Tom Brennan – KINGSPORT BATS ACTUALLY WORK
Perspective always
helps.
The entire Brooklyn
Cyclones squad has 9 homers in 46 games (and 14 wins) through Sunday, but Kingport’s Anthony Dirocie has 9 in 39 games.
And Dirocie is not
Kingsport’s best hitter.
Kingsport
can hit, folks, sitting at a league-leading .286 in 43 games, with 35 homers.
Who are their best batsmen? Try these seven:
Anthony Dirocie is a 20 year old righty 5’11”
outfielder with speed, but the 12 doubles, 1 triple and 9 HRs and a .243 average
intrigues me. Power always does. The international product fans an awful lot
(59 times in 39 games) but seemed to be clicking the past 8 games (3 homers, 11
for 30, just 8 Ks, plus a grand slam), so it will be very interesting to see
how his season (and future) unfolds.
Rigoberto Terrazas is actually Kingsport's best hitter. Ricky T is a 21 year old switch hitting 3B who is lighting it up with a .377/.428/.547 line in 40 games, and a league-leading 14 doubles, and just 20 Ks. He seems to hit both lefties and righties very well. A no-nonsense, no stenosis 3B.
Perhaps swapping him up to Brooklyn for 2017 draftee 3B Carl Stajduhar (hitting 200 points less at .174, with 38 Ks in 82 at bats) would be advisable. Carl, though, has 3 of Brooklyn's 9 homers, so perhaps they want to not lose 1/3 of their homer production with what appears to be a very sensible move.
Wagner Lagrange: hitting a robust .347; just 9
Ks in 28 games, a fine ratio.
Jeremy Vasquez is doing first base proud, with a
.308/.406/.432 line in 35 games with 26 Ks, and has 8 doubles and 7 homers to boot. Booted up to Brooklyn this weekend, where he is off to a fine start (3 for 7 and a walk).
Dionis Paulino, another OF, has speed and is hitting
.336 in 35 games.
Juan Uriarte, 19 year old catcher,
.289/.353/.452 in 34 games, with 21 Ks.
Rafael Gladu, a 16th rounder in 2017, is hitting .297./.350/.432 in 19 games, with just 9 Ks in 80 plate appearances.
Maybe a
nickname like the Sensational Seven aptly describes this bunch.
It'll be interesting to see how they progress as their careers move forward.
How is all
that Kingsport hitting helping with wins and losses?
Not much, as they sit at 18-25, due to their pitchers allowing 5.8 runs per game.
In fact, the 3 rookie league Mets teams are a cumulative 43-79. Whoosh!
Perhaps
a story for another day.
Interesting read as always Thomas as I sit shell shocked from this weekend and the season in general. Who would have thought we would fall so dramatically from our post season success less than 2 years ago to the depth's of despair we currently reside in now. My hope for this team has changed so completely in such a short time I don't know where to start but our pitching staff would be a good place. We really only have 2 starters we can count on for next season and with Thor he still is just a 6 inning guy so add hopefully Familia and that's about it. Our big off season signing is having a terrible season and really just mailing it in at this point. Conforto and Bruce have been very good outside of that not much and to think we've spent what 28 million on Walker when if we weren't going to sign Murphy should have gone with a TJ Flores 2nd base combo as he's another bad signing. When I looked at the Dodgers last night I came away realizing we have only 2 players on our 25 man roster that would make their team in Degrom who would be a 3rd or 4th starter and Conforto in center. so my question to all the writers here is: where do we go from here?
ReplyDeleteGary, your question as to where do we go from here will certainly get lots of focus from here on out.
ReplyDeleteMy take? No easy answers - the pitching has frankly been putrid - how much health in 2018 corrects that is anyone's guess? If all healthy, is our supposedly elite staff just average? If it is, we may be lucky to get a Wild Card for years to come. And Cespedes hopefully returns as beast and not least next year.