Author: Obstructed View Staff

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Iowa Cubs

Brett Jackson was 1-4 and struckout twice. He has an astronomical 33.8% strikeout rate, but is still managing a wOBA near .370, which is good for a wRC+ of 113. It's not as good as his stint in Iowa last year, but it's still above average. Josh Vitters was 1-3 with a walk and is now sporting a wRC+ higher than jackson (117). His walk rate is nearly 6% too. Randy Wells tossed 5 innings, allowed a few hits and a run, walked a couple and struckout 4. 

Tennessee Smokies

Trey McNutt must have fallen off a very large cliff becuase he's not yet landed. He pitched 4 innings, allowed 7 hits, walked 3, struckout 4, but I guess he did manage to allow only 2 runs. Great start, kid! McNutt is walking quite a few guys this year, not striking many out at all and generally getting hit pretty hard. Logan Watkins was 2-5 with a triple and Michael Burgess was 2-4 with his very own triple. The bullpen sucked.

Daytona Cubs

Rubi Silva was 3-5 with a triple and Rebel Ridling was 2-4 with a double. Matt Szczur was 0-3 with a couple walks. Szczur is batting .285/.387/.404. Prior to last night's game his wOBA sat at a cool .380 in the pitcher friendly FSL. That's good for a wRC+ of 136. The guy knows how to walk. He's taken 35 walks in 271 plate appearances and he's been hit 4 times. That's 14.4% of his plate appearances ending in a walk or hit batter. You gotta like that for a future leadoff guy. 

Peoria Chiefs

The Chiefs offense pounded out 3 hits, 2 of which were doubles, in last night's 4-1 slugfest. Zeke DeVoss was 0-4 with a strikeout and Taiwan Easterling was an impressive 0-4 with 4 strikeouts. Easterling had a 24.6% strikeout rate prior to last night's game so it's only getting uglier. Joseph Zeller walked 1 and struckout 1 over 5 innings of work. Hunter Cervenka struckout 4 in 3 innings.

Boise Hawks

Jeimer Candelario was 2-3 with a walk. Shawon Dunston, Jr.'s first taste of professional ball isn't going well. He was 0-4 with a couple strikeouts last night and is now hitting .204/.283/.333. Ian Dickson pitched an inning in relief last night, except it wasn't an inning in relief. He was the starter and lasted 1 inning, allowed way too many hits and runs and stuff like that. Rafael Diplan threw 3 innings and allowed only 1 hit. 

AZL Cubs

Dan Vogelbach was 1-5 with a strikeout last night. Izaac Garsez was 4-5 with a home run. Carlos Martinez-Pumarino was even worse than Ian Dickson. He lasted only a third of an inning and gave up lots of stuff you don't want pitchers giving up. Alvido Jimenez threw 3.2 innings, allowed a hit and a walk and struckout 3. 

DSL Cubs1
DSL Cubs2

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Iowa

Brett Jackson was 2-5 with a 2B and a 3B. He also stole his 17th base and struck out. Vitters was 3-6 and I think by the end of this year will be major league ready.  His OPS now sits at .860. 

Smokies

Nobody did anything.

Daytona

Spellcheck Jr went 1-3 with a double and a walk. He also had an OF assist. The Greg of Rohan was promoted to AA. 

Peoria

Taiwan Easterling went 3-3 and is hitting .240. Baez went 1-3 and is now batting .299.

Boise

Jeimer Candelario went 2-5 and is hitting .344. Dong Yub Kim hit his 3rd HR of the year and Chadd Krist stayed hot going 3-3. James Pugliese struck out 5 in 4 shutout innings. 2012 draft pick Eddie Orozco struck out 2 in 2 IP.

AZL Cubs

Dan Vogelbach might be a bit too good for rookie ball. Last night he went 4-5 with a HR and a triple. That's right MO, a triple. Right now 10 of his 16 hits are XBH and he is sporting a .471/.514/.824 line. Rock Shoulders isn't tearing up the club in Boise so maybe a switch-a-roo is in the works.

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Iowa

Brett Jackson went 3-4 with a triple and a SB. It was Jackson's 9th triple of the year and while has walk rate is down and his average is as well his slugging has stayed pretty consistent with his minor league career average. Vitters was 1-3 with a BB and continues to improve his walk rate. 

Smokies

Matt Cerda went 3-4 with a HR. Cerda has always had a very good OBP and there is a chance he could make it as a utility guy. Stuck worked 5.2 scoreless IP and Jeffery Antigua earned the save.

Daytona Game 1

This was a stupid game. No comment

Game 2

Micah Gibbs hit a HR. Who the fuck is Micah Gibbs you ask? Good question. PJ Francescon worked 5 scoreless innings striking out 2. 

Javier Baez

Hit another HR. 

The Boise Hawks kick off their season tonight and I was excited to watch on milb.tv but I have softball tonight and a travel tourney tomorrow. Thats the price you pay to be a world class athlete. 

Baseball America on Matt Szczur's 2nd Full Season

Baseball America has a nice article up about how well Matt Szczur has progressed so far in his young career. He was drafted in the 5th round in 2010 and after giving up football altogether the Cubs signed him to a $1.4 million contract and added him to their 40-man roster. He's rated as the 64th best prospect in baaseball by Baseball America. The article is for subscribers only so I'll quote just a little bit. I will say the one thing I notice so far about this year is how much he's improved his walk rate. Once he gets on he can do some damage on the bases.

Because he split time in college between the diamond and the gridiron, there has been the sense since he was drafted that Szczur needs to make up for lost time in terms of developing his baseball skills.

"The biggest thing is just continuing to improve his hitting approach like he's doing and just get more experience at all the outfield positions," Daytona manager Brian Harper said. "He definitely can play center field, there's no question, but he'll get more innings in left and right just for experience purposes."

Cubs to be patient with Javier Baez

The Cubs top pick in the 2011 draft, Javier Baez, is off to a fantastic start. So far he's hitting .315/.403/.537 with 3 home runs in about 60 plate appearances. Prior to his game yesterday he had a wOBA of .415, which is good for a 161 wRC+. He's still young and this is just 60 plate appearances so the Cubs are going to be patient.

"There's an old adage, it's a lot easier to move somebody up than to move them back," Cubs vice president of player personnel Oneri Fleita said. "You're talking about a young man from the state of Florida. It's real cold in Peoria. We wanted to make sure he had his feet on the ground. It's his first season. When you're dealing with your top prospect, you want to be on the conservative side."

Fleita said that the Cubs explained the process to Baez, and that he understood and accepted it well.

"Javier understood why he didn't go to Peoria right away," Fleita said of the 6-foot-2, 205-pound right-handed hitter. "He understands we have a process set up and that we'll follow it to the letter. Being in Arizona, in a controlled atmosphere, allowed him to get a good handle on what's expected every day from the organization, and it gave us a chance to get to know him. He also got a lot of extra work, and that allowed him to be prepared to join the Peoria Chiefs."

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Iowa

Nothing worth talking about.

Smokies

Junior Lake as 2-4 with a triple and is now hitting .299. James Adduci hit a HR and Dae Eun Rhee earned the win despite not pitching that well.

Daytona

Rain

Peoria

Javier Baez went 2-3 with another monster shot of a HR. It cleared the scoreboard in LC according to twitter. Zeke DeVoss went 2-4 with a SB and Jose Rosario earned his 6th win after allowing 1 ER in 6.1 IP.

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Iowa

Rizzo left the game with a knee contusion as is listed as day to day. Soto went 1-4 with a 2B in his first game back and Brett Jackson struck out 3 more times. 

Smokies

No Game

Daytona

Nelson Perez was 3-4 with a HR and The Greg of Rohan went 2-5. Alcantara continues to impress with his bat in a pitchers league and is hitting .291. Goldstein had a write up about him the other day but I don't have insider so I would imagine he said Alcantara has average speed. 

 

Peoria

Javier Baez went 2-4 and stole a pair of bases as well. I didn't know he had this kind of speed but he has already accumulated 7 SB's and has yet to be caught. The kid can do it all. In low A. He also made 3 errors in one game so Dave Kaplan probably needs to remind him to focus. 

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Iowa

What more can be said about Rizzo? Another night another pair of HR's and a ringing ground rule double. The future looks bright at 1B. Josh Vitters was 2-4 with a BB as well. Also, can somebody tell me why Jay Jackson still has a job?

Smokies

Trey McNutt's ERA finally caught up with his secondary #'s as he was rocked last night. 9 hits and 8 ER in 3.1 IP will do that do you and we can forget about this guy being anything but a RP. Junior Lake was 1-5 with a HR and BB. In his first rehab appearance Beef Castle lit up the other team to the tune of 1-2 with a HR and BB. 

Daytona

Matt Loosen put up a hell of a start working 6 shutout innings where he allowed only 2 hits and struck out 7. Loosen is somewhat of an interesting arm he struck out nearly a batter per inning last year and is doing the same so far this year as well. That said he is 23 and in Daytona so nothing to get overly excited about. His good pitching must have been contagious because even Hayden Simpson decided to show up striking out 2 batters in a clean inning of relief work. 

Peoria

Geraldo Concepcion was terrible (must still be working on that fastball command!) and Javier Baez had the night off. Thats all you need to know.