karenmac

yah, because DARE Day at the park isn't *quite* long enough...we really needed a double-header tomorrow. Well, at least Raisin will have something to do at work :wink: That said, I'm having a hard time getting excited for taking a vacation day in order to be at the park at 7am to wrap a bajillion hot dogs. At least it's not going to be really warm. I am looking forward to the Chiefs getting back to their winning ways.

I'd have to agree with this - guess he looks great in BP (I'm never there to see it, but have heard from staff), so guess he's got the capability for power. I've seen him make good contact in a couple of games, but continues to show inconsistency. The "flashes of brilliance" makes me think he would be better in EXT/Boise right now, but I suppose it depends on who else they may have in EXT that could take his place.

to reinforce Andy's move, I am going to drop Soto and add Kinsler, please.

OK, couple of things to mention from Sunday's game: First, not sure what was going on with Andersen, but Kelly (Chiefs trainer) didn't spend any time asking Cliff if he wanted to try and walk it off, so am wondering if it was something that had been bothering him in the recent past. That said, his single should have been a double, but he just got to first. Hope it's nothing too serious, as he seems to do well in the lead-off role. Second, there were a couple of plays at 3rd that it seemed like Vitters should have had. Not sure if it was positioning or what, and perhaps I'm expecting too much, but was kinda hoping that some of those XBHs to the left-field corner wouldn't happen as frequently. We'll see... It was good to see fewer walks today...Bristow must have been on a strict pitch count, and he still has some work to do to get back to where he needs to be, but Beliveau looked great. Finally, as heartwrenching as the top of the 9th was, the bottom of the 9th provided for excellent entertainment and offense. The entertainment came from Nelson Perez and Mike Brenly - Perez had what could have been a triple, but with Brenly running ahead of him, they practically crossed on the base paths! Earth to Nelson - the CATCHER is in front of you! Don't expect a ton of speed! Perez got back to 2nd (no one was covering the bag, thank goodness), but it looked a little keystone copper-y :) Campana & Harrison put things away - it's interesting to see the dynamic between these 2 college teammates - Campana did a diving sprawl on to home plate and all of us in the crowd were going nuts. A good day for the Chiefs. Hopefully we'll be able to keep the rain away tonight.

sweet - I was hoping to see Shafer in Milwaukee! Hope it warms up in Appleton - at least you didn't open the season there this year :)

just thought I'd bump this to remind folks that the Chiefs will be playing at Miller NEXT FRIDAY 4/24. If you haven't been to Miller, it's a great park to see a game at, and is set up for great tailgating ahead of the game too! Couple of things to mention: - If you'd like to go, and are in the Peoria area, our booster club is doing a bus trip - $55 for ticket, transportation and snacks - If you'd like to go and *aren't* in the Peoria area, our club has some additional tickets that I'd like to get rid of - $10 face, but would be willing to take $8. You'd get to sit with fellow cub / chief fans. Don't remember exactly what section the seats are in, but do remember them being about 10 rows up from the Chiefs' dugout. Have we been mentioning that Vitters and Flaherty have been *raking*?!? Come see them in an MLB park!!! Not sure who our starter is going to be yet, but after the Wrigley experience last year, I'd really like to get as many folks up to see the game as possible. Finally, if my pitch hasn't been enough to sway you yet, remember that Miller does have a roof for this time of the year, so it's always about 20 degrees warmer inside than it is outside!!! PM me if you're interested :D

I think he'll be in Daytona by June. So your telling me I need to get my ass to Peoria ASAP huh. I already saw him. :D Better hurry yourself up if you want to go see Vitters! Heck, Flaherty might not even be in Peoria any more come June if he keeps this up. Agreed...Shafer too, if he keeps things up. Generally we'll see that sort of movement right before the all-star break (also pretty close to when the draft is, so not too shocking)

Actually he was 11GO/3AO in the box score, so not many fly balls that were caught, at any rate. Thanks for the good report. Of course we've got to ask the scouting questions, to whatever degree you feel confident to answer. 1. Does Peoria show radar readings for velocity? If so, and if you remember, what kind of readings was Shafer getting? (And if you noticed, Huseby?) 2. The report on him last summer was that he had a good breaking ball (curveball), on good days. Did you notice some? That's probably true...just more hits, and those were the ones that ended up in the outfield, I suppose. Glad to see it - just my perception getting in the way. No worries on the scouting questions...am happy to help with those as I can. I sit in the same section as the *real* scouts and definitely know my observations are amateur hour all the way! 1) normally the radar readings do display, but there have been some issues with the gun early this year. They may be fixed - I'll admit that I haven't trained my eye to look up right after the pitch, so afraid I can't comment on speed of Shafer or Huseby. Nate, do you recall? 2) yes, it does seem that the breaking pitch is there, although in general, his pitches seem to have good movement. Wish I could do a better job explaining - Nate has a good view from his spot too, so maybe he'll be able to bail me out of this one :)

Vitters didn't get charged with any errors in the box score. How did Rebel look? His numbers are great to start the season. hmmm...well, he got charged with an error in *my* book. It was a ball to his right that he snagged cleanly. I thought that, with a good throw, the guy would have been out. Guess Brandon Thome, our official scorer, disagreed with me! Rebel has looked *great* this season. His work at first has been good, and he's become much more patient at the plate. Last year, he seemed to swing at junk and you can tell he's really worked to fix that over the off season. He doesn't seem to be swinging for the fences every time, either, making him a better hitter...can think of at least a couple xbh in the gap that have scored us runs, so very glad to see he's made adjustments.

Shafer looked great again tonight - wasn't keeping score, but still lots of 1st pitch strikes. It did seem to me, though, that he wasn't *quite* hitting his spots like he did last Thursday (or just a pickier ump, perhaps). It also seemed like there were more balls in the air with this outing. Then again, pretty hard to keep it on the ground as much as he did the last time around. Pretty sure he had family or friends in town to see the game too, as I passed a MO license plate with Wichita St stuff in the window on the way back to my car after the game. Glad they were able to make it! Also, it looks like Mike Brenly has made it to Peoria. He wasn't on the roster tonight, but was down in the bullpen warming guys up during the game. Not sure when or what the roster change will look like, but would guess it won't be too long before it happens. Thought I'd mention too, that, while Vitters did hit tonight, he had an error at 3rd too (airmailed a throw to first early in the game), so still some work to do there. Guess it's good to see even the first rounders are human :)

4-3 Dayton in game 1 - Nelson Perez with what sounded like a ginormous 2 run HR to right

NSBB love from Nate on the radio! hope you're staying warm, Nate - I'm hoping to get down there for the last part of the 2nd game...

Pretty sure for the first couple of games, he was in the 7th spot...Nelson Perez is our clean-up guy, and just haven't seen much out of him yet. Am hoping he's just a little slow in coming around, but am surprised he's continued to hit where he's at.

I think they trade off 2 hour shifts, as they can't do 6-8 hours at a time. Not sure if it's 2 teams each taking 2 shifts or what, but it seems to be working pretty well. Just saw part of the 1 hour wrap-up show yesterday morning when getting ready for work, so think that's new. Am definitely liking it better than sportscenter or bbtn.

nope, they're rained out (oh, and it's freezing too). Playing 2 tomorrow, beginning at 11am, just for Raisin. He won't get any work done ;-)

you're in luck tomorrow too, then, Raisin - Chiefs play at 11am so Bradley can play late. :D

well, look at Miss Laura, jumping out to the early lead...

I'm so excited that the minor league season has started! Glad to see Sam have such a good start in Iowa, but hope all is OK with Mitch Atkins - hopefully those earned runs will be the last of it for a while. As far as my impressions of the Peoria game... I was *very* impressed with Shafer. While, yes, he did only strike out 2, he was consistently throwing 1st pitch strikes, which was good against Kane County, as they are generally groomed as such "patient" hitters. There was one play in the 2nd where he grabbed a bunt to the 3rd base side and tried to throw to first from his rear-end...luckily, the throw was OK, but he should have just eaten the ball, as it was clear there was no way the guy was going to be out. Finally, he's a ground-ball pitcher, which is great for the infield we have, I think. Of the 15 outs he had, 12 were on the ground (one with a DP), 2 strike outs, 2 were fly balls. If he can keep that up, we're in good shape and he's not going to be around long. The other person that really impressed me last night was...Kevin Kreier. You're probably thinking, what?!? Kreier had better control than I remember from last year (maybe I'm just forgetful) and had 5 of his 7 outs as Ks...3 of them called. Offensively, it seemed that many of the guys put together good, patient at-bats. They looked quite human the 1st time through the lineup, not surprising, I suppose, but you could see some of the adjustments starting in the 4th. While there were 6Ks total, only Nelson Perez did so twice. Guess that's it for now...am hoping the rain stops and it gets warm so we can get the game in tonight!

I just got laid off so Ive got plenty of time to go watch Peoria this year. Think we need to have a NSBB meetup in Peoria this year. Sounds like a plan! I'm happy to set it up - just let me know what dates work for those that may want to join!

Just saw a note the the Cubs traded Rocky Roquet to Oakland - according to this http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?n=Rocky%20Roquet&pos=P&sid=milb&t=p_pbp&pid=503352, he's been assigned to their AAA affiliate in Sacramento, along with Eric Patterson and Yusuf Carter. Not sure what we got for Rocky Am sad to see Rocky leave the organization, but think he might get a quicker shot with Oakland and wish him nothing but the best. With Oakland also having Jerry Blevins, Sean Gallagher, and Daric Barton, their organization is full of Peoria Chief grads :) Rocky's also from California, so am glad his folks will be close enough to come and see him play more often.

Yep, Peoria got it too - channel 949...woo hoo!

Team Stats & Scoring 1. Number of Cubs wins, 2009 = 93 2. Number of Cubs wins, Cardinals season series (16 games) = 11 3. Number of runs scored, 2009 = 870 4. Number of runs allowed, 2009 = 734 5. Final Placement in the NL Central Division = 1st Player Stats & Scoring 1. Number of Aramis Ramirez Home Runs = 26 2. Number of Soriano Stolen Bases = 21 3. Ryan Theriot's Batting Average = .281 4. Milton Bradley's RBIs = 76 5. Ryan Dempster's Wins = 11 6. Sean Marshall's ERA = 4.57 7. Carlos Zambrano's Ks = 147 8. Rich Harden's Innings Pitched = 176 Bonus Questions I 1. Which will be higher: Soto's RBIs 2. Which will be higher: Aaron Heilman's relief appearances 3. Which will be higher: Mike Fontenot's at-bats 4. Who will have more HRs: Fukudome 5. Who will have more wins: Harden 6. Who will have a higher SLG: Bradley Bonus Questions II (30 points each) 1. Most HRs: Soriano 2. Highest OBP (min. 400 ABs): Bradley 3. Lowest ERA (min. 150 IPs): Haren 4. Most saves: Marmol The Annual Tiebreaker: Date of Lou Piniella's First Ejection: July 3rd

Group A - Howard Group B - Braun, Fielder Group C - Soriano, Pena, Reynolds Group D - Bruce, Davis, Votto, Morneau, Soto WC - PM'ed

that's too bad. When he was with the Chiefs (briefly) last year, I was really impressed and glad to see him get moved on so quickly. After having arm issues in 2007, he just seems to get going before having a setback. Hopefully this will be the last of it, and he'll come back strong for 2010.

according to mlbnetwork.com, here's the info for Rockford (61108): MLB Network is available in your area by subscribing to the following providers: DirecTV 213 & 213 (HD) Insight Communications 516 That said, it is part of the "basic" package I have here in Peoria with Comcast (it's not part of some special sports or HD package) BUT you still have to have a digital cable box to receive, I'd bet.