Minor league update

mark1 · April 6th, 2003, 03:17 AM

Both the Sidewinders and Diablos are off to 3-0 starts. The Sidewinders beat Edmonton 25-11 yesterday. It was the most runs scored in the PCL since 1994. Brian Gordon has 12 RBI's already with 2 homeruns. Chad Tracy is 7 for 12. What have they been feeding Gordon? Hurry up and send some to Colorado

AZZenny · April 6th, 2003, 08:43 AM

"Hurry up and send some TO THE DIAMONDBACKS in Colorado." - I think we need to be very specific!

Those tricky baseball gods, you know. I'll pay for same-day FedEx, no problem. Have some of whatever it is waiting for our guys in LaLa Land, too.

AZZenny · April 6th, 2003, 03:21 PM

btw - Cintron is definitely a Major Leaguer - he is looking great all around and running roughshod over the minor-leaguers - so is Donnels.

adbacksfan · April 7th, 2003, 06:19 PM

I had heard the Sidewinders won 25-11 the other day and left 15 on base, is that hitting or what! I was very impressed with some of the minor league players during ST.

mark1 · April 8th, 2003, 08:23 AM

Chad Tracy is 11 for 22 so far this year. This kid can really hit. I don't think the minor leagues are going to hold him for long. He's mainly a singles hitter so far in his career, but, he is young (23 in May) and could develop some pop. He's listed at 6'2 200 lbs, so he has good size.

Moose Lady · April 8th, 2003, 05:23 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by mark1
Chad Tracy is 11 for 22 so far this year. This kid can really hit. I don't think the minor leagues are going to hold him for long. He's mainly a singles hitter so far in his career, but, he is young (23 in May) and could develop some pop. He's listed at 6'2 200 lbs, so he has good size.

Yep and he's also a RED head which ought to give us some fire & brimstone.

mark1 · April 9th, 2003, 05:20 AM

Alex Cintron is tearing it up. He had 4 more hits last night. He's hitting 469 with 7 RBI's hitting in the 2 hole. The D-Backs would be smart to trade Wohack for some bagels and cream cheese, and bring Cintron up.

AZZenny · April 9th, 2003, 07:14 AM

Boy, I agree! Cintron needs to be here, NOW.
Bringing up their hitting coach might not be a bad move either.

They were talking about Cintron on their radiocast the other evening - how he clearly feels more like a major leaguer than a minor leaguer; that finding himself playing in places like Yankee stadium "grew him up" - and when the "kids" are screaming and all revved up in the dugout, he sort of looks over at Donnels and smiles, and thinks "that's what you do in a college game."

schillingfan · April 9th, 2003, 07:31 AM

Interesting news about Cintron. Back in 2000 or thereabouts when the D-Backs seemed to be 30th out of 30 in prospects Cintron was rated up there with Overbay, Cust and Patterson as a top prospect. He sort of got lost in the shuffle, being not too impressive in his brief stints with the big team. His play in the NLDS separating Scott Rolen's shoulder didn't really help that impression. It would be nice to see him back up there.

I'd have said he should take Matt Williams place on the roster, but Matty's been hitting pretty well (I notice nobody is talking about that much). So okay, take the tire iron out on Womack's knees then.

DWKB · April 9th, 2003, 07:49 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by schillingfan

I'd have said he should take Matt Williams place on the roster, but Matty's been hitting pretty well (I notice nobody is talking about that much). So okay, take the tire iron out on Womack's knees then.

Well let me say something about Matt's 2003 performance up until now:

Code:

By Breakdown	AB	AVG	OBP	SLG	OPS
vs. Left	8	0.625	0.600	1.125	1.725
vs. Right	13	0.154	0.267	0.154	0.421

Use his bat correctly and you see huge dividends pay out.

mark1 · April 9th, 2003, 08:01 AM

Cintron bulked up during the offseason. He hit two spring homers with the big club and has 1 homer already with Tucson. It is so nice seeing our minor leaguers knocking on the door to the majors. Even if there is no place right now for people like Terrero (381) Tracy (481) or Cintron (469) it's nice to know that when the D-Backs retool, they have some people to take over and still be competitive.

Unless the big club gets a solid 3 hole hitter and straightens out a shaky bullpen, I fear they are going to struggle all year. From what i've read, Villarreal would rather pitch out of the bullpen, and I hope they put him there. Although Patterson hasn't pitched real well his 2 starts for the Sidewinders, he is probably their best option for the 5 hole if Villarreal goes to the bullpen full time.

THIS TEAM NEEDS A CONSISTENT RUN PRODUCER!! GO GET ONE JOE JR

mark1 · April 9th, 2003, 08:14 AM

DWKB is right. If the Diamondbacks would play Matty against lefties only, he would probably put up pretty good numbers. Matt can't hit righties. He goes fishing for breaking pitches constantly that he can't hit, let alone drive. Brenly needs to get his head out of his a$$ and realize that his buddy Matty is a situational player at best.

schillingfan · April 9th, 2003, 08:55 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by DWKB
Well let me say something about Matt's 2003 performance up until now:

Code:

By Breakdown AB AVG OBP SLG OPS vs. Left 8 0.625 0.600 1.125 1.725 vs. Right 13 0.154 0.267 0.154 0.421

Use his bat correctly and you see huge dividends pay out.

Well I said this a couple of days ago on another message board, so I guess we have something we agree about:

Quote:

I would platoon Matty against lefty pitchers to replace Lyle Overbay. In the past three years he has batted almost .50 higher against lefties (.306 v. .257). His OPS is .915 v. .709.

It makes no sense to platoon him with CC as CC hits lefties and righties almost equally.Or alternatively, against lefties play CC at SS in place of Tony Womack, who has a huge lefty righty split.

But put Matty on the bench against righties. He really doesn't hit them well and hasn't in a while. We have tons of left handed hitters on the team who do hit righties.

DWKB · April 9th, 2003, 09:36 AM

I would much rather have Counsell, Williams, and Womack play merry-go-round on the left side of the IF than to have the sort-of 3-way 1B solution that we've had before. Overbay and Grace should be able to take all of the 1B starts this season.

AZZenny · April 9th, 2003, 07:36 PM

Anyone besides me think we ought to call JPatt back up, prepare to ride out some rough spots, and let him mature and polish? We know he is able to pitch well and win at this level. Maybe show some faith in him.