individual players.

Curt Clark did a stint on the DL, but he’s back, and he has been throwing well. He’s in the last year of his contract (he’s the highest paid player on our team, making 18 million), and he has expressed an interest in extending. However, he is asking far too much for too long. I’m planning on letting him walk. I have no plans to trade him because I want him pitching for us in the playoffs and WS, if we get there. We have eight starters who could ably pitch in the majors right now. It’s time to let the older, more expensive pitcher move on.

Jeff Racine is back up from AAA, he’s off the DL, and he’s pitching well. We just signed Racine to a reasonable extension over the All-Star Break. The contract is for 4 years, although the last year is at Racine’s option. It moves from 9 million to 11 to 14 then back to 12. I don’t expect Racine to take that final year. But that’s a good deal for a number 2 starter.

The other starters are Jose Vincent, Albert Dominguez, and Jose Gomez. Dominguez has just finished a stint on the DL, and Gomez is back on the DL for the second time this season. Gomez has pitched incredibly well. His current ERA is about 2.00. He still gives us about 6 innings each start because he has some control issues and he doesn’t have Curt Clark’s stamina. But he continues to exceed expectations.

Beginning of the season starter Jack Lee has spent a majority of the season at AAA, although he’s up now filling in for Gomez. He’s been inconsistent, striking out a lot of batters and giving up a lot of runs.

The bullpen was the biggest reason we struggled early. Their collective ERA is 5th in the Western League. Gabrielle Robles, our closer, has blown 5 saves. He keeps his WHIP around 1.00 but gives up HRs. He was getting better but blew his last save opportunity. Lee Perkins and Kazuki Takano have had good years, and the rest of the pen is improving. As they have gotten better, our record has gotten better. We signed Lee Perkins to a 4-year extension. He and Takano provide solid set-up relieving for 3-4 million per year.

Tom Hall is arbitration-eligible at the end of the season, and my inclination right now is not to tender him. We have pitchers at AAA ready to move into major league roles. However, two relievers who have seen major league time before, Augusto Gonzalez and Jack Hayden, remain in AAA. Gonzalez was up for a while has not been effective enough. He got injured, and after he recovered we sent him back down to AAA.

We also claimed a former closer, Enrique Ruiz, off of waivers. With a number of injuries to pitchers and a struggling bullpen, I thought it prudent to add Ruiz as some insurance. He’s the last arm in our pen and has been serviceable.

The big news for the offense has been injuries to Eric Kelham and Joe Robbins. They hit 1-2 in our order. What’s been remarkable is that we’ve made up so much ground in the division without them. Both are returning to the lineup now and will start the first game after the All-Star Break.

Jose Herrera and Ron Daggett have served as our middle infielders in Kelham’s and Robbins’ places. Herrera proved more valuable by hitting a little better than Daggett and by doing it for longer (Kelham was out longer than Robbins). But the injuries affected our depth more than anything. Herrera and Daggett played every inning of every game for a month. So did third baseman Manny Davilla and first baseman Andrew Hicks. In some ways, that has helped us—because Hicks and Davilla are having All-Star seasons, but I do worry if they’ll tire down the stretch.

In the outfield, Frankie Trujillo has missed time because of injury and now so has Max Makeever. Trujillo has had the better season. Frankie, Hicks, and Davilla have driven our offense, an offense that ranks 2nd in runs, SB, and OBP and first in HRs.

Tim Nicholson has not taken over a starting role. He’s struggled and remains our fourth outfielder and a pinch hitter. We haven’t played Joe Martin enough. He’s a righty, and I’ve been trying too hard to get more lefties in our lineup. Martin is hitting over .300, so he’ll see more time in the second half of the season. Martin was a great summer FA signing. He’s playing for $900,000 or so. He’d like to stay in Cheyenne, but he’s asking for 5 million. I’d like to keep him as a platoon player in left field but not at those prices.

The real star of the season so far, though, has been Roland Pena. Pena is a guy I picked up in a trade a couple of years back. He’s improving and with Nicholson not seizing a spot in the outfield, Pena got a chance. For a while, he was hitting .500. He’s now hitting around .350, and that will keep regressing, but with all our injuries he’s been an invaluable fill-in.

One final note about our roster. We have more catchers than I know what to do with. Frank Hankins has become our back-up. He’s hit terribly, although he’s been getting better. Our starter, Stephen Pelletier, has been fine. Hankins is signed through next season. That’s one season too many as far as I’m concerned. We have two catchers at AAA ready to play and one at AA ready to move up. I’d try to trade these guys except I don’t know who to trade them for. I’ve got the lineup depth to fill injury holes. That’s what these fringe players are for. And I’ve got prospects. I guess in the off season I’ll have to do some inventory and try to figure out how I can move my surplus and fill a need.

Which leads to one more observation about my overall organization. I’ve noticed this for a while. I’ve got a lot of adequate AAA players and a few AA players pushing to move up. I’ve also got a lot of Rookie ball players and players in A who should really be in rookie ball. It’s tough to fill my A-ball roster. That’s the level that gets squeezed.

I’m making a couple of lineup moves as I open the second half of the season. I’ll talk about them in my next post.

[Sal, The Barber]

17 July 2011
Kansas City, MO

When Eric Kelham went on the DL, I moved Joe Robbins up from second to first in the lineup and brought Francis Trujillo up to the second spot. I like Trujillo there mostly because he’s lefthanded. My ideal batting order would be Kelham-Robbins-Davilla, but all three hit righthanded. I don’t want to start my lineup against a righthanded pitcher that way.

When Robbins went down too, I moved Roland Pena to leadoff; he’s a lefty. And when facing a lefty, Ron Daggett led off. Daggett was playing second for Kelham. But Daggett is back on the bench, and Pena just got injured. Pena will be out for the rest of the season. Max Makeever will come back and play center, but he’s got another week on the DL. Makeever is a righty, so his return won’t solve my lineup issues. Makeever has a good eye, but he strikes out a lot. I like him lower in the lineup—fifth or sixth.

So coming out of the All-Star Break, I lead Kelham off, then stuck with Trujillo in the second spot. Davilla hit third, then Hicks. The rest of the order is mix and match, especially with Makeever out. Joe Martin is usually the fifth hitter. But I haven’t mentioned Robbins. What to do with him?

So I put him ninth and batted my pitcher eighth.

The problem with this is that Robbins is such a good hitter that he seems wasted batting ninth. He hits, he walks, he can run. But I don’t know what else to do unless I move Davilla from the three spot and put Hicks there or Trujillo. So I’m trying all that out to find what works best.

We came out of the AS Break with 3 games against Oakland. They didn’t go well. Oakland is stacked with lefthanded hitters. We have one lefty in our bullpen, Kazuki Takano, and one in our rotation, Jack Lee. But Lee is there because Jose Gomez is hurt.

So I knew I had to be clever to get the best out of Takano against Oakland. In the first game, we had a 3-2 lead going into the eighth. I pitched Takano in the eighth. But, in the ninth, instead of defaulting to Gabriel Robles, our closer, I looked at the lefty splits. Robles has been homer-prone, and his ERA against lefties is terrible. So I went to one of the two relievers who get out lefties (besides Takano), Lee Perkins. Perkins gave up 3 runs, and we lost, 5-3.

In game two, we had a two run lead heading into the final innings. I pitched Tom Hall in the eighth (the other righty who is good against lefties) and gave Takano the ninth. Both did the job, and we won, 6-4.

In game three, we again had a lead heading into the ninth. Jeff Racine had gone 8 innings, and we led 4-3. Takano had pitched two straight games, so I went with Robles. He gave up 3, and we lost, 5-4.

So all of this led me to decide that I needed another lefthanded reliever in my bullpen. So I traded Augusto Gonzalez for Raul Torres. Torres had been closing for Boise. His ERA has not been good (think 5.00), but he gets a good scouting report and has had an ERA under 3.00 the past two seasons. We’ll see how it goes when we get Oakland again. We still hold a 2 game lead on them in the division.

[Sal, The Barber]

20 August 2011
On the road

We have a day off as we travel from Oakland to Topeka. I wanted to go back a few decades and take the train, but I don’t think we would have made it in time for tomorrow’s game. There’s not as much romance in flying.

Our two game lead on Oakland has grown. We’ve played well lately (we won 9 in a row to end July, then won another to start August), mostly on the strength of our starting pitching, and opened up a 7.5 game lead in the division. We just split a 2-game series with the Oaks.

We lost the first game after going up 2-0. In the fifth inning, Curt Clark gave up a run and had a couple of runners on when he got what should have been an inning ending grounder to Kelham at second. But Kelham booted the ball, allowing another run to score and Luis Manuel Garcia to bat. Garcia knocked one over the fence, adding 3 more runs. Clark had given up 5, but 4 were unearned. We never recovered and lost the game 7-5. Oakland has vastly improved their bullpen the last couple of seasons, so it’s difficult to catch up and pass them when chasing.

The second game was our game. Jose Gomez shut out the Oaks for 6 innings. The bullpen chipped in 3 more scoreless, and our offense blew them out. We won 11-0, scoring 6 in the ninth. We beat their best pitcher, Jorge Garcia, who we often seem to beat. This game felt like what happens when we play well. When we don’t, we usually still have a chance, but against good teams that chance becomes very small.

And we’ll look ahead to good teams. Maybe not in the LCS. Kansas City currently leads the Cornhusker Division, and they’re 10 games behind us. But Halifax has the same record as us in the East, and Youngstown is the best team in baseball, 6 games better than us. The Eastern League playoffs should be great, and we’ll have to be playing well to bring home another WS ring.

[Sal, The Barber]

20 September 2011
Boise, ID

Yesterday, we scored 6 runs in the first inning against a Boise team that is in last place in our division, 8 games under .500. But the Braves came back and won the game, 9-7. I want to say that that game right there is the lowest point to which we will sink this season. And I want to claim that today signified our arrival back at the surface. Today, Boise put up 5 runs in the first two innings. But today it was our turn. We scored 9 runs in the eighth and ninth and won, 9-6.

The win clinched the division and another trip to the playoffs. I’ve missed the playoffs just one time in my now 10 years in charge of the Cheyenne baseball club. That means we’ve won the division 9 times in 10 tries. And the year we missed? We won 102 games. 102 wins is the second best record we’ve achieved in ten years in Cheyenne.

But enough patting myself on the back. Except let me mention that in 9 playoff runs, we’ve won the WS 5 times. I say that only to say that this year I’m not so confident.

We are the third team to clinch a division. Youngstown did it a week ago. They are the best team in baseball. They’ve been atop the power rankings the second half of the season, and their record is 8 wins ahead of ours (we have 8 games left in the season). Halifax clinched yesterday, but they trail our record by a couple of wins. Kansas City should be our playoff opponent, but it’s not yet official.

We just have not been playing well. Check out our month-by-month record. Remember we got off to a terrible start.
April 11-13
May 18-9
June 19-7
July 15-7
August 20-10
September (so far) 8-9

The best part of our team is our starting pitching. The bullpen continues to blow leads in the late innings at times. But they have brought their collective ERA back to 3rd in the WL; it had sunk as low as 5th. And our offense is still pretty good. We’ve lost some offensive ground. We’re ranked 2nd in HRs when we had led most of the first half of the season. And our batting average is ranked 4th. That had been better earlier in the year, too. The playoffs will be a real challenge. You’ll get a game-by-game report; my next post will be in the midst of the post-season.


PLEASE NOTE: I would like to take a minute to thank those of you who read regularly and especially those who leave their thanks. Reports from this season have been infrequent and irregular, and I am grateful that you have stuck with this dynasty. It helps to know that readers are interested in my Cowboys. Thanks.

[Orcin]

Good luck in the playoffs! It's hard to believe that 10 seasons will be in the books soon.

[Sal, The Barber]

3 October 2011
Cheyenne, WY

LCS Notes: Before I recap game one of the LCS, let me pass along some information. Jose Gomez, one of our starting pitchers, injured a hamstring in his last start of the regular season. Doctors believe that he will not be able to pitch for 2 months. He is, then, essentially, on the DL and unavailable for the playoffs. This is bad news for us; however, it does make all decisions about our pitching rotation for the playoffs pretty easy. We will go with a 4-man rotation, leaving Gomez out. Jose Vincent, who’s been our best pitcher recently, pitched the final game of the regular season, so we’ll put his in the #3 slot. He’ll get game 3 and game 7 if there is one. We’ll start Jeff Racine and put Curt Clark in the #2 spot. Clark has been hot lately. Gomez, by the way, has been struggling a bit anyway. Our 4th starter, Albert Dominguez, has also cooled off. He may be tired, as he did not pitch nearly as many innings last season.

We’ve added Wesley Huffman to our playoff roster in Gomez’s place. He was the only other player eligible. We brought Huffman up from AA when Max Makeever went on the DL. This is a complicated story, so stick with me. We got Huffman in the middle of this season in a swap of minor league outfielders. We traded Larry Gallant, from our AAA ballclub, for Huffman. Huffman’s got a bit more potential than Gallant, at least according to our scout Jodi Mack. We also had a lot of outfielders at AAA. We also had a lot of outfielders at AA. Huffman, like almost all these outfielders at both minor league levels, was playing but not every day. Still, we got a lot of inquiries about Gallant before the trade deadline. It didn’t appear to me that Gallant would ever play for the big club. There are, in my mind, two outfielders ahead of him, and Gallant is in his mid-twenties. So I figured I’d trade him since teams seemed to want him.

We placed Huffman at AA when we got him, and he performed well. The final layer to all of this is that our AAA and AA clubs were in first place in their divisions. So when Makeever got hurt, I didn’t want to dip down and take a key offensive player from either team to have him sit on our major league bench. That’s why I promoted Huffman. And Huffman was fine. And he’ll be fine in the post season. We’ll use him to pinch hit and maybe play the field and maybe pinch run. He’s not going to be a hero, but he’ll be serviceable.

By the way, the success of our minor league clubs kept us, too, from promoting anybody September 1st. That kept our regulars in the lineup more than perhaps we would have liked. But both our AAA team and AA team won their minor league championships. So I think it was worth it. It’s not a bad thing to have guys come up to your team with some, albeit minor league, playoff experience.

There are a couple of things to say about Kansas City before the playoffs begin. They have good pitching. Starters’ ERA and bullpen ERA are ranked 2nd in the WL. Their offense isn’t scary. But they do have Bruce Charles. He’s a beast. Most HRs in league history. We’re careful with him, and we will continue to be. He hits cleanup.

Ok. Writing all of that has calmed me down some. Game One was a heart-racer. Jeff Racine versus Ron Thompson. Thompson’s ERA = 2.72. Racine’s ERA = 2.49. Yep, that’s what we got, a pitching duel.

Really, the game was boring. We got a couple of hits in the early innings. Joe Robbins singled in the first inning but got thrown out stealing. KC didn’t get a hit until the fourth. Racine was sharp. I felt that if we just got one run, we’d win.

In the seventh, Davilla led off with a walk. Hicks followed and homered. 2-0. There it was.

Racine came back out for the eighth. He had given up only 4 hits. He finished the eighth with just over 100 pitches. But in the ninth KC had the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th hitters, all lefties. This was also each of these guy’s fourth time up. So we started the ninth with Kazuki Takano, our lock-down lefty. The score was still 2-0.

Tony White, KC’s CF, led off with a double. Lefties aren’t supposed to hit Takano, but White also didn’t matter; he was only one run. Takano got Andrew Caffey, KC’s LF, to ground to Kelham at second. White moved to third. One out. Charles was next. The count went full on Charles—at least we had Charles up with only one on. That’s how I think about pitching to Charles. I don’t want him killing us. We’ll take a beating from him. Just keep us alive. But not this time. Takano struck him out.

Antonio Maldonado was next, a lefty and another KC outfielder. He’s a good hitter, but they pinch hit for him, bringing on Miguel Villarreal, a righty. I was sticking with Takano because two batters from Villarreal was another lefty. But I did get Robles up in the pen. Villarreal singled. White walked home, and the game was 2-1.

John Parker was next. 2 out. Man on first. Parker worked the count full, then walked. The next hitter was a lefty. But KC again went to a righthanded pinch hitter. I decided to stick with Takano. I’m not sure why. I guess I thought I’d let him try to get out of it before he gave up the lead. So KC brought on Jean-Claude Gautier, a Frenchman for goodness sakes! And damned if the Frenchie didn’t line one into right for a base hit.

So Villarreal rounded third and headed home to score the tying run. Except that Francis Trujillo plays right field for us, and he has a strong arm. And an accurate one. Trujillo fielded the ball, threw home, and Villarreal was out. Game over.

[Sal, The Barber]

6 October 2011
Kansas City, MO

KC crushes us in game two. It’s never close. Curt Clark is not sharp. Bruce Charles hits two 2-run HRs. We are never in the game and lose, 8-2.

But there’s more important news. Apparently, Miguel Villarreal was hurt in game one on the final play—his slide into home. It’s a leg injury, and he’ll be out for the rest of the playoffs. I should have also mentioned that KC is without their closer for this series. He’s been out for a while with a hamstring injury, and he won’t be back for this series. Not that they’ve needed him yet.

And, finally, Max Makeever is hurt in game two, making a diving catch in the outfield. It’s an elbow injury, and he’ll be out for the rest of the playoffs. This isn’t good news for us. We’ll move Francis Trujillo to center and play some combination of Joe Martin, Tim Nicholson, and Jose Herrera in the corners. But both Nicholson and Herrera are a step down from Makeever.

Game three goes the same way as game two, except in our favor. Before there is even an out, Andrew Hicks hits a grand slam. KC is never in the ballgame. Jose Vincent is pretty good, and we win, 8-3.

Youngstown has taken all 3 games so far against Halifax, although they have lost one of their starters, Kyle Phillips. Phillips hit .327 on the year with 18 HRs and 29 SBs.

[Sal, The Barber]

8 October 2011
Kansas City, MO

The first game of this series gave the wrong impression. The rest have not been close. KC does it again to even the series. They crush us, knocking 5 HRs. They take Game Four, 9-3. There’s more bad news. Andrew Hicks is hit by a pitch and dislocates a finger. He’ll be out a couple of games.

So on to Game Five, the last in KC. Back to Racine vs. Thompson. This one starts all offense, too. We get two in the first on a Davilla triple (that scores Kelham) and a Martin single that scores Davilla. Davilla is playing first base for the first time all year. Herrera is manning third. Martin and Nicholson are in the outfield corners.

KC comes back in the bottom half of the first and ties the game. They get a double, a hit by pitch, a sac fly, and another double.

But, as I say, offense rules the day, and we get two more in the second. Robbins and Trujillo get run-scoring singles, and this is a good sign for Trujillo who has been freakishly cold. I swear he lost 30 points on his batting average at the end of the season. I mean this cold streak is unnaturally long.

But KC comes right back in their half of the second and gets one on a sac fly. It’s 4-3. KC also removes their starter Ron Thompson. So we get their bullpen for seven innings.

We take one inning off and wait ‘til the fourth to score again. KC has this guy playing third base who is guaranteed to make an error a game. Except for today. He makes two. So that error combined with two singles and a walk give us two more runs. It’s 6-3.

And here it seems that Jeff Racine has calmed down. He shuts KC out for a couple of innings. Jose Herrera adds a HR in the fifth, and at the end of the sixth, it’s 7-3.

We score twice more in the top of the seventh thanks to that second error by the KC third baseman. But the Monarchs come back and score two in the bottom of the seventh with help from a passed ball and a walk.

The ninth beckons, and we hold a 3-run lead at 9-6. KC has all lefties scheduled to bat, hitters 2, 3, and 4, so we go to Takano. For some reason, Takano likes to pitch with at least one man on base; he always puts the lead off guy on. Sure enough, Tony White doubles to start the inning. Andrew Caffey flies out, but it’s a deep enough fly to move White to third. Bruce Charles is next. Takano strikes him out. And Takano strikes Maldonado out to end the game.

We have the series lead now, 3 games to 2. Youngstown has finished off Halifax, 4 games to 1.

[Sal, The Barber]

10 October 2011
Cheyenne, WY

Game 6 features Curt Clark against Justin Moore. It’s not a good game for Clark; he doesn’t make it through the fifth. Here’s the problem with Clark now. He gives up hits. 10 of them in 4.2 innings. By the time Clark leaves the game, he’s faced some of KC’s batters three times already. Even when he manages to escape innings, he does so with a cost—a rising pitch count and a constant turning over of the opponent’s lineup. It doesn’t lead to good things.

In this case, the good things Clark’s performance doesn’t lead to are runs, a victory, a series win. In fact, Clark’s performance leads to Kansas City runs. Five of them.

And, frankly, Clark isn’t the only guy deserving of criticism here. Where’s our offense? Against a middle of the road starting pitcher we muster 4 hits in seven innings. Zero runs. Then, two mediocre relievers continue the shut out, not even allowing a hit.

We lose 5-0. We go to game 7 tomorrow. By the way, we started Andrew Hicks today with a dislocated finger. He wasn’t good at the plate, and I took him out of the game halfway through. I’ll leave him on the bench tomorrow. But we have no one on the bench with him and Makeever hurt. That’s one thing that’s crippling our offense.

[Sal, The Barber]

11 October 2011
Cheyenne, WY

Jose Vincent starts for us. This is the guy we want to pitch the decisive game. KC is starting Don Stinson. Stinson lasted 3 innings in his previous start, and he’s got below average stuff and about average control. He’s a back-end starter who we should pound.

But we’re playing like we belong in the pound—the dog pound, and we’re the dogs no body wants. We don’t get a hit until the fifth! In the meantime, KC is struggling with Vincent’s stuff, but their error-prone third baseman, who all the sudden is not making any errors, hits one out to left. It’s not even wind-assisted, as the breeze is blowing out to right. But they only have 2 hits, it is just that one of them was that HR. After 5, it’s 1-0 KC.

It gets worse. Vincent starts the eighth inning by walking the lead off hitter. That’s it for Jose. We go to Lee Perkins. Perkins gets an out, but it’s a sac bunt. Then Perkins gives up a hit, scoring the runner from second. Takano comes on to get out of the inning, but now we’re behind 2-0.

They go to their mediocre bullpen and bring on Oliver Montoya. I’ve been waiting for the move to the bullpen. We always have an advantage against a bad bullpen, and KC’s is not great. But I had hoped we’d have more than 2 innings against it. That’s already a bad sign. An additional bad sign is that Montoya breezes through 3 of our hitters in the eighth. We’re down to our last bats.

Remember KC is without its normal closer. We bring ours on to pitch the top of the ninth. Robles has been inconsistent all year, and we get bad Robles at exactly the wrong time. A single, a walk, a single, and a sac fly score 2 more KC runs. We go to the ninth down 4-0.

Since we’ve come home for Games 6 & 7, we’ve played 17 innings of baseball. And scored 0 runs.

Montoya stays on the mound for KC, and Kelham leads off with a single. Joe Robbins follows with a liner to the gap, scoring Kelham. Robbins is on second base. No outs. KC turns to their replacement closer, Francisco Rangel. We’ve seen this guy one thousand times over the last 10 years. He’s beatable. Beat-ABLE!

Frankie Trujillo is next, and he sputters a grounder to short. Robbins moves to third, but there’s now one out. Manny Davilla singles to right, and it’s 4-2. Now how stupid does Robles’ performance look?

Joe Martin beats one into the ground, and the error-prone third baseman fields it cleanly and throws him out at first. Two outs. Runner on second. Tying run to the plate. It’s Stephane Pelletier, our catcher. Another ground ball. But at least if you’re going to hit it on the ground to someone, pick that third baseman, and damned if he doesn’t look like Brooks Robinson over there closing us out of the LCS.

We lost 2 in row at home. All our guys should walk off the field with towels over their heads. They should be embarrassed. Our performance is embarrassing.

[Orcin]

Arrgghh!

[Sal, The Barber]

22 October 2011
The Off-Season Begins

Youngstown wins the WS. They beat KC 5 games to 1. However, the Series is closer than that makes it seem. KC lost four straight games, after winning game 2, by a total of 5 runs.

We have some minor league players who win awards. By the way, did I mention that Laredo, our AAA club, and Groveton, our AA club, both won their league championships?

Michael Brooks wins AAA Pitcher of the Year.
Bernard Charlot wins AA Outstanding Hitter; he’s a third baseman.

I’ve got this nagging idea in my head. Given Eric Kelham’s off year—he hit .270 and missed 30 games—I’m wondering if I should try to trade him. He hit .278 in 2010. That was after 4 seasons of hitting above .310. Is this natural decline? He’s 27 years old so not really old. There’s no way I could find a second baseman who is as good, I’m sure of that. And I know Oakland would love to have Kelham; they ask for him all the time in trade talks. Not that I want to send him to Oakland. But I could play Jose Herrera at short (he’s becoming a very good player) and move Robbins to second and perhaps not lose much offense—except in the stolen bases category. And in the trade for Kelham, I could improve somewhere else. Maybe the bullpen? Maybe left field? Right now it’s just a nagging idea, something, though, I’m going to have to explore to make go away.

My preliminary plans for the off-season are to let Curt Clark become a free agent. He wants $25 million a year, and, after his struggles this year, there’s no way I’m going to even pay him half of that. I’m going to let Joe Martin become a free agent. I’d love to keep Martin, but I signed him for this season at less than $1 million. He’s now asking for more than $10 million a year. No dice. My plan for left field is a platoon of Wesley Huffman and Roland Pena. I’m also going to let bench players Danny Jackson and Tim Nicholson go and most likely relievers Tom Hall and Raul Torres. I’d also like to trade catcher Frank Hankins. I’ve got 3 catchers in the minors ready to play at the big league level.

[Sal, The Barber]

November 2011
Offseason News

-We trade catcher Frank Hankins to Boise for a 5th round draft pick.
-Andrew Hicks and Frankie Trujillo win gold glove awards.
-Manager of the Year in the WL went to Raul Romo.
-Andrew Hicks won the Paul Waner Award for best hitter in the WL.

We make a big move Nov 13. Here’s some background. Our starting pitchers coming in to spring training will be Jeff Racine, a legit #1, Jose Vincent, who Jody Mack considers a #5 but who has performed for 2 seasons as a #2, Albert Dominguez, who Jody Mack calls a #5, and Jose Gomez who Mack thinks is a #2 but who doesn’t log the innings to ever live up to that.

And I’m comfortable with that group. Losing Curt Clark doesn’t really hurt us, especially since he seemed to decline this past season.
In AAA, we have 4 guys who are ready for promotion. Michael Brooks, who Mack calls a back-end starter and who has a scary (as in not good) control rating; Albert Moreno, who Mack calls a #5 but who OSA likes a bit better; Jack Lee, who pitched a bit at the big league level for us and is considered a #3; and Carlos Gonzalez, who is probably a AAAA pitcher.

What have I got? Jeff Racine and a lot of backend talent, right? A lot of it. So there’s a move to make here. And Montreal just happens to have two, young pitchers who are top of the rotation material. Moreover, Montreal has a budget deficit of a few million dollars. One of Montreal’s good young pitchers is signed for the coming season at 2.5 million. The other is signed for the next 4 years, for 7, 8 and 9 million. Bingo. That’s our guy.

We package Michael Brooks, whose lack of control makes me think he’ll never be a reliable pitcher and Albert Moreno, who probably has more talent than Jody Mack thinks. But we get another top of the rotation guy and make some room at the AAA level for upside prospects. The pitcher we get, by the way, is Doug Hopkins.



In evaluating my roster for 2012, I again want to add a left-handed reliever. I have one in the minors with a lot of potential, but he’s only 20, and he spent last year at AA. So after pouring over potential free agent relievers, I make an offer to Takeichi Mori****a. He’s no closer, but he seems a capable reliever, and his asking price is just under $1 million. I offer him $900,000.

And then I get two trade offers for AAA 1B Ramon Arrendondo. Arrendondo was a first round draft pick, and Jody Mack turned on him just about as soon as he was drafted. Jody Mack did that to the next 1B we chose in the first round too. Arrendondo does have power, but Mack doesn’t think he’s going to be a big league player. Plus, we have Hicks at first for a few years yet. I don’t like what is being offered for Arrendondo, but I negotiate with Burlington and get a potential closer in Gabriel Tullis for him. Tullis looks like he’s going to be a very good reliever for years to come.


Nov 28: Curt Clark signs with Cincinnati. A couple of surprising things about this. He signs for 2 years at $15.2 million each. He was asking for $22 million and 5-6 years.

[Sal, The Barber]

December 2011
Off-Season News

We sign Takeichi Mori****a. He’ll be our second lefty in our bullpen. Besides a left handed reliever, I also want to add a fifth outfielder, preferably a left handed hitter who can play centerfield. I want a good defensive outfielder and someone with some speed. This guy is going to pinch hit, pinch run, and come in as a defensive sub. The one free agent who fits this bill and intrigues me is Freddy Soto. Soto used to eat us up when he played for Omaha. Soto has gotten old, but I kind of like veteran left handed hitters on my bench. So I make Soto an offer. He doesn’t like it; he wants more money.

In the meantime, I get an interesting offer from Wichita. They are dangling outfield Anastasio Sanchez. Sanchez is 26, a left handed hitter, and a good corner outfielder. He can also play first base. He’s got speed and potential. A little back and forth, and Wichita is willing to trade Sanchez for minor league outfielder Marty Brooks. Brooks had a good year at AA last season, but he isn’t going to start for our big league club, according to Jody Mack. So I make the deal.

That ends my interest in Freddy Soto. Jody Mack thinks Sanchez is a big league regular, so our left field job is going to be quite a competition.

Oakland has made some interesting moves this offseason. They trade starting outfielder Shumei Toyota, their leadoff hitter, for a starting pitcher, Roger Colwell. Colwell is projected to be a #3 starter. He’s had just one season in a rotation, but his ratings are quite good. He’s 29.

In addition, Oakland acquired another starter, Frank Ayloffe, for a couple of minor leaguers. Ayloffe is a minor leaguer himself except that Jody Mack says Ayloffe has Cy Young potential. He’s only pitched 19 innings above A ball, but Oakland has already slotted him in their starting rotation. I can’t believe they got this guy so cheap.

The Oaks did lose a good relief pitcher. Alfredo Rodriguez, a lefty. But they have interest in a former Cowboy who is now a free agent, Tom Hall. Hall, however, eventually signs with Quebec.

[Sal, The Barber]

January 2012
Off-Season News

I’ve chronicled some of the changes occurring in Oakland, but San Francisco finished just a game behind the Oaks in our division. They’ve quietly made up 4.2 WAR this offseason, second in all of baseball. And they’ve done it just by adding 3 guys to their bullpen. They’re going to be an interesting team to watch.

Oakland signs another top of the rotation pitcher, Miguel Angel Martinez. His stats aren’t quite that great, but they have made some moves to improve their starting pitching.

[Sal, The Barber]

March 2012
Spring Training

I’ve got a couple of problems at the moment. Newly-acquired Doug Hopkins is having a terrible spring, and we’re going to have to start him at AAA. His ERA is over 6.00. My left field platoon has sort of fallen apart because Wesley Huffman is hitting .100. He’ll start the season in AAA, too. I’ve also got too many pitchers.

So all this gets me thinking that I should try to trade two relievers for a right handed hitting outfielder. (I’ve put the trade Eric Kelham thoughts to bed). But, fortunately, I’m a introverted, thinking man who likes books. I happen to be reading over Bill James book on managers for the millionth time, and I spend a good deal of time pouring over his profile of Billy McKechnie. McKechnie simply intrigues me because he does things—he consistently does things that get him winning results. He always chooses defense over offense. Everywhere he went he took a shortstop and put him at second base. To improve his defense. I’m not fully on board with this strategy, but I see that it worked for him time and time again. And while I’m not ready to adopt this McKechnie strategy, I note that he made strategic choices that got him results, so I respect what he did, and I try to learn from it. And something else I know about McKechnie—because I read it in this book—echoes strongly in my head when I encounter it again. McKechnie always kept two veteran, left handed hitting outfielders on his bench.

Why am I searching for another right handed bat? I immediately ask. I go back through my roster and see that I have plenty of right handed hitters in my lineup against lefties. I have 2 catchers, both right handed. I have 2 utility infielders, both right handed. What I need is another left handed bat.

[Sal, The Barber]

3 April 2012
Boise, ID

We start the 2012 season with a short two-game series against Boise. The Braves don’t figure to be particularly good, and our season opener then goes to form. I just love a start like this. Eric Kelham, leading off, walks. Joe Robbins strikes out. Kelham steals second. Andrew Hicks singles, and it’s 1-0. Kelham steals off our old friend, catcher Frank Hankins, who we traded to Boise for a draft pick.

This post is all about Big Frank. Frank is not a great thrower behind the plate, and he was never a great hitter for us. And he’s declining. Still, in his prime, he had some power and a better than average eye. He never hit for a high average, but he was useful.

When Jeff Racine takes the mound in the bottom of the first, with a 1-0 lead, we notice (because we’re not all worried about Boise in general to notice beforehand) that Big Frank is hitting in the number four slot. Frank couldn’t even make our roster this season, and he’s Boise’s clean up hitter. I hope that doesn’t sound too snotty. I’m just trying to lay out the facts.

Racine has a rocky first inning, allowing two singles to start the game. He then gets a strike out, which brings up Big Frank with 2 on and one out. Frank grounds into a DP. We cruise to a 8-1 victory from there.

Today, we’re having deja vu all over again. Jose Vincent starts for us and gives up two singles in the first inning as well. With one out, two on, Frank Hankins comes to the plate. Today, he takes Vincent deep. 3-run homer. And Boise cruises from there, Hankins adding a solo shot later in the game to rub dirt in the wound. Boise wins 7-0.

While I guess this should piss me off, it doesn’t it. Good for Big Frank, I think. We thought he was washed up, traded him for a draft pick, and watched him hit into a DP in a critical spot. And felt good about our evaluation of him. Today, he took that evaluation and shoved it down our throat. Got to like that even when you don’t.


By the way, we have the #1 rated prospect in baseball, outfielder Alfonso “Buzzy” Gonzalez. The odd thing is that we signed him as a free agent this offseason when we just happened to be trolling the free agent board.

[Sal, The Barber]

12 April 2012
Lincoln, NE

We haven’t lost since Frank Hankins beat us in the second game of the season. That means we finished our first 10 games with the record of 9-1. How do I explain that? We’ve been a good team for a long time. We were a good team last year, but why does this team feel so much better than last year’s team? I don’t know. Maybe the rest of the league got worse? We really haven’t played anyone good yet either.

To be a bit more serious, there are a couple of differences between this year’s team and last year’s. First, our bench is better this year. I got another lefthanded hitter by trading Jack Hayden and Gabriel Solis to Montreal, my new favorite trading partner, for Jose DeJesus. DeJesus is a high-contact outfielder who can play defense and who has an average to a better than average eye at the plate. Hayden was a good reliever who hadn’t yet pitched to his potential and Solis is a back of the rotation starter who just won’t pitch on our club.

But what adding DeJesus means is that we shuttle Roland Pena, Anastasio Sanchez, and DeJesus through left field, and we keep a couple of lefties on the bench. Actually, it also means that we’ve been resting our players more deliberately this season already. Sanchez will play a game at first to give Hicks a day off. Pena can play centerfield, so Makeever gets a day. And, the biggest reason our bench is better, Jose Herrera should be a regular. Instead—because who is he going to put on the bench Kelham? Robbins? Davilla?—we simply move him around the infield and give everyone a day off each week. Herrera, who bats right, can also play rightfield, so we start him out there against lefties. And this, I believe, is making us better.

One more note. In the eighth inning of Jose Vincent’s last start, Vincent caught a liner coming back at him and strained an abdominal muscle in the process. It’s just a mild strain, but it will cause him to miss a start; it doesn’t appear to be a serious enough injury to put him on the DL. So we’ve called up Doug Hopkins to take Vincent’s next start.

[Sal, The Barber]

17 April 2012
Seattle, WA

I shouldn’t write about winning streaks. Lincoln beat us in the fourth game of our series with them to snap our streak at 10. Then, we went to Seattle.

While I’ve been worrying about Oakland and up-and-coming San Francisco, Seattle, apparently, has become the biggest threat in the division. They beat us twice—in a two game series—and we are crawling home with our tails between our legs.

So we’ve lost 3 in a row. Our record is 11-4. Seattle’s record is also 11-4. We lost those 3 games all by one run, and today’s loss to Seattle was the worst. We gave up 4 runs in the bottom of the seventh inning. It was almost torture watching Seattle tie the game, then take the lead. But at least we’re seeing this early when we can make plans for the rest of the season.

Seattle has a centerfielder, Burton White, who just pounds us. And the other problem on their roster is Dave Burton. Does anyone remember Dave Burton? I traded Burton and Robert Garza for Jack Lee. I knew Burton was going to be good, but I also thought Lee was going to be good. Hopefully, Lee’s time is coming. But when Burton gets on, White just brings him home. And Seattle’s pitching appears good enough. They’re the first team that has caused me some worry this season.