Prospect and Minor League Discussion

[Bleeding Green]

Oh, yeah. I should know that.

Regardless, Tim Cox is also really good. People say he's not projectable, he's short, he doesn't have good stuff, but he gets guys out.

[Bleeding Green]

Pawtucket

Murphy was hitless in 3 AB, but he drew 2 walks and scored twice. Kottaras was 1-4 with a double and a walk. Do you hear those footsteps, Tek? Moss and Spann each collected a hit. Moss's was a double and Spann added a walk. Timlin pretended he was playing for Boston and surrendered a run in one inning of work. Pauley pitched well, going 6 strong allowing one unearned run and he posted a 5:1 K:BB. Edgar Martinez got a blow save by allowing a run, but he also struck out four in 2 innings.

Portland Snowdogs

What, you were expecting them to play baseball? Hell no, it's Winter!

Lancaster

Bubba Bell is going crazy. This is the second game in a row with 2 homers. He went 3-5 with a BB, a 2B, 2 HR, 4 RBI, and 3 R. Zach Daegas went 3-5 with a walk, an RBI and 2 runs. Luis Soto went 2-3. Chris Turner: 1-5 with 2 runs and 2 RBI. Ryan Khoury: 2-4 with a walk, 2 doubles, 2 runs, and 2 RBI. Aaron Bates: 1-3 with a double, 3 RBI, 3 runs and a walk. Lancaster went on an 11-1 run to end the game, winning 19-5

Greenville

Reid Engel went 1-3 with a run and a walk. Lars Anderson went 1-3 with a stolen base, a walk and an RBI. Dustin Richardson tossed 4 innings and walked 4; he gave up 4 hits, 2 runs and struck out 5. Josh Papelbon tossed a scoreless inning and surrendered a walk.

[alwayslovetheceltics]

BG, great work,

do you have any more info on Soto- i remember reading that the org. was really high on him last year- what do you think of him?

Pawtucket

Murphy was hitless in 3 AB, but he drew 2 walks and scored twice. Kottaras was 1-4 with a double and a walk. Do you hear those footsteps, Tek? Moss and Spann each collected a hit. Moss's was a double and Spann added a walk. Timlin pretended he was playing for Boston and surrendered a run in one inning of work. Pauley pitched well, going 6 strong allowing one unearned run and he posted a 5:1 K:BB. Edgar Martinez got a blow save by allowing a run, but he also struck out four in 2 innings.

Portland Snowdogs

What, you were expecting them to play baseball? Hell no, it's Winter!

Lancaster

Bubba Bell is going crazy. This is the second game in a row with 2 homers. He went 3-5 with a BB, a 2B, 2 HR, 4 RBI, and 3 R. Zach Daegas went 3-5 with a walk, an RBI and 2 runs. Luis Soto went 2-3. Chris Turner: 1-5 with 2 runs and 2 RBI. Ryan Khoury: 2-4 with a walk, 2 doubles, 2 runs, and 2 RBI. Aaron Bates: 1-3 with a double, 3 RBI, 3 runs and a walk. Lancaster went on an 11-1 run to end the game, winning 19-5

Greenville

Reid Engel went 1-3 with a run and a walk. Lars Anderson went 1-3 with a stolen base, a walk and an RBI. Dustin Richardson tossed 4 innings and walked 4; he gave up 4 hits, 2 runs and struck out 5. Josh Papelbon tossed a scoreless inning and surrendered a walk.

[Basketball Jesus]

Pauley pitched well, going 6 strong allowing one unearned run and he posted a 5:1 K:BB

I see Pauley having a Dinardo-like career shuttling between parent clubs and their respective AAA teams, pitching well enough to not embarrass in spot starts but not good enough to prevent demotion and never consistent enough to prevent him moving to another team.

In a just world, he

[Bleeding Green]

Yeah, that sounds about right for Pauley. I had hope for him to be the number 5 starter in Boston at some point, but that's a little unlikely with Bard, Bowden, Lester, Buchholz, Johnson, Hansack, Masterson, et al coming through the system right now. Even right now he's probably option #3 at best if Tavarez falters. Hopefully he still has a spot as a long reliever in the future.

As for Soto, he's just all tools right now. He was originally signed as a SS and then moved to RF. He's never put up the numbers to match his tools. He should be able to put up good numbers in Lancaster, but everyone puts up good offensive numbers in Lancaster.

[The Rondo Show]

Jacoby Ellsbury had a terrific game tonight: 4-6 with 3 doubles, 1 run scored, 1 SB and 1 RBI. Portland lost the game 8-6, Buchholz did not pitch.

Lars Anderson was 2-4 with a double. Jason Place went 1-2 with 2 BB's as Greenville battled back to win 6-5.

Craig Hansen threw a scoreless inning for the PawSox in a 5-0 defeat. He allowed 1 hit, 1 walk and struck out 1. George Kottaras went 0-2 with a walk in the game.

None of our other top prospects played today. I'll let BG give the updates on the mid-level prospects that I know very little about.

Lester, Bowden and (I believe) Buchholz will pitch tomorrow.

[Bleeding Green]

Craig Hansen's line doesn't look that ugly until you see that he threw 25 pitches in that 1 inning and only 13 of them for strikes. Chad Spann got the only hit for Pawtucket on the day.

For Portland, Jed Lowrie had a good game. 2-4 with a triple, a walk and a run scored. He's probably the system's best SS prospect right now, although no one expects him to stick at short.

The wind in Lancaster was apparently blowing out to RF at 30 MPH with gusts up to 40. There were 31 hits and 21 runs scored in the game with Lancaster coming out on top on a Suarez gamewinning single.

Mike Rozier is fat, he sucks, and he doesn't seemingly have any sort of upside as his fastball is topping out at 87 MPH. He gave up 7 ER in 3 IP. He's going to have a fun year in Lancaster. What a waste.

Luis Soto had a good game, going 2-5 with a run. Tony Granadillo ripped two doubles in 4 AB and drew a walk; he also scored a run and drove in another. Aaron Bates was 2-5 with an RBI. Bubba Bell continued his dominance of the universe and drove in 3 runs with a walk and a single. He also scored a run. On the season, Bell is hitting .520/.556/1.240. That last number is his slugging percentage. in 25 AB he has 5 HR and just 1 strike out. Not bad for a 39th rounder.

Greenville won 6-5 over Columbus. Kris Negron slapped two singles in 5 at bats; he also walked and scored a run. Reid Engle was 1-5 with a run and 3 strikeouts. Carlos Fernandez-Oliva was 2-5 with 3 strikeouts , and RBI and a run. Argenis Diaz cranked 2 doubles and scored and knocked in a run in 4 at bats. Jordan Craft got knocked around in 3 IP, allowing 4 runs on 4 walks and 3 hits; he struck out 3. Josh Papelbon pitched a scoreless inning despite allowing two hits.

[Bleeding Green]

I'm lazy.

Pawtucket box score
Portland box score
Lancaster box score
Greenville box score

Bryce Cox is filthy. 2 IP, no hits, no walks, 3 strikeouts, and no balls hit in the air. Buchholz' AA debut didn't go so well. 4.67 IP, 6 H, 3 ER, BB, 2 K.

As of right now, Bowden has 2 K's in his first inning of work. The wind is once again blowing out to RF at 30 MPH. Haha, I can't imagine having to pitch in that.

Lars Anderson had a nice day going 1 for 1 with 2 walks. Jon Lester worked 4 inning, struck out 5 and walked 1.

[alwayslovetheceltics]

just to add on to BG's post

good day for Emart-2 scoreless innnings- i think he will be helping us out sooner than later

[Bleeding Green]

Devern Hansack with 10 more strikeouts in 5 innings. That's 20 strikeouts in 10 innings this year. Enough of this. Call him up and make him the #5 starter. Delcarmen also pitched nicely notching 4 K's in 2 innings.

Brandon Moss continues to hit really well, going 2 for 5 with a double.

Jeff Natale and Jacoby Ellsbury both have doubles. Ellsbury has a 1.278 OPS on the young season.

[Bleeding Green]

So... Dan Bard. 1.67 IP, 6 walks, 1 strikeout, 3 ER.

On the season thats 4.33 IP, 8 H, 7 ER, 7 BB, 2 K.

[alwayslovetheceltics]

whats the timeline on bryce cox- i.e. moving up to tripe A or up to the big league- are they going to rush him like hansen?

[Chach]

No, they learned their lesson with Hansen and Cla. I seriously doubt he makes the majors this year. He'll probably spend most of the first half of the season at AA and then get a promotion because he's nasty and finish the year at AAA. You have a relatively stocked pen with veteran talent and then you have Hansen, Delcarmen, Lopez and Edgar all at AAA as well as Lester looking to make it back (Tavarez goes to the pen) and Hansack being dominant so far. There is clearly no rush to get him to the majors this year but I would expect him to be the first minor leaguer called up in 2008.

In retrospect, maybe it would have been better to start Bard off at Greenville and work on some of his stuff because he's not going to get enough work in at Lancaster if he can't get out of the second. Some of that falling apart was due to a two out error which resulted in a HR and then the wheels came off after that. I really hope he can pull it around soon. mahalo
~Chach~

[Bleeding Green]

I don't even think Meredith was rushed. He had like a bad 2 innings and was thrown into a pressure situation for some strange reason.

But yeah, I wouldn't send Bryce to the majors until September at the earliest. Well, unless he truly dominates and doesn't give up a run over his next 50 IP or something.

[Chach]

Meredith was definatey put on the fast track and got rushed. Then, when he finally made it to the majors, Tito has to put him in the absolutely worst possible situation you can do for a kid facing his first batter of the game (and it was raining too, if I remember correctly). Kid just wasn't the same for the rest of the season (I think the pretty quick demotion played a part in that). Then they unload the ONLY bullpen pitcher from the minors we had that would have been productive in that horrendous Maf trade and we are screwed six ways from Sunday.

I honestly don't expect to see him in the majors at all this year. There are so many other guy ahead of him in the minor league depth chart that unless there is a rash of injuries or complete ineffectiveness, it would be useless to call him up in September, especially if we are in the race. Then again, I guess you could have said that about K-Rod in 2002 as well. mahalo
~Chach~

[Bleeding Green]

Lars Anderson is setting the globe on fire. 3-4 tonight with his first homer and a double. On the season he has is hitting .375/.429/.563 (I think, but maybe that wasn't updated after tonight's awesome game). It's early, but this is very exciting.

Other good news includes David Murphy walking three times. That's 8 walks in his first 37 PA of the season. The bad news is that he's hitting .222 and all of his hits are singles.

[Dirty Water]

Can we please just cut our losses with Coco and call up Ellsbury?

[Bleeding Green]

Crisp went 2-4 and Ellsbury isn't even in AAA yet. And Pena is on the roster anyway.

Buchholz pitched well today. 5 IP, 3 H, 0 BB, 8 K, 1 HR.

Lars Anderson is a man. 3-5 with a double and 2 RBI. It's so nice to see him match the hype that was surrounding him.

[Bleeding Green]

Assorted goodness:

Ellsbury is hitting .500 through his first 36 atbats. Half of his hits are of the double and triple variety. Be very excited.

Lester had a relatively poor outing today given that he should be absolutely dominating Lo-A hitters. 5 IP, 6 H, 3 ER, 0 BB, 6 K, 2 HR. Still, he's going to Pawtucket after this.

Lars Anderson. I don't even have to say anything else.

Every player on Lancaster is hitting over .306. Except Chris Turner who is hitting .114. Turner has struck out in over 50% over his atbats this season, which is really disturbing; he's playing in a park that is easier to hit in than Coors field from the late 90s. He has so much raw power, it's a shame that he can't do anything with it even in such an easy hitting environment.

[HeelSox]

Ellsbury went 1-4 last night to drop his average to .475...darn.