Minors Stuff

The Herd:

Buffalo Baseball Hall of Famer Torey Lovullo has made the walk into Coca-Cola Field hundreds of times, as both a key player on the Bisons' 1997 and '98 championship teams and as the manager of the Herd the last three seasons.

But when he arrives Thursday morning, the walk will be an odd one for Lovullo — and for many of the players on the Columbus Clippers. That's because they'll all be heading to the visiting clubhouse.

For the last 14 years, Cleveland Indians farmhands have called Buffalo home.
But now they're the visitors coming in for perhaps the most anticipated series of the season. Chief Wahoo's reunion with his former Triple-A home starts Thursday afternoon at 1 in the opener of a four-game set against the New York Mets-era Bisons.
"It is going to be a little different, definitely," Lovullo said this week by phone. "The last three years as manager I walked to that home clubhouse and now I have to take a detour, but I'm ready for it."

http://www.buffalonews.com/sports/bisons/story/677995.html


B-Mets:

Starter Jose Sanchez gave up six runs in the first three innings and Connecticut pounded out nine hits en route to a 6-3 win over the B-Mets, evening the three-game series at a game apiece. Sanchez was tagged for six runs in five innings and took his team-leading fifth loss of the year.

The majority of the Defenders’ runs came in the second inning when five came across. The inning started when Sanchez walked leadoff man Brock Bond. Brad Boyer followed with a double to put two men in scoring position for Eddy Martinez-Esteve, who singled the two in to make it 3-0. With two outs, Bobby Felmy tripled to drive home Brett Pill, who had reached on a fielder’s choice, and Tyler LaTorre followed with a two-run dinger over the right-field wall to put Connecticut (21-18) in front 6-0.

Binghamton (18-19) cut the deficit in half with three runs in the seventh inning. The frame started with singles from D.J. Wabick and Ruben Tejada off starter Tim Alderson. Emmanuel Garcia followed with a double down the third base line to drive home Wabick and get the B-Mets on the board. With the infield playing back, pinch-hitter Jake Eigsti grounded out to short, scoring Tejada and moving Garcia up to third. The final run came home on Carl Loadenthal’s groundout to short off of reliever Jesse English, making it 6-3.

Connecticut’s run in the first came on a two-out solo homer from Brandon Crawford, who now has six hits in the series after going 2-4 on Wednesday night.

Alderson threw 6.1 innings giving up 3 runs on 9 hits and managed to pick up the win to improve to 2-0. Daniel Otero threw the ninth to nail down his 10 save. He has yet to give up a run in 2009.

Garcia led the way at the plate for Binghamton going 3-4 with a double and an RBI to break an 0-14 slump. His multi-hit performance was joined by Josh Thole, Wabick and Tejada, who also hammered out two hits each.




Thursday, May 21 at Connecticut 10:35 am RHP Eric Brown (3-2, 3.41) vs. RHP Henry Sosa (2-0, 2.18)

Friday, May 22 New Britain 7:05 pm RHP Tobi Stoner (1-0, 1.46) vs. TBA

Saturday, May 23 New Britain 7:05 pm RHP Ryan Coultas (3-1, 2.54) vs. TBA

Sunday, May 24 New Britain 6:35 pm RHP Dylan Owen (0-3, 6.18)) vs. TBA



Lucy:


Sent IF Jake Eigsti to Binghamton

THE WEEK THAT WAS: It was three steps forward and three steps back for the Mets. St. Lucie began the week with a three-game sweep at Palm Beach, then threw away its gains, getting swept at home in a three-game set vs. Fort Myers. The .500 week kept the club a game above the .500 mark with an 18-17 record, good for third place in the South, five games behind division-leading Fort Myers.

WHO'S HOT, WHO'S NOT: RHP Bradley Holt has pitched lights-out of late. The Albemarle, N.C., native has limited opponents to one earned run over 10 2/3 innings in his last two games, amassing 14 strikeouts against two walks in that span. ... LHP Matias Carrillo, Jr., meanwhile, is having the opposite results. He's been tagged for eight runs and 12 hits over his last 4 2/3 innings of work.

PLAYER TO WATCH: SS Reese Havens has a terrible batting average in his last 10 games (.179), but he's been money with runners on base, clouting two homers and driving in 11 runs.

PERFORMANCE OF THE WEEK: LHP Eric Niesen chalked up his second win in his sixth start, a 3-0 victory at Palm Beach. The Wake Forest product fanned seven Cardinals over six innings while issuing a pair of walks

http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090519&content_id=4816664&vkey=news_l123&fext=.jsp&sid=l123



Gnats:


A sacrifice fly by first baseman Mike Sheridan in the top of the 12th inning lifted the Bowling Green Hot Rods (21-18) to a, 4-3, win over the Savannah Sand Gnats at Historic Grayson Stadium Wednesday night. The knuckleballer Diego Echeverria (2-1) picked up the win for the Hot Rods while Rhiner Cruz (0-1) is saddled with the loss for the Sand Gnats.

The Gnats (21-17) never led in the contest but fought valiantly throughout the evening coming from behind twice. After the Hot Rods scored two in the third, it was an RBI-double by Josh Satin in the fifth that tied the game at two.

Savannah had opportunities to push the go-ahead run across in the sixth and ninth innings but was unable to do so before extra innings. An Eric Campbell single started Savannah’s 10th-inning rally when the Gnats were down by one. Wilmer Flores and Rafael Fernandez placed bunt singles down the third base line to load the bases with no one out and it appeared as if the Gnats had the momentum.

Kai Gronauer knocked in a run with a sacrifice fly to center and all the runners moved up placing the winning run 90 feet away at third with less than two outs. Reliever Josh Satow battled to strikeout Jefry Marte and Jordany Valdespin to end the inning and the threat. The Gnats re-loaded the bases in the 11th off Echeverria but the knuckleballer induced an inning-ending fly out by Rafael Fernandez to strand all three runners.

All told, the Sand Gnats left 16 men on the bases tonight. Valdespin, Campbell, Flores and Juan Lagares each collected two hits for Savannah. Starting pitcher Jeurys Familia pitched five innings and allowed two runs on three hits.



THE SEASON SO FAR: The Sand Gnats are 21-16 after winning five of their last seven games. They are in second place in the Southern Division, a half-game behind Rome.
WHO'S HOT: OF Sean Ratliff is clubbing SAL pitching at a .349 clip (53-for-152). ... Fellow OF Josh Satin is right behind him, ranking fourth in the league at .346 (45-for-130). ... RHP Jeff Kaplan (4-1, 1.15) is second in the league in ERA, while RHP Jeurys Familia (3-2, 1.24) is third.

WHO'S NOT: C Jean-Luc Blaquiere is scuffling at .203 (13-for-64) after a 1-for-9 week. ... 1B Jose Jimenez is in a 2-for-31 rut (.065).

NEWS & NOTES: Ratliff, a 2008 fourth-round pick, continues to show consistency at the plate. He certainly is not the same hitter he was for much of last summer at short-season Brooklyn, where only a strong finish brought his average up to .229 (46-for-201). A former SAL Player of the Week (May 4), Ratliff had it all clicking after the New York-Penn League All-Star break in '08, hitting .288 (15-for-52).
DID YOU KNOW?: Familia, a native of the Dominican Republic, is following up on an excellent season in the Gulf Coast League, where he was 2-2 with a 2.79 ERA in 11 starts. He also had a stellar strikeout/walk ratio of 38-13 over 51 2/3 innings. Familia did not allow more than three hits in 10 of his 11 GCL starts.

http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090519&content_id=4818610&vkey=news_l116&fext=.jsp&sid=l116


VSL:

VSL Cards beat the VSL Mets 3-1.

Cardinals three hit the Mets… three Mets pitchers on strict pitch count… good outing by Victor Peralta (2008: 4-3, 3.45 in 20 appearances) who pitched 3 scoreless innings, though he did give up 3 walks… also, three scoreless innings by newcomer Jesus Berreto.