Showing posts in the “Carolina Mudcats” category
Mike Potter ·
4 Dec 2009, 5:12 PM ·
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FIVE COUNTY STADIUM/ZEBULON The Carolina Mudcats are doing a little outsourcing.
Don’t worry. They’re not taking any jobs out of the country.
But the club has sold its broadcast rights to Play-by-Play Sports Properties, LLC, of which veteran play-by-play man Patrick Kinas is president, and will also be picking up another radio station on its network.
Kinas (pictured), joined by company chairman Joe Bourdow and Mudcats general manager Joe Kremer, made the announcement at a press conference in the home clubhouse at the park.
The main aspect that will affect listeners is the addition of WDWG-FM 98.5 out of Rocky Mount as a co-flagship with Raleigh’s WDOX 570.
“As far as I know, this is the only minor-league team in the country that has agreed to license its broadcast,” Kinas said. “The bottom line is we’re all about the success of the Mudcats. What we bring to the table is that we’ll bring the Mudcats back to where they were a few years ago coverage-wise, and the bottom line is getting more people to this great stadium and watching the Reds’ players here.
“We’ve essentially quadrupled our coverage range. You can drive basically an hour and a half on I-95 and not lose our signal. That’s about 2/3 of a game, if you’re going the speed limit. Last year, you couldn’t even hear our games in our ballpark (without tuning in to Kinas’ 0.1-watt in-house FM broadcast.)” Continue reading »
ACC, Baseball, Carolina Mudcats, N.C. State Birmingham Barons, Cincinnati Reds, Colorado Rockies, East Carolina, Florida Marlins, Joe Bourdow, Joe Kremer, Montgomery Biscuits, Patrick Kinas, Pittsburgh Pirates, Southern League, WDOX, WDWG
Mike Potter ·
13 Nov 2009, 7:06 PM ·
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Manager David Bell (left) and hitting coach Ryan Jackson (bottom right) will be back with the Carolina Mudcats next season, the Cincinnati Reds organization has announced.
Tom Brown, who was with Class A Sarasota each of the past three seasons, will be the new pitching coach replacing Rigo Beltran. Jimmy Mattocks will return as athletic trainer.
Bell, 37, took the Mudcats to a 65-74 record and within one win of a first-half title in the Southern League’s North Division in his first year as a skipper.
Jackson, a 37-year-old Duke alumnus who is a former Durham Bull, will be back for his second season with the club.
Brown, 60, has eight seasons’ experience as a Triple-A pitching coach.
Mattocks, 27, is in his fifth year with the Reds’ organization and third at the Double-A level.
The Mudcats will open on the road April 8 at Birmingham, later hosting the Montgomery Biscuits in the Five County Stadium opener on April 14.
ACC, Baseball, Carolina Mudcats, Duke Birmingham Barons, Cincinnati Reds, David Bell, Jimmy Mattocks, Montgomery Biscuits, Ryan Jackson, Sarasota Reds, Southern League, Tom Brown
Adam Sobsey ·
13 Sep 2009, 5:00 AM ·
1 Comment
We got the slugfest we were due for, and the Bulls’ first homer of the series as well (by Michel Hernandez, of all people—his first as a Bull this year and his second overall); but the Bats lived up to their name and outhit Durham, 10-7, on Saturday night. The win forced a fifth and final game of the divisional series.
Both starters fared poorly—Durham’s Rayner Oliveros and Louisville’s Tom Cochran were gone by the third inning, having allowed 11 runs between them in just 3 1/3 innings combined. The difference in the game was probably the two guys who followed them. The Bulls’ Heath Rollins allowed three runs on four hits, including Danny Dorn’s sixth-inning home run, in 4 2/3 innings; by contrast, the Bats’ Lee Tabor threw four scoreless innings of two-hit ball in relief of Cochran. By the seventh inning, it was 8-6, Louisville.
The Bulls mounted rallies late, but they managed only one run during the seventh and eighth innings, when they had two hits and two walks, plus a pair of errors on Louisville pitchers to help move runners around the diamond. The final Durham reliever, Mike Wlodarczyk, surrendered two more runs to Louisville in the eighth to provide the final three-run margin.
Continue reading »
Baseball, Carolina Mudcats, Durham Bulls Camilo Vazquez, Heath Rollins, Lee Tabor, Logan Ondrusek, Louisville Bats, Michel Hernandez, Mike Wlodarczyk, Paul Phillips, Rayner Oliveros, Tom Cochran
Adam Sobsey ·
12 Sep 2009, 5:00 AM ·
6 Comments
Luck. Did it even itself out last night in the Bulls’ achingly difficult, teeth-gnashing 4-3 win at Louisville? The Bulls scored all four of their runs in the fourth inning with help from two walks and two singles that might easily have been outs: they weren’t hit hard. Down 4-1, the Bats chipped away, scoring a run on a Yonder Alonso homer in the sixth inning off of Jason Cromer (it was disputed by Justin Ruggiano, who claimed that the ball hadn’t cleared the wall but had been interfered with by a fan), and then getting a pair of cheap infield hits by Todd Frazier and Juan Francisco to push across their third run in the seventh off of Joe Bateman, who pitched well and can be faulted only for a leadoff walk, really. The rest was just rotten luck. Note, however, that Cromer, who has earned the nickname “The Strandman” from the folks at Draysbay, allowed none of the seven men who reached against him to score, save the two guys who hit homers. Over 115+ Triple-A innings, opponents are hitting .155 against Comer with runners in scoring position. With RISP and two outs, .085. Wow.
Julio DePaula did a good job of stranding a leadoff single in the eighth. In the top of the ninth, Justin Ruggiano singled (it was his third hit of the game) and took off for second on a pitch to Elliot Johnson, which Johnson hit to center field. Chris Heisey came on and made a good running catch; he fired to first to nail Ruggiano for an (un)lucky double play. That twin-killing loomed large when Michel Hernandez followed with a double to right that might have scored Ruggiano from first. Henry Mateo then smacked a line drive near first base, and Yonder Alonso made a nice grab to end the inning. Luck.
Winston Abreu came on in the ninth and fanned Heisey and Jay Bruce on six pitches. He got Frazier down in the count 0-2 before Frazier reached on an infield single, his second in two innings. Then Juan Francisco fell behind 0-2 before he reached on another infield single, his second in two innings, dribbling one down the first base line and simply getting lucky that it was timed so that he managed to elude Joe Dillon’s tag.
It seemed as if fortune was simply favoring Louisville. Chris Valaika stepped in—and he, too, had had an infield single the night before in Durham, driving in the Bats’ fifth run—but this time Abreu finished the job, getting a swinging strikeout from Valaika and earning a save while giving Cromer a well-deserved win. The Bulls are a victory away from winning the series.
If they’re to win it on Saturday, they’ll have to do it behind Rayner Oliveros, who has made all of two appearances for Durham, one good, one eh, since his callup from Double-A Montgomery in late August. Oliveros spent over four months in the Southern League this season, but missed pitching in the Biscuits’ series against the Mudcats, several of whom are now with Louisville. So he’s as blind as the Bats are.
Lest that seem totally unfair, which it is, consider the Bats’ counter-move: Tom Cochran, a 26-year-old lefty (better against righties, oddly) who has made all of three appearances for Louisville, two good, one eh, since his callup from Double-A Carolina in late August. Not too long ago, Cochran was pitching for the Worcester (MA) Tornadoes in the independent Canadian-American Association. Cochran spent almost three months in the Southern League this season, but missed pitching in the Mudcats’ series against the Biscuits, two of whom are now with Durham.
In other words, take your pick. The Bulls have played five games at Louisville this season, and all five of them have been decided by a single run. One went 13 innings, another went 16. Here’s my only prediction: after hitting no home runs in the first three games of the series, the Bulls—who led the league in homers this season—will hit at least one on Saturday. And here’s something I won’t predict but will suggest: Saturday could be a slugfest. (Hey, that rhymed!) The game is at 6:05 p.m.
Baseball, Carolina Mudcats, Durham Bulls Chris Denove, Jason Cromer, Joe Bateman, Juan Francisco, Julio DePaula, Justin Ruggiano, Louisville Bats, Luck, Rayner Oliveros, Todd Frazier, Tom Cochran, Winston Abreu
Adam Sobsey ·
10 Sep 2009, 4:00 AM ·
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DBAP/ DURHAM—Only one thing about the Durham Bulls’ 8-4 win over the Louisville Bats last night made it seem like a playoff game: the size of the crowd. The attendance, 1,809, must have been the smallest of the year to date, and that’s about normal for a playoff game at the DBAP. It’s as if fall comes along and snatches four out of every five spectators from the stands. You can pretty much sit anywhere you want for the most important games of the season each September. Not sure if it’s the playoffs? Just cock your head and listen to the unsettling silence all around you, occasionally disrupted by the home plate umpire saying “Ball Two!” so loudly that you’re startled by it.
But the fans who came were into the game in a way that regular-season crowds at the DBAP rarely are, and their intensity made up for their fellow citizens’ abandonment of their team. It was fun to watch the game with them. They cared. They were in it. The Bulls rewarded them by taking a 1-0 lead in this best-of-five series.
But they did it in a game full of bad baseball. Yes, there was clutch hitting and good fielding, another double-digit strikeout game by Jeremy Hellickson, and a fine performance by his counterpart, the Bats’ highly regarded left-hander Travis Wood. But both starters’ performances had substantial flaws, as well; there were seven errors (and could easily have been an eighth—games at the DBAP have lately been plagued by poor glovework); there were three errors by Sean Rodriguez alone; a total meltdown by a Bats reliever; a lot of pitchers struggling to get ahead in the count and hitters failing to make them pay for it—and also pitchers getting ahead in the count and then failing to finish off hitters, who did make them pay for it. The Bulls took a comfortable lead into the ninth inning, but for a moment, it suddenly looked to be in grave danger, and a game that should have been over-and-done managed to get sticky at the end.
And for the first three innings, it barely seemed like we were watching an official game at all. When Juan Francisco creamed a Jeremy Hellickson fastball off the Triangle Orthopedics sign way out in left-center field for a two-run homer, you felt like you were watching a big strong young prospect take batting practice. “Wow,” you said to yourself, “that kid can really hit.” The ball thwacked off the sign with a resounding crack and landed back on the outfield grass. Justin Ruggiano trotted over to it as though he was just out there shagging flies.
But in fact it was 2-0, Louisville, in Game One of the playoffs. Bats, of course, are nocturnal, and dusk was fading to dark when Francisco hit his homer. But apparently, your late-inning Bulls are creatures of the night, too. They awakened in the middle innings, first needing some tapping on the shoulder from the Bats, who should have let sleeping Bulls lie.
Continue reading »
Baseball, Carolina Mudcats, Durham Bulls Charlie Montoyo, Federico Baez, Jeremy Hellickson, Juan Francisco, Louisville Bats, Mitch Talbot, playoffs, Ray Olmedo, Sean Rodriguez, Travis Wood, Winston Abreu
Adam Sobsey ·
8 Sep 2009, 12:39 PM ·
3 Comments
Triple-A baseball teams are subject to a variation on the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, the one you may have run across in the movie The Man Who Wasn’t There or in the play Copenhagen. Basically, it says that you can’t determine both the velocity and position of a particle at the same time. It’s possible that we’re really talking about the Observer Effect here, or possibly Schrödinger’s cat, or even quantum superpositions. All I can say is, don’t do what I did; don’t go look them all up, because the next thing you know you’re lost in something very like the Uncertainty Principle yourself: you think you know what you’re looking for, and then as soon as you think you’ve found it, it turns into something else. Eventually you wind up desperately lost in a terrible, mountainous region, overrun by wild beasts and full of tar pits, known as Verschränkung. Just don’t go there, kids.
Instead, do what Bulls manager Charlie Montoyo does before each series—or rather, don’t do what he doesn’t do: pay any attention to the opposing team’s record, or to what happened the last time the Bulls played them. Montoyo has said several times this year that all he looks at is how they’ve been playing the last couple of weeks.
That’s because, as you probably know if you’re a Bulls fan, minor-league teams change constantly. The last time the Durham Bulls played the Louisville Bats was July 19 at Louisville. Thirty-two players saw action in that game, and only half of them remain on the teams’ rosters. Both starters, each team’s leading home-run hitter, four of Durham’s five pitchers that night, the league’s Most Valuable Pitcher (Justin Lehr) and the Bats’ leadoff man: all gone.
So take the following preview as a thought experiment, a la Schrödinger’s cat—until Wednesday at 7:05 p.m., when the cat (the Durham Bulls) actually goes into the box (the DBAP) with the flask of poison (the Louisville Bats) and the radioactive substance (Jeremy Hellickson’s first pitch, let’s say). Then we’ll see if the beast lives or dies.
If my colleague Mike Potter, who for most of the season has covered the Reds’ Double-A affiliate, the Carolina Mudcats, feels inspired to chime in, the cat will get at least partway out of the bag/box: more than half of the current Bats’ roster has seen time in Zebulon this year.
Continue reading »
Baseball, Carolina Mudcats, Durham Bulls Ben Jukich, Charlie Montoyo, Chris Heisey, Chris Nowak, Chris Richard, Jason Cromer, Jay Bruce, Jeremy Hellickson, John Jaso, Logan Ondrusek, Louisville Bats, Mitch Talbot, Paul Phillips, playoffs, Sam LeCure, Schrodinger's Cat, Sean Rodriguez, Travis Wood, Uncertainy Principle, Yonder Alonzo
Mike Potter ·
8 Sep 2009, 10:31 AM ·
1 Comment
Former Carolina Mudcats slugger Yonder Alonzo, who is now with the Louisville Bats of the International League, was named Southern League hitter of the week for the final week of the regular season.
Right-hander Matt Torra of the Mobile BayBears was the pitcher of the week.
Alonso (pictured), the seventh pick in last year’s June draft out of Miami, led the league with a .458 average, 11 hits, four doubles, a .536 on-base percentage, five extra-base hits and six runs scored. He was second in slugging percentage at .750.
Monday’s game against the Mississippi Braves was not the last chance to see Alonzo play in the Triangle this season. Louisville will be taking on the Durham Bulls in the first round of the Governors’ Cup Playoffs, with Games 1 and 2 in the best-of-5 series on Wednesday and Thursday nights at Durham Bulls Athletic Park.
ACC, Baseball, Carolina Mudcats, Durham Bulls Arizona Diamondbacks, Atlanta Braves, Cincinnati Reds, Louisville Bats, Matt Torra, Mississippi Braves, Mobile Bay Bears, Southern League, Yonder Alonzo
Mike Potter ·
7 Sep 2009, 5:52 PM ·
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FIVE COUNTY STADIUM/ZEBULON One last trip across Wake County for the Carolina Mudcats’ rainy season finale.
And the team just got hot too late.
David Bell’s club comes into its 139th game on a seven-game winning streak, despite the depletion of the team for much of the second half. Early on in the half there were players who absolutely had to go to Triple-A after making mincemeat of the Southern League, while over the past couple of weeks the Cincinnati Reds have been bolstering their Louisville roster in preparation for the Governors’ Cup Playoffs.
Louisville is at Durham in the first round on Wednesday and Thursday, so if you’re going to be suffering from Mudcats withdrawal it’s a last chance to see a whole lot of Carolina’s best 2009 players this season. SL All-Stars Travis Wood, Todd Frazier and Juan Francisco are playing for the Bats as is Chris Heisey, who was simply the best player in the league this year.
In case you’re interested, I’m scheduled to cover those games for the Louisville Courier-Journal.
The game starts 36 minutes late because of rain. And they’ve shut down the Italian sausage, so I’ll be having chicken on the last getaway day. The Braves win 5-0 to make that long bus ride home seem a little shorter. Everybody is on fast forward today as game time is 2:01.
Mississippi doesn’t take long to get started, as Jon Owings launches Jeremy Horst’s first pitch of the game out of the yard about 20 feet inside the left-field foul pole.
The score stays right there until the seventh, when the visitors strike for two.
Brandon Hicks leads off with a double to right, scoring on Greg Creek’s one-out double to left. Creek then comes home on Travis Jones’ two-out single to right.
Mississippi scores another in the eighth, as Chris Anderson slaps a leadoff double to left, followed by pinch-hitter Stephen Marek’s single to left and a ground ball from Owings to score the run.
The Braves get their last one in the ninth off Josh Beal, as Hicks leads off with a homer to left.
After the game Mudcats slugger Yonder Alonzo (pictured) gets the call to Louisville for his Triple-A debut. That makes for 17 current Bats who played at least part of the season for Carolina. Continue reading »
Baseball, Carolina Mudcats, Durham Bulls Arizona Fall League, Birmingham Barons, Brandon Hicks, Chris Anderson, Chris Heisey, Cincinnati Reds, David Bell, Greg Creek, International League, Jeremy Horst, Jon Owings, Josh Beal, Juan Francisco, Korey Feiner, Logan Ondrusek, Louisville Bats, Mississippi Braves, Peoria Saguaros, Phillippe Valiquette, Sean Watson, Southern League, Stephen Marek, Todd Frazier, Travis Jones, Travis Wood, Zack Cozart
Mike Potter ·
7 Sep 2009, 12:18 AM ·
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The Carolina Mudcats aren’t going to the Southern League playoffs, but they have a chance today to finish the season on fire.
Jerry Gil (pictured), Ruben Medina and Sean Watson put together a three-hit shutout on Sunday night as the Mudcats beat the visiting Mississippi Braves 1-0 to win their seventh straight game. The streak matches the fifth longest in club history.
Carolina got the run in the first when Zack Cozart’s sacrifice fly scored Kris Negron.
Gil (3-4) got through seven innings - his longest stint in Double-A - before Medina came on for the eighth to set up Watson for a perfect ninth inning and his eighth save.
Carolina’s season finale is today at 2 p.m. at Five County Stadium, with southpaw Jeremy Horst (1-3, 6.65) taking the hill against Mississippi.
Baseball, Carolina Mudcats Atlanta Braves, Cincinnati Reds, Jeremy Horst, Jerry Gil, Kris Negron, Mississippi Braves, Ruben Medina, Sean Watson, Southern League, Zack Cozart
Mike Potter ·
6 Sep 2009, 3:54 AM ·
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A walk-off single from Logan Parker (pictured) completed a late comeback, giving the Carolina Mudcats a 3-2 win over the visiting Mississippi Braves on Saturday night.
The Braves began the scoring with a pair of fifth-inning runs off starter Alexander Smit, on an RBI double from Concepcion Rodriguez followed by an RBI single from Brandon Hicks.
Mississippi starter Jose Ortegano carried a shutout into the eighth before Carson Kainer’s single started a two-run rally. A wild pitch and walk followed, before a one-out RBI single from Kris Negron chased the starter. Shaun Cumberland’s infield hit tied the score.
In the ninth, Zack Cozart singled and took second on an error. Eric Eymann’s single moved Cozart to third to set up Parker’s heroics.
Zach Ward (2-4) was the winning pitcher.
The series continues tonight at 6:15, with Jerry Gil (2-4, 9.57) on the mound for the Mudcats.
Baseball, Carolina Mudcats Alexander Smit, Atlanta Braves, Carson Kainer, Cincinnati Reds, Eric Eymann, Jerry Gil, Jose Ortegano, Kris Negron, Logan Parker, Mississippi Braves, Shaun Cumberland, Southern League, Zach Ward, Zack Cozart
