Minor League Update: 4/18 & 4/19

AAA Scranton-WB

• Carlos Ruiz: 3-8, 2B, RBI, BB, 2 R, K
• Chris Roberson: 3-9, 2B, RBI, 2 R, 2 K, 2 SB
• Josh Kroeger: 1-6, BB, R, K
• Danny Sandoval: N/A
• Brennan King: 1-7, RBI, K
• Angel Chavez: 2-8, BB, 3 SB
• Chris Coste: 1-9, RBI, R, K, SB

• Eude Brito (W, 1-1): 6 IP 1 H 1 ER 2 BB 3 K
• Brian Sanches: 1 IP 0 H 0 ER 0 BB 0 K
• Yoel Hernandez (2 S, 5 total): 2 IP 3 H 1 ER 0 BB 0 K
• Ryan Cameron (W, 1-0): 2 IP 0 H 0 ER 0 BB 2 K

ERA's of a few potential Phillies bullpen options: Brito: 3.21, Cameron: 1.29, Sanches: 2.57, and Hernandez: 1.12. All but Cameron were mentioned by Mike Arbuckle in today's Phillies Notes section of the Inquirer:

But if the Phillies think they need to make a move at some point, they might have a few options at triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. Righthander Yoel Hernandez has five saves in six appearances. Lefthander Eude Brito, who pitched for the Phillies last season, is 1-1 after a 2-1 win over Columbus last night.

"Hernandez is throwing the ball pretty well," said Mike Arbuckle, the Phillies' assistant general manager. "He may be an option for us. I don't know when that might be, but he's throwing well. Brito has thrown the ball pretty good. We're aware of them."

Arbuckle also said Brian Sanches (1-1, 2.57 ERA) "has thrown pretty well, too."

Pretty generic comments really, but good to see that Arbuckle acknowledges the fact that the organization is aware of three potentially helpful arms within the system...

The Clippers pitching staff featured a couple sleeper type players who did a nice job on Wednesday night. Matt DeSalvo took the loss for Columbus when he couldn't outduel Eude Brito even though he pitched well - 7 IP 6 H 2 R 1 ER 1 BB 4 K along with an eye-popping 15/1 ground out/fly out ratio. DeSalvo is a 25-year old pitcher in the Yankees organization capable of throwing five different pitches in any given at bat - fastball, curve, change, and two different kinds of sliders (different arm slots on the sliders). Baseball America ranks him as the Yanks 16th best prospect, John Sickels has him at 10th in the system, and Baseball Prospectus lists L.A. Angels reliever Scot Shields as his third highest rated PECOTA comparable. My own personal comparison (without ever seeing him throw) would be Cory Lidle with a higher K rate - i.e. someone that any team in the bigs could find a use for. It should be very interesting to see what the Yankees do with DeSalvo in 2006 - does he see the majors for New York? Is he trade bait come July? Will he spend his entire Age-25 season in AAA?

Clippers relief pitcher Colter Bean currently has a 0.90 ERA for the club - so much as been said about Bean over the years, I'm not really sure what more I can add. In 6 minor league seasons, he has an ERA of 2.69 with 471 K's in 371.1 innings pitched. The Yankees (and any other team in baseball I suppose) remain skeptical about his big league potential - he has a mediocre fastball and no real dominating secondary strikeout pitch. I think Sickels put it best when he wrote...

Good Old Colter Bean is still around. His main problem now is age. . .too old at 29 to be more than a Grade C prospect, but I think he could help a lot of teams in the bullpen.

Colter Bean will never be an All-Star...but can you honestly say you'd rather trot Julio Santana out there before giving this guy a chance? Maybe major league GM's really are that much smarter than the typical fan, but to be perfectly honest...I sincerely doubt it.

AA Reading

• Michael Bourn: 2-8, 3B, RBI, R
• Tim Moss: 0-3, RBI, 2 K
• Jason Jaramillo: 2-8, R, 2 K, PB
• Bryan Hansen: 1-6, RBI, BB, R, K

• Daniel Haigwood (W, 1-1): 6 IP 3 H 0 ER 5 BB 6 K
• Gio Gonzalez (L, 0-1): 6 IP 6 H 4 ER 1 BB 9 K

Haigwood helped himself yet again by knocking in his third run of the year - I haven't read anywhere about his hitting abilities, but he seems to be doing a nice job with the bat so far. Gonzalez had just an okay start by his standards, but the 9/1 K to BB ratio is encouraging. Gonzalez is really a special young pitcher, I truly believe that. Aaron Rowand has done a very nice job at the plate thus far for the Phils and Haigwood is more or less a sure bet to reach the bigs someday (I think he has the ceiling of a 4/5 starter or a solid bullpen arm personally), but Gio Gonzalez will be the guy fans look back on many years from now and point to as the greatest thing to come out of the Jim Thome trade.

High A Clearwater

• Mike Costanzo: 1-8, 2B, 2 K
• Brad Harman: 1-9, 4 K

• Zach Segovia: 8 IP 2 H 1 ER 3 BB 4 K
• J. A. Happ: 5 IP 5 H 2 ER 1 BB 5 K
• Chris Booker: 1 IP 0 H 0 ER 0 BB 1 K

Segovia and Happ were both excellent. For some reason Segovia is forever linked with Kyle Kendrick in my mind - two big, strong high school righthanders picked early on in the draft. Speaking of Kendrick...

Low A Lakewood

• Greg Golson: 2-7, HR, 2 RBI, 3 R, BB, SB
  
• Tim Kennelly: N/A
  
• Welinson Baez: 1-8, 2B, R, 3 K
  
• Lou Marson: 3-7, 3 RBI, 2 R, 4 K

• Kyle Kendrick (W, 1-0): 8 IP 2 H 0 ER 1 BB 12 K
• Matt Maloney (W, 1-2): 6 IP 1 H 0 ER 1 BB 6 K

Two sparkling performances for these two young pitchers - Kendrick had the best game of any Phillies minor league pitcher this season and Maloney followed up with an similarily impressive outing. Good couple of nights for the Phils minor league teams, especially for many of the young talented pitching prospects.