Maybe Buchholtz in the Rotation Mid2008 isn't unreasonable. He finishes the year at AA, moves up to AAA next season, somebody gets hurt/rocked something next year, and he's in the rotaiton?

I don't see why he can't start the year in the rotation. We let the fat toad walk, re-sign Wakefield and just plug in Buchholz.

In other news, Reid Engel is The Franchise.

Nice little 30-0 Lancaster loss tonight.

Jed Wowrie: .257/.402/.410., 25/20 BB/K

April: .170/.286/.264, 9/13 BB/K
May: .346/.507/.558, 16/7 BB/K

vs. LHP: .143/.194/.214, 2/10 BB/K
vs. RHP: .299/.465/.481, 23/10 BB/K

He's the best positional prospect baseball has seen in the last decade folks.

Reid "The Franchise" Engel

April: 70 AB's, .200/.243/.214, 2/16 BB/K
May: 51 AB's, .451/.500/.686, 5/11 BB/K

He should be a top 20 prospect in baseball by July.

I don't see why he can't start the year in the rotation. We let the fat toad walk, re-sign Wakefield and just plug in Buchholz.

Is it so wrong to want to see a highly-rated prospect to build confidence in AAA first?

"vs. LHP: .143/.194/.214, 2/10 BB/K"

Trot Nixon, the infielder?

That's what June-August is for. He's not going to be in Po-town for that much longer.

Trot Nixon, the infielder?

Seemingly. And sadly, he is a switch-hitter. But he has always had problems from that side of the plate.

As for that 30-0 game:

"It was also a revenge game in the history of the two clubs. The JetHawks all-time record for most runs scored in a game, 27, was set against Lake Elsinore August 15, 1999. The previous opponent record against the JetHawks, 23, was also set by the Storm."

I like that the JetHawks are in a revenge battle with a team called Lake Elsinore. (If only the Storm were called the Handsaws.)

team "from" Lake Elsinore, that is

???? You don't want him to finish the year in Portland? WTF?

Well I don't really care. But it makes no sense to keep him all year in Portland if he is going to dominate like this. In all truthfulness, he can pitch in the majors right now. Why not raise him up a level? I guess I don't really understand why this is so quizzical to you.

Maybe Engel isn't a switch-hitter, even though he thinks he is? What were his splits like last year?

Jed Wowrie: .257/.402/.410., 25/20 BB/K


I can't find him at Sox Prospects. And if he is a switch hitter and is doing so horribly right-handed he should drop the switch hitting. Yesterday.

His real name is Lowrie.

Lester went 3.2 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 2 K tonight in AAA. Travis Hughes also went 3.1 scoreless, lowering his ERA to 0.38

And Ellsbury seems to be getting the hang of AAA, 3-5 with a 2B, 3B, and SB.

Lester went 3.2 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 2 K tonight in AAA.

Did he start or come in from the pen?

I take it they're gradually increasing his workload.

Aaton Bates was 5/5 tonight with 4 HR's for Lancaster. They were all hit to the opposite field.

I have an extra to today's game. Send an email for details.

Sorry. Taking off.

Tease.

Reid "The Franchise" Engel

Home: .347/.390/.472, 4/15 BB/K
Road: .231/.286/.308, 3/12 BB/K

Except for two games in Asheville and four games in Kannapolis, Greenville has been home the entire month of May. The Drive is about to embark on an eight-game trip to Lexington and West Virginia; I'd suggest we wait and see what Engel's numbers for the month look like after that trip.

-- MWE

The problem with Bates so far this year was his BA, and that game brought him up to .294. He has struck out a lot, but also walked a lot, putting him at .294/.436/.634. I'd expect to see him move to AA soon as there's no one blocking him at 1B there, and at 23, he's on the old side for high-A. Bubba Bell, who's 24, should be headed up soon to.

Bell, incidentally, has a similar walk rate to Bates with half the K's.

Apparently the Sox have also decided to revisit Delcarmen. He's been called up to replace the very impressive Gabbard.

So Gabbard won't fill in for Beckett's next start, then? (There's some rule about calling a guy back up, right?)

gabbard will be back eventually. he was impressive. i think gabbard would have stayed around if it weren't for saturday's blowout using up the pen.

Yeah, I was wondering about that too PJ. Seems like they're getting an extra reliever for a few days at the expense of a starter who did quite nicely. Maybe they plan to call up Buchholz.

According to Amelie Benjamin on the Globe's blog, the Sox will use their off day to skip Gabbard's slot in the rotation, planning for Beckett to return on the 29th.

Sox pen has thrown 10 IP in two days. Getting another arm in there makes sense to me.

(There's some rule about calling a guy back up, right?)

They can't call him back up for at least ten days, unless he's replacing someone who went on the DL in the interim. That's how they got Hansack back for Saturday. He was optioned down on 5/11, but Beckett went on the DL officially on 5/19, eight days later. Hansack was tapped to replace him.

Hansack was optioned back down to Pawtucket after the game on 5/19, so I think he can return on 5/29, which is also Beckett's targeted return date. If Beckett isn't ready, they can recall Hansack instead.

Let's see, major league minimum is around $300k, or $50k/month, or around $1,700 for one day. Don't spend it all in one place, Devern.

Yes, there's a 10-day rule which requires players to stay in the minors unless recalled to replace an injured player (and if that happens, the team doesn't burn an option on the player if they haven't already used one for him that season).

-- MWE

Now that Delcarmen is officially revisited, can we get a "I'm worried about J.D. Drew's Performance" thread going?

Except for two games in Asheville and four games in Kannapolis, Greenville has been home the entire month of May. The Drive is about to embark on an eight-game trip to Lexington and West Virginia; I'd suggest we wait and see what Engel's numbers for the month look like after that trip.

Why?

Greenville's first year open was last year and it was a neutral park.

Are you saying he just feels more comfortable at home?

His BB/K ratio has improved this month, his GB rate is down, his LD rate is up, and his FB rate is up. Unless I'm misinterpreting the home field advantage you are speaking about, it seems like his improvement has been real.

I guess my confusion is why I should be impressed with Reid Engel. Does he have power potential? If so, where is it? I see a singles-hitting corner outfielder with poor strike zone judgement who's gotten relatively better at hitting singles.

If he were (a) a center fielder and (b) hitting for power, I could see myself being excited. It seems to me like the argument for Engel is that he really is a center fielder, but he's been moved off for Place (if so, why does Hall start in CF when Place sits?), and that he really has power potential, but he hasn't showed it yet. That's a lot for me to take.

Further, if Engel has all these tools, why has he yet to be included by BA in the top 30 Sox prospects? Has this just been a multi-year oversight on their part?

The above two posts are probably snarkier than I mean them to be. I like tweaking Temple, but hopefully it doesn't come off as more than that. I am honestly interested to hear the case for Reid Engel - but I don't see it, right now.

You don't have to be impressed with Engel. What I see with him is a raw athlete from a cold-weather state who has better raw tools than 90% of the players in our system. He has always been young for his league, and in general inexperienced, but his tools have big-league potential. He's got good size (6'3") and excellent speed (6.4 second 60-yard dash). There were questions when he was drafted if his body was even ready to hold up to the grind of a professional schedule. But he has put on 30 pounds of "good weight" since then, while still maintaining an athletic frame. I understand he has never really put up numbers yet, but stats in the low minors aren't that important anyway. As the cliche says, power is the last tool to develop, and he has the right body to develop power with. I'm not sure why he hasn't played CF this year when Place hasn't played, but the reports on his defense from Lowell were very positive last year. Just watch out for him. He is the franchise after all.

-Power potential is at least as much about what a guy's swing looks like as about his build, right? That's really my question about Engel, if he has a swing that will add power. That, and whether all the stuff about his speed has translated to baseball speed. If he does have the baseball speed of an above average CF, and he has a swing that will add HRs as he ages, Engel impresses me. But there's a good bit of silence from some people who should have noticed if that were the case, so I'm holding off.

-Buchholz vs. Clemens today. I'm taking Buchholz.

Bowden went 4 today and gave up 0 ER, but 5 BB and only 3 K. His game log was interesting because it showed that of his 6 "air outs," five were infield popups. Makes me look at that GO/AO stat in a new light.

Here's my brief report from the ballgame:

Some general thoughts on Bowden:

1. He just didn't have good command today. No way around it. He rarely threw consecutive strikes. He didn't have the chance to set hitters up, because he often started out behind in the count. He really just never seemed to settle into a groove.

2. He threw only 1, maybe 2 good curveballs all day. He got a strikeout on one and he bounced the other into the dirt. It would have been nice to see him feature it more, but as I said above, he rarely had a chance since he was behind in the count so much.

3. There wasn't a hard hit ball off him all day. Take it for what it's worth, but that's pretty impressive since the hitters so often had the count in their favor.

4. I was sitting with the major league scouts and they all had him between 89-92 mph.

5. He's not better than Buchholz, but it was hard to judge him today, where he presumably had his worst stuff of the season.


Other thoughts:

1. Every time I've seen Jed Lowrie play, I'm never disappointed. He's a good solid player.

2. Buck was charting today. He also spent a good bit of time conversing with Princeton head baseball coach and former major league catcher Scott Bradley.

3. This team is very unathletic.

Power potential is at least as much about what a guy's swing looks like as about his build, right? That's really my question about Engel, if he has a swing that will add power. That, and whether all the stuff about his speed has translated to baseball speed.

I think so. I have watched him play each of the last 4 days on Milb.tv and he has actually improved leaps and bounds from where he was last spring training.

1. His regular speed translates to baseball speed. He has stolen a base, taken an extra base, or stretched a double into a triple with relative ease in the games I've seen.

2. He has a very nice, compact left-handed stroke which I could see developing into 15-20 home run power with 30 2B's.

Lester tonght: 5 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 1 BB, 1 K, 0 HR. Meh.

I would really love to see him put up a couple 10-K games or otherwise dominate in some way before inserting him in the rotation.