ChiefsVoice

Veal- Great when his control is good. Walks are his undoing. He just needs to trust his stuff and pitch cause the fastball is good and the curve is good. Right now just throwing too many pitches. I like his prospects remember he is only 21. Johnston- I just wish he'd get healthy cause this kid can be special. He can hit to all fields, has good speed, a great glove, good range and an outstanding arm. He just has to get the thumb healthy and get back in the lineup. Valdez- good bat. Needs work in the outfield. Already has five errors and probably should have anywhere from 6-8. Reed- Came back to Peoria more mature. Has a great attitude which he also had last year. Just 20. can hit, can play defense can throw. Hits lefties well and has better speed than I expected. Has also looked good now at 1st and 3rd in emergency situations which speaks volumes for his athleticism. He can play. Norwood - best hitter on this team. takes care of RBI situations. Very underrated defensively. has saved quite a few plays at 1st and you can tell a difference when he isnt out there. can hit to all fields as well. not much speed but thats expected after the ankle injury. Mota - Only 35 at-bats so I'd like to reserve judgement on him but he is a good singles hitter and has mixed in a few extra base hits. Taylor - Let's see how he throws tonight at SB. All of his starts so far have been at home which is obviously more comfortable. He is young and I like what I've seen so far. Keeps his pitch count low. Ones you left out? Atkins has been our best starter. Campusano is lights out. pretty unhittable so far. Teasley has been great out of the pen with maybe two exceptions. Avery looks good as well.

The rainouts have forced the Chiefs to juggle their starting rotation. Here is how it stands now: Today: LH Donnie Veal vs. LH Ryan Schreppel Mon: RH Scott Taylor vs. RH Eduardo Baeza Tues: RH Todd Blackford at home vs West Michigan TBD Wed: LH Jesus Yepez at home vs West Michigan TBD Thu: RH Mitch Atkins at home vs West Michigan TBD Repeat... also, Kevin Collins re-injured his quad last night in game 1 running out a double and is out and Dylan Johnston re-injured his left thumb.And Davy Gregg is sick also needless to say we are alightly shorthanded here today...

Very good. Quick bat. very fast base runner. We havent tested him in center yet. He glides after the ball in the outfield and makes it look effortless. Took a walk here in game two on a 3-1 borderline pitch instead of being over-aggressive with 1st and 2nd and no outs.

Taylor is fine. He is getting skipped because Mother Nature hates us. Back to back rain-outs and they werent going to screw up the whole rotation on 7 days rest. Taylor will jump back in on Tuesday at home. He threw a side yesterday after we were rained out and is the only one affected by the rainouts now instead of having 5 guys affected...

Is there a list published anywhere online? A bunch of us from the Peoria Chiefs are going up on Wednesday the 17th and just wanted to see who was scheduled to sing that day! Thanks in advance for any help. Nathan

he hit 97 a few times. mostly 92-94

Actually, Yepez has a blister and was skipped. Atkins came back to today because of the off day Wednesday. Wood will be follwed by the pen. Veal, Blackford, Yepez and Taylor in Ft. Wayne...Atkins starts game 1 in So Bend.

oh well. this is really a non-story to me. I can't tell a whole lot of difference from 05 to 06. The only think I don't like is that without announcing the names they have no accountability. and having different guys every single night makes it tough. but other than those two minor things, these guys havent bothered me much....or at least not any more than the last three seasons!

We just got a press release from MILB. Back to work no later than May 8th assuming the deal which was reached last night is ratified on May 1st....

and Norwood hits a Loooooong 2 run homer here in Dayton. 3-2 Chiefs.

50 games Max IMO....this is NO WHERE close to Artest like.

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.

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.

this bullpen is um, struggling. i can say that right?

He's not sitting out for any reason. and he is also not the full-time catcher. Muyco has started every game against a Lefty so far with Reed starting most the games vs righties though Morgan started one. We have 3 catchers so there is more of a rotation than having full-time catcher.

Left handed starter for QC. Reed, Johnston and Defendis, all LH hitters are all on the bench. the only LH bat is Davy Gregg.

2 hits, 1 walk, 1 k, 1 pickoff (1-6-3), 1 error at third and then the batters interference...threw a 1-2-3 2nd inning on 11 pitches. 32 total pitches. down 1-0 after 2.

Yep. We are ready to do it now but it will be done through Minorleaguebaseball.com's multimedia page and the email I received today indicated it would be Late this week or early next week before their system is ready to archive.

those are impressive numbers for West Tenn... Chiefs bullpen through 4 games: 15.2 ip 3 hits 0 runs 7 bb 18 K 1 win 2 saves 0.00 ERA 0.53 WHIP All 7 guys have pitched at least 1 inning led by Estrada with 3.2

Yepez was great yesterday. no hits through five. mixed in all over the soze. he doesnt throw as hard as some of the other guys ( i think he was 85-88 if the radar on the scoreboard was accurate) but is somewhat deceptive from the left side. it looked like lefties had trouble picking him up yesterday. some of that had to do with the positioning of the sun but he took advantage of that. everyting was either popped up or on the ground so his sinking fastball was obviously effective. also had a nice breaking ball and changeup working yesterday. good control as well.

Campusano looks better this year than he did on the mound last year. Looks to be throwing harder and looks a lot more confident. His numbers were good with us last season but his control was too shaky to be a closer. Not so this year, at least so far! I think he is a prospect, not as high as Phelps but the 2nd best in our pen. Sotolongo, I'll have to hold judgement on until I see him throw more than 27 pitches but he did look good Friday night. He is a big guy. I don't remember the radar numbers, but I didn't say Wow thats a great fastball. Blackford looked great Friday. Keeps the ball low, mixes it in and out and up and down. Watching him pitch was fun on Friday night. He was 89-91 with the Fastball

Doesn't that make 17 outs? It should be 18 outs....the other was a pickoff of 1st base....he threw 6 innings.

todays starting 9, er 10. Chirinos 2B Rivera SS Ciaramella CF Norwood 1B Garcia DH Taylor 3B Valdez LF Dedendis RF Muyco C Billek P All lefties except Defendis sitting against the LH Paul Fagan. Little warmer here today and not as windy, but still football weather in Wisconsin.

During the Chiefs' game, Nate said that Dope had a sprained knee I do believe. Hopefully it is only a mild one, but those can be hard to recover from; especially for a power hitter who puts so much stress on his knees. Nope, that was Harvey I was talking about, I didn't even know Dopirak was injured....

I had a lot of problems with that Peoria feed last year too. I would have to turn sound up as loud as possible just to hear anything... its a completely different feed this year. last year's feed was garbage from the radio station