All sorts of roster moves were made today. As I’m sure most of you heard, Chris Perez was promoted to Memphis. Mike Sillman was activated off of the DL and will pitch for Springfield. Cody Haerther is back with Springfield as well. Amaury Marti will now move to Springfield now that the Mexican League season is over. Marti posted a .963 OPS for the Minaltitlan Oilers and most encouragingly, he cut his strikeout rate in half.
Kary Booher has another “what’s up with Colby?” article, talking about his prolonged slump with Colby and his coaches, who are working heavily on getting him to control the bat in the zone more and starting to use the whole field. As I noted on an earlier post, Colby is extremely pull happy and lately hasn’t been seeing the ball too well.
But since early June, particularly after he fell ill with a sinus infection and dropped 10 pounds, Rasmus has become extremely pull-conscious as he tries to hit the ball to right field.
That is why May has stressed in recent weeks that Rasmus attack off-speed pitches and plop them into left field. But May notes that such a task is difficult for Rasmus because he moves his wrist through the strike zone as fast as anybody in the league.
“For him, he’s got such quick wrists, he’ll get out there and get around on it,” May said. “We’ve tried to have him release the top hand a little bit and we’re hoping we’re going to get to a point where he’s comfortable with that because he’s a two-hand guy (on the entire swing).”
Rasmus acknowledged it is a difficult adjustment but that he is heeding the advice.
Let’s face it, he’s young, and this horrific slump may be good for Colby in the long run. He has all the tools, open to learning and pretty driven. I’m confident he’ll turn it around, even if it doesn’t start to happen these last few weeks. Of course, I’d like to see him stop striking out at least once in every game and start driving the ball.
Lastly, Jocketty didn’t sound real certain about signing Kyle Russell . Per Jeremy Anders of MLB.com.
“I’d like to get him signed,” Jocketty said. “He strikes out a lot, but a lot of power hitters do. He would be a nice guy to have. … We knew it was going to take a while to sign him. He’s got a lot of leverage. He’s a sophomore.”
Yes, a lot of power hitters do strike out a lot so I don’t know why it’s worth mentioning, unless you’re trying to excuse yourself. Now that the trade deadline is over, I’m hoping something gets done but have become more lukewarm about the situation because I’m not expecting much. It would be a shame that they would essentially forfeit their 4th round pick. I gotta be honest. While the front office has been pretty genius over it’s long tenure here, but over the course of two bad off-seasons, two crappy trade deadline moves the past two seasons, and now this, I wonder what in the world is happening these days, to put it mildly. At least they didn’t sell the farm for Matt Morris.
To the games…Palm Beach’s game was canceled, Chris Perez makes a splash in AAA, Cody Haerther is back, the Swing had their 6 game win streak snapped. And ladies and gentleman, it’s Tyler Henley! More after the jump.
- Chris Perez struck out 2 of the 3 batters he faced in his AAA debut.
- Brendan Ryan went 2 for 4 and had a throwing error.
- Nick Stavinoha homered for the only Redbird run.
- Mike Ferris had a pinch-hit double.
- In his first game back with Springfield, Cody Haerther doubled and homered.
- Mark Shorey went 2 for 4 with a HR and had 4 RBI.
- Mark Hamilton also went yard, going 1 for 2 with 2 walks, one intentional.
- Colby Rasmus scored 3 runs, doubled, walked and struck out.
- Eric Haberer allowed 4 runs on 5 hits and a walk over 6.1 innings, striking out 5.
- Jason Motte retired all three batters he faced.
- Steve Hill went 2 for 5 with a HR.
- Daryl Jones went 2 for 3 with a homer.
- Christian Lopez went 2 for 5 with a double.
- Arnoldi Cruz went 2 for 5.
- Shaun Garceau got beat up pretty bad. He lasted only 2.1 innings and gave up 5 runs, including 2 homers.
- Chuckie Fick allowed a run on 4 hits over 3.1 IP, striking out 3.
- Tyler Henley had a heckuva debut, going 3 for 4 with a double and scored 3 runs.
- Andrew Brown hit 2 triples.
- Josh Dew retired the only batter he faced for his 8th save.
- Pete Parise allowed no runs on 4 hits and 2 walks, striking out 3.
- Nick Additon had everything going smoothly, allowing a run on 3 hits over 5 innings, striking out 6.
- Jose Arredondo then came in and stunk up the joint, allowing 5 runs in just an inning.
- The team had a total of 4 errors and a passed ball in a sloppy game.
- Joseph Hage doubled and had two walks and was caught stealing.
- Adron Chambers went 2 for 5 with 2 K’s.
GCL Cardinals 7, GCL Marlins 6
- Reid Gorecki went 2 for 4 with a walk.
- Pete Kozma watch: He went 1 for 4 with a walk and had a fielding error.
- Osvaldo Morales went 2 for 5 with a double.
- Jairo Martinez doubled.
- Michael Blazek allowed 2 runs on 2 hits and a walk, while striking out 5.
- Edgar Lara struck out 3 times.
Future Redbirds 
If Steven Hill keeps hitting the way he does, maybe he can be a catcher that allows Brian Anderson to move to 3b like a few have suggested. Or, since he has shown a propensity for being a utility guy, maybe have Hill focus on 3B.
Nick Additon—a lefty with a 6:1 K/BB. I am intrigued
I’ll be sure to check out this Perez guy on Wednesday in Tacoma. I hope he gets a chance to pitch in a save situation.
According to the Post, looks like Russell won’t get signed 😦
[Azru edit: the P-D has massive URLs. HTML-ing it into a small one]
link
So Russell will not be a Card, what about Zawacki?
Russell still has 2 weeks to sign. I want him as much as anyone else but let’s be realistic about when the deadline is. It’s still to early to say whether he will or won’t sign with any degree of certainty.
Perez was downright electric last night. Fastball was 94-96, the 85-mph slider was wicked as hyped.
I’m used to a sidearmer slinging it at 88, so seeing a Redbirds pitcher blowing hitters away with 96-mph heat was nice.
Russell doesn’t strike out “a lot”. Russell strikes out more than anyone else ever has. He sets league records for strikeouts 😉 It does sound like WJ was trying to downplay it though.
The last thing I wanted to come in and see today is that they are monkeying with Colby’s swing…
Like everyone, I hope the Cards do sign Russell. But I won’t go into a catatonic depression if we don’t.
About the only strength in our org right now is middle-of-the-lineup, corner-outfield types, starting with Dunc and Ludwick on the varsity and Ankiel at Memphis. Then you have a crowd of potential power hitters from Springfield down to the Gulf Coast League.
And that’s not counting Hamilton and the rest of the first-base types who’re already blocked by Albert.
Russell may turn out to be better than any of the guys who aren’t Albert, and if he is it’s too bad we couldn’t get him signed and into the mix (if indeed it turns out that way). But given his strikeout propensity, there’s really no telling if he’s better than Ankiel or the other options, who’re cheaper and closer to the majors.
I’d be a lot more concerned if we had failed to get our first-round middle infielder signed, since that’s the weakest part of our system. For all our signings in Latin America, not to mention the million-dollar bonus given to Tyler Greene, Brendan Ryan might still be our best middle-infield prospect. And that’s just not good enough for a team that wants to rebuild from within.
sleepyca,
whatever colby is doing, it needs fixing. may is credited with helping hoffpauir and mather, i think he knows what he is doing.
On Colby & Hamilton – both hitters like to pull the ball and now that the pitchers are going away from them with breaking stuff, all that they are doing is hitting groundballs to the middle infielders. They need to start adjusting to the pitchets and start using the “whole” field, which is what May is trying to get them to do.
Lou – keep an eye on Jose Martinez at Springfield. Considered a 2B, he has been playing SS this year at Palm Beach/Springfield and has been drawing rave reviews from the pitching staffs at both stops. He may turn out to be our best middle infielder of the bunch in the long run. Especially if he continues to hit.
keep an eye on Jose Martinez at Springfield. Considered a 2B
It’s too early to pigeon-hole him as a 2B. The organization doesn’t consider him a 2B and given the lack of defensive metrics for the minors, there’s little evidence as to why he can’t play SS. He is an intriguing prospect who boasts fantastic contact rates although he doesn’t offer many secondary offensive skills.
Thanks, Bleacher and Azru. That’s exciting to hear. I’ve been wondering if his .300/.387/.500 line at JC in ’05 was a park-factor/small-sample-size fluke, or if he’d start hitting again.
He’s only 21, so it’s great to see him holding his own at the plate in AA.
Plus, since he’s the marquee player in the first wave of the Cards’ rejuvenated Latin American program, his success should be encouraging to the guys who followed him into the org.