the splendid splinter

Well explained Cool!

Hector Villanueva still lives or thats a son of Carmelo Martinez

11 K's by the Peoria pitchers and another great night by Renshaw vs a very good Dayton team. Hempy 6 punchouts in 4 innings so far.

LEON to you JOHNSON!!!

Mesa Cubbies sneak by those baby Brewers 4-3. Looks like catcher Perez can swing the bat, along with 3b Jova Rosa and Redmond a local, starting to put it together with 3`scoreless and 5 strikeouts.

What did Wilkens do?

I think the point is that it's a lousy division if .500 gets you to first place, I'm pretty sure it wasn't a commentary about the talent level. I guess if 500 is you gauge and your only talking win and loss % then thats great talk, I thought this was forum to talk about future major leaguers and not win/loss % ?

How do you know its a lousy division? 1st of all, lot of the teams dont get their full staffs until July 1st or later. For instance Boise didnt have Donaldson, Thomas, Hempy and a few others until after July 1st and in some of those cases, the player isnt 100% ready, beccause the've been sitting for so long. Anyways its not how good the club is, its how many MAJOR LEAGUERS it can produce!

Leon's youngest brother Cedric was drafted by the Phillies this year out of Thatcher Hs, Az. they also have a brother who's presently is on the 40 man major league roster of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, 2nd baseman Elliott Johnson who plays for Durham in 3a and his middle name is Willie. They have an older brother whose name I dont know but I think he played in the Angels system.

Johnson has 16 since he signed and it looks like Camp has some between Peoria/Daytona, looks like Wyatt and Hardman might steal some in their futures.

Both Vitters and Acosta will sign, the biggest question will be if Russell will sign?

Well even more amazing in a`game which had 15 runs with Wright walking 5 times and he didnt even score one of the 15 runs!

This is a very valid point but I think you could probably put most of the students that actually attend Arizona state in that category as well. He'll (Vitters) will sign the last week before the deadline which is August 15.

Yup! Thanks for the link. To recap: OF Chris Amador (Peoria) and IF Bo Hart (Iowa) traded for PTBNL. C Chris Robinson and OF Jorge Cortes from Tenn to Iowa. IF/OF Jeffrey Rea and P Yusdel Tuero from Mesa to Daytona. C Steve Clevenger is off to Daytona from Boise. Daytona cut OF Jesus Valdez. SS Darwin Barney to Peoria from Mesa. 2B Tony Thomas, RHP Brandon Taylor and C/1B/OF Luis Bautista are all headed to Boise from Mesa. Raisin, good luck on your upcoming trip! Also thought I heard or read somewhere that Leon Johnson and Hardman could be going to Peoria!

At the very least, I'd like to see more than 36 AB at short-season before promoting him. But he's already played against AA-level competition in the SEC? :p The best team in the SEC`either Vandy or Miss State could'nt play 400 winning % in the Arizona League for a course of the season, because the teams have limited pitching depth, they maybe ok for the 1st two games of a series, bu the last two/three they would get hammered! Players need to learn how to play everyday for the 1st times in their lives.

Rea has more pop to his bat than, Augie and runs quite a bit better and agree that Rea probably cant play ss. Pop =that he hits the harder in the gaps more consistent than Augie, plus he runs quite a bit better and can play the outfield pretty good especiaaly Cf.

ugh, what's the point Ok Nicky Negatory!

I am ready to see Harvey move to the mound, hopefully the move comes in instructs this fall. Obviously the Cubs aren't ready to move Johnston to the mound since he's showing signs of life at Boise and is still only 20. I'm not ready to give up yet on his bat yet but I expect he'll eventually have to be converted too. He always struck out way too much but he does have good patience too (of course, a lot of guys have racked up walks for Boise which begs the question - are the Hawks a patient team or do the NWL pitchers have such poor control that it's hard not to take some walks?). It's a shame the Cubs rushed Johnston up to Peoria last season, I worry that we might see the same problems with Samson now that he's up in Peoria and skipped Boise (Samson is obviously doing much better at Peoria than Johnston ever did and he seems to have a better approach and a far superior BB/K ratio). Its not as much the bb/k ratio (which is a key componet) but Sampson has a VERY good baseball mind, especially to compete pretty decent in the Midwest League at 19.

It has to do with the election process in Florida. Oh by the way thee elections commish in Florida came fro the graet state of Massachusetts.

I wouldnt bet against the moves raisin!

Wondering who pissed on Truffle's wheaties?? Also kudos to our leagues batting leaders Leon Johnson and Steve Clevenger ( yes truffy we know Leon is 22 and he spent the last 2 years in Siberia and Clevenger is a repeat offender) also kudos to Marquez Smith for leading the Northwest league in rbi's.

Cal, I can't find it right off, but a few weeks a go I read a linked article about huseby, perhaps from that Boise paper. Had some stuff info from Huseby himself. Often to here guys tell it, they throw harder than they often do, of course. They cite the one pitch that clocked 6 mph above their normal velocity and all that, so from hering guys tell you'd think they were all power pitcher possibilities. So, if anything maybe huseby was inflating his stuff, that's the norm. But, his personal report was much less than 91-95. He claimed that he was back to his sophomore velocity. Said he was happy to be back up working in the upper 80's. And said that he'd touched 90-91 a couple of times. So, for now it would appear that Huseby is something of a soft-tosser. He'll need to have special location, special breaking stuff, special movement. But for now, it would appear that 91-95 is projection hope, not current reality. Kind of like when Sisco was supposedly 91-94, but projected to perhaps throw 100 someday and perhaps project into Randy Johnson type. Huseby's only 19, of course, and like any 19-year-old who's tall, there's the chance that he'll throw significantly harder down the road. But for now, it appears that he's gotten slower, not faster, compared to last spring. Which might also help to explain why he's been pretty hittable in XST and Boise. I'm not trying to rip on the kid. Hope he works out well. But for now, it would appear that both special control, special stuff, and special velocity are all projected possibilities rather than present realities, even relative to his level. Hopefully all those projection hopes will become reality in due time, even if they aren't yet. Often that happens. My info on the 91-95 was from what the Boise announcer said. It could be a scouting report that the announcer was reading, since he says it at the opening of the broadcast, in which case those could be based on last season and no longer correct. The few times he did read the velocity over the air, Huseby was 90-92. Of course when an announcer reads a velocity, it's going to be one the pitcher's best, so if he's topping out at 92, that's not good. Is this the Idaho Statesman story you were talking about? Raisin I also heard some of that game and thee anouncer from Boise did say 91-95 and he went on to say that he received the readings from thee next night starter from the opposing club, also the Boise starter for the next night had similar readings and also said he( announcer) was getting them from some scout in the stands.

your right again Raisin! Only have Vitters, Acosta and Russell left in the top 15

One night in Tennessee about two weeks ago Hart's fastball was being clocked by the scouts at 89-93. Read in the Knoxville paper the next week that he's added a cutter or quick slider that's 84 to 88 mph and this pitch has seemed to be the difference maker according to Hart who also features a change and curveball.

The best SEC team which I guess would have been Vandy, (even thou Miss State made it to the CWS) wouldnt play 400 ball in the Appy League, maybe the Arizona/Gcl league, the pitching staff are so weak after the 2nd game in 3 game series in the SEC or any college league for that matter.