Kevin Collins, Kyle Reynolds Join Chiefs

[ChiefsVoice]

PEORIA, IL- The Peoria Chiefs in conjunction with the Chicago Cubs have announced that outfielder Kevin Collins and infielder Kyle Reynolds have joined the team from extended spring training. To make room for the two new players, the Cubs have released infielder Luis Rivera and outfielder Johnny Defendis.

Collins was a Midwest League mid-season and Post-Season All-Star in 2004 with Lansing and finished that season with a .290 batting average, 33 home runs, 26 doubles and 86 RBI. Last season in High-A Daytona, Collins was batting .265 with 18 homers, 15 doubles and 52 RBI when he separated his shoulder while slamming into the outfield wall. He has not appeared in a game since and his been in Mesa, AZ rehabbing the injury. Collins was drafted by the Cubs in the 24th round of the 1999 draft out of Pasco Hernando Community College in Florida. He led the Northwest League in hitting in 2002 with a .342 average and 13 homers before hitting .225 with 14 homers in Lansing in 2003.

Reynolds was drafted out of Baylor University in the 6th round last June and played in one game in Mesa before moving up to Boise for the remainder of the season. In 52 Northwest League games, Reynolds batted .256 with five homers, six doubles, 24 RBI and 28 runs scored. The 22 year old left-handed hitter played 26 games at shortstop last season and 17 at second base.

Rivera, a native or Puerto Rico, was batting .080 (2-for25) with three runs scored in 10 games. He saw action at third base, second base and shortstop with the Chiefs this season and last year when he batted .348. Rivera was signed in June 2005 by the Cubs out of Florida International University and started his career in Mesa before joining the Chiefs in late July.

Defendis appeared in nine games and was batting .172 (5-for-29) with two doubles and one run scored. He was drafted out of Rutgers in the 29th round last June. The 22 year old hit .324 with two homers, 12 doubles and 33 RBI in 62 games last season split between Mesa and Boise.

The Chiefs return home for a weekend four game series against the Burlington Bees. On Friday April 21st and Saturday April 22nd, all fans will receive 2006-07 Peoria Chiefs calendars while supplies last. Sunday April 23rd is the first Family Fun Day at O’Brien Field with kids allowed to run the bases after the game and a post-game team autograph session on the concourse. The series with the Bees finishes on Monday April 24th with Mountain Dew Half-Price Monday.

[Chris]

Thanks for the update!

[ChiefsVoice]

Scott Taylor is also here and will join our rotation. He is not activated yet so there is no corresponding move. Taylor will start Monday with Billek moving to the bullpen...thats all for now.

[CubsMinorLeagueReport]

Scott Taylor is also here and will join our rotation. He is not activated yet so there is no corresponding move. Taylor will start Monday with Billek moving to the bullpen...thats all for now.

 

I like this, hopefully Taylor steps up, Billek could be very tough out of the pen.

[Coach C]

Good to hear.

 

I am curious, since I don't follow the minors very well, but I take it the "ChiefsVoice" person is the person who does radio for the Chiefs?

[Laura]

Good to hear.

 

I am curious, since I don't follow the minors very well, but I take it the "ChiefsVoice" person is the person who does radio for the Chiefs?

 

Yes, ChiefsVoice = Nathan Baliva, the broadcaster and Media Manager for the Chiefs.

[Guest]

http://www.theoldcomputer.com/Libarary

[NCCubFan]

Good to hear.

 

I am curious, since I don't follow the minors very well, but I take it the "ChiefsVoice" person is the person who does radio for the Chiefs?

Just like "jaxxradio" is Ron Potesta, radio broadcaster of the Djaxx.

[craig]

Scott Taylor is also here and will join our rotation. He is not activated yet so there is no corresponding move. Taylor will start Monday with Billek moving to the bullpen...thats all for now.

 

Thanks, Nathan. Very, very interesting. I'll guess that Sotolongo will be demoted, he's been toast his last handful of outings. At his age and without any extraordinary velocity, it's hard to see him commanding extended opportunity.

 

It's a shame that Billek has struggled. I had a friend the other day who watched him get pounded, and said he didn't have a single pitch that reached as high as 90. So either he's not healthy, or else the velocity that Cub scouts had seen on occassion and that they projected to possibly become more consistent with improved health and/or optimized delivery, it seems that velocity step hasn't materialized. Maybe it will in future, but for now it probably makes sense to get him out of the rotation.

 

Often when they call somebody up, it's a rehab pitcher (Ransom, Blasko, and Petrick are three rehab guys I know of), or a college vet, or somebody like Downs (who may be rehab/hurt for all I know); or they could call up a college vet for relief and shift some reliever into rotation.

 

Taylor choice is none of those, so I'm hoping it means he's been rocking in XST. I guess we'll get a better picture over the next several rotations.

 

Interesting that he got the call rather than Pawelek. Possible reasons I can think of: a) Pawelek is hurt (no reason to assume any such thing...) b) Taylor is much less wild than Pawelek and in terms of current readiness, is simply more advanced than Pawelek (Pawelek is a month or two older, I think), c) Taylor's stuff is simpler than Pawelek, and less likely to go wildman than Pawelek, d) Pawelek is a bigger deal, so they'll treat him more carefully. They want to make sure Pawelek is limited to an easy league where he won't struggle too much; if Taylor struggles some, they don't mind as much. d) Taylor is a tougher hard-guy psychologically, so perhaps they think he'd respond better to being overmatched than would Pawelek? e) Maybe Pawelek is a hard worker but Taylor is more lazy? If the lazy guy gets spanked in Peoria, that will be the movitation he needs to work harder? Whereas getting spanked in Peoria would not help Pawelek since he's already working as hard as he can? f) Maybe Pawelek has been the lazy one? So this is a reward to the harder working Taylor, and a message to Pawelek and everybody else that it's not about draft status anymore, work hard or people will pass you by? g) Taylor played against some fairly decent Virginia area teams. Pawelek only against some very low-competition Utah teams. So even though Pawelek is a shade older and higher drafted, his actual baseball experience is way less, and he needs more practice to catch up? h) Taylor's stuff and delivery hasn't been changed much, so he's been able to keep pitching the way he did in HS. But perhaps they've done a lot more reworking with Pawelek's mechanics and stride and grip and release points, etc., so it's going to take him a lot longer to geet consistent? i) It's PR. If a high-draft advances and gets slaughtered, he looks bad, the org looks bad, the org gets accused of "rushing" etc., and it just brings out tons of fault-finding. If a later draft moves up and gets killed, you just send him back down, and nobody finds it at all shocking that a 5th rounder isn't ready yet, who expected him to be?

[CaliforniaRaisin]

All in all, I'm still disappointed Pawelek hasn't made it to Peoria yet. Good for Taylor though.

[Quakers]

I am disappointed with Defendis. I thought he would do better. True he lacked the speed to play center and the power to play a corner outfield spot, but he showed a nice line-drive stroke when I saw him with Boise...Oh well.