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Saturday, July 19, 2008

Baltimore Sun: Loewen to try new position

No longer willing to go through another surgery and extended rehabilitation process on his left elbow, Orioles pitcher Adam Loewen will attempt to reinvent himself as a position player.

Loewen, an accomplished hitter in British Columbia before the Orioles drafted him in 2002, sustained another fracture during his last relief appearance. Renowned orthopedic specialist Dr. James Andrews inserted a screw in Loewen’s elbow last year, which allowed him to eventually return to the mound. But Loewen went back on the disabled list earlier this season with soreness in the elbow and forearm area, successfully completed his injury rehab assignment and made three relief appearances before sustaining another fracture.

Loewen has been told that another surgery would sideline him for 1 ½ years, “and he has zero interest in going down that path again,” team president Andy MacPhail said. The Orioles plan on waiting until after the season and perhaps assigning Loewen to the fall instructional league.
...
While some teams coveted Loewen as a hitter going into the draft, the Orioles chose him with the fourth overall pick and envisioned him being a frontline starter for many years.

NTNgod Posted: July 19, 2008 at 11:10 PM | 10 comment(s) Login to Bookmark
  Tags: orioles

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   1. xbhaskarx Posted: July 19, 2008 at 11:55 PM (#2865150)
Maybe Mulder should do this.
   2. Enrico Pallazzo Posted: July 20, 2008 at 01:06 AM (#2865211)
Every mental-problemed/arm-toasted/2-way-talented pitcher should be Ankieled. Dontrelle, Grienke, Loewen, Owings, etc...

I'd love to see what those guys could pull off with plenty of at-bats. Ankiel has 35 bombs in 575 at-bats for crying out loud. The scary part is he's still only 28.
   3. Esoteric Posted: July 20, 2008 at 01:15 AM (#2865221)
Erm...I'm thinking Greinke has done a good enough job at this point in harnessing his talent as a pitcher to keep him there...
   4. Gamingboy Posted: July 20, 2008 at 02:29 AM (#2865266)
Loewen to be Ankieled?

Cripes. This is gonna be scary. I mean, at least Ankiel had at-bats against pro pitching.
   5. NTNgod Posted: July 20, 2008 at 02:30 AM (#2865268)
The scary part is he's still only 28.

Well, he was Friday, at least :P
   6. Enrico Pallazzo Posted: July 20, 2008 at 03:39 AM (#2865297)
Erm...I'm thinking Greinke has done a good enough job at this point in harnessing his talent as a pitcher to keep him there...

Oh, I know. Just sayin', a bomb in his first ever at-bat and a pretty good athlete.
   7. MM1f Posted: July 20, 2008 at 06:23 AM (#2865364)
6,
Grienke was actually a better SS prospect than RHP before his senior year of HS. IIRC, when he signed with Clemson it was as a SS first, pitcher second. Then he broke out in a big way on the mound and it was obvious thats where he was going to play.
His brother is a OF-RHP at Auburn but isn't particularly good at either.

Another could be P-to-SS project is Expos' prospect Clint Everts. He was a top 10 pick in '02 and was Kazmir's HS rotation mate Clint Everts. He hasn't been the same since an arm injury but was a good enough HS SS that he would have been a first-round candidate even if he didn't pitch.

Ryan Klesko was more of a pitching prospect in HS but hurt his arm so the Braves just drafted him to hit and it worked out well.

Post 2,
Don't forget about Mike Stodolka. He probably isn't a MLB 1b but to go from bust pitcher to actually having a pretty good year as a hitter in AA last year aint too shabby.
   8. MM1f Posted: July 20, 2008 at 06:33 AM (#2865368)
Adding to the list...

The Rockies have a good organizational 1b/OF in AA named Jeff Kindel who was a LHP his first two years at GT. He entered GT as, apparently, a pretty good pitcher but broke a teammate's jaw (or something) during a fall scrimmage and guilt and fear from that got in his head couldn't throw strikes again after that. GTs coach gave him a year or two to work his deal out but it was hopeless and after his soph year coach told him that there wasn't a spot for him on the team anymore since he, essentially, could no longer pitch a baseball. Kindel asked to start hitting and put up two big years as an OF and then has kept hitting pretty solidly in the minors.

GT had an early rounds pick this year who was drafted out of HS and JUCO as a P, fairly high too. When he turned down the Marlins to go to GT he was expected to be a key arm for them but for some reason he pitched just one bad inning for GT and redshirted the rest of the year. I think an injury was involved, but I'm not sure. So he played summer ball in a second or third tier college summer league in TX and got the coach to let him pitch and play OF. He excelled offensively and defensively in the OF and the summer coach called Tech and told 'em to let the kid hit and when the college season rolled around this year he was Tech's fulltime leadoff hitter. He put up a good year and showed some good tools and got picked high and he now has somewhere between a quarter-mil and a half-mil in the bank... mostly because he got a summer ball coach to let him hit some. And he saved a once-promising pro career that was almost extinguished.
   9. Philippe Posted: July 20, 2008 at 08:00 AM (#2865383)
I don't see how you can broach this topic and not even mention John Van Benschoten. It's been obvious for three years now that the Pirates made a mistake by making him a pitcher and he should be allowed to go back to hitting (for most observers, it was obvious on draft day, but that's another story). Unfortunately, he's running out of time to make the switch back.

He should sue the Pirates for screwing his career.
   10. crict Posted: July 20, 2008 at 08:43 PM (#2865752)
Another bad news for Canadian starters. It looks bad for the upcoming World baseball classic.

In Bedard, Harden, Shawn Hill and Loewen, we have 3 very fragile starters. Loewen is now gone, and most probably the other 3 won't have permission to play. That leaves Ryan Dempster and Jeff Francis.

Add to that Scott Mathieson who was a bit of a prospect before injury, so the record is not good for Canadian starters. Could it be that throwing so few innings in their youth hurt them? Very small sample size obviously.

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