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Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Frustration and Semantics

-While Scott Proctor was busy giving the game away, Chris Britton pitched 2.1 more shutout innings for Scranton. Britton’s season totals are now 36-33-12-9-11-42-2 (IP-H-R-ER-BB-K-HR) and a 2.25 ERA. There has to be at least ONE reliever in this awful, awful, awful bullpen that he’s better than. He should be given the opportunity to show this.

-Ian Kennedy was solid over 5 innings for Trenton. I think the Yankees are beginning to attempt to cap his innings a bit. Either that or he’s just been more inefficient than usual. Kennedy is a guy whose scouting reports always mention control and command. He also has 30 walks in 89 innings on the year. The walk rate seems high for someone with such a reputation especially given that Tyler Clippard posted lower rates over his minor league career only to come to the bigs and walk the park. However, the difference here is that despite low walk totals, Clippard’s always been a guy noted for being somewhat wild in the zone. The result is that despite typically low walk totals, Clippard might throw fat strikes, reflected in his less than stellar HR rate. On the other hand, Kennedy seems to know when to pitch around guys and how to throw quality strikes, as he’s only given up 3 homers thus far despite being a flyball pitcher. Some of that low homer rate is luck and some of it is skill. How much of it is skill is going to be a huge part of determining Kennedy’s value as a prospect.

-Ivan Nova struggled with his control and got knocked around, 4-8-8-8-4-2-1. Nova’s ERA is now up to 3.74. While he was able to overcome his peripherals and post a pretty ERA in the early portion of the season, his peripheral stats and ERA are beginning to line up.

-Angel Reyes, a popular preseason breakout pick, continues to do just the opposite. Reyes walked 3 guys in less than 2 innings and has now walked 9 in 3 NYPL innings. Taking into account his Sally League numbers, he has 30 walks in 34 innings. The diminutive hard throwing lefty is looking more and more like the last diminutive hard throwing Yankee lefty prospect, Abel Gomez.