The Baseball Enthusiast: June 2015

Monday, June 29, 2015

6/29/2015 Syracuse Chiefs 5, Louisville Bats 0

Louisville Slugger Field, Louisville, KY

Game 1 of 3

The massive construction project that has gripped downtown for nearly a couple of years has begun to make its mark on the riverfront skyline...what you see out there is the new Ohio River bridge in process, what you hear out there (if you were here) is the incessant sound of piledrivers clanging away...all this and Slugger Field can't get a new scoreboard...

But, I digress...the Chiefs came, the Chiefs shut out the Bats, and HEY, whaddya know, it's Jose Valverde!!

My scoresheets, using my pitch-counting method! Read about it HERE, download the scoresheets for free HERE!

LOU RHP Keyvius Sampson faces SYR 1B Mario Lisson

LOU RF Brennan Boesch singles off SYR RHP A.J. Cole.

Boesch is back in Louisville after 32 games in Cincinnati; Cole leaves the game after 2 innings.

SYR LHP Matt Grace in relief faces LOU 2B Irving Falu

One of my early baseball follows on twitter is in LOU this season...RHP Collin Balester (here he's pitching to SYR C Dan Butler)

For the Mystery Rookie Card game, my pick was more typical than not...here's the story of Randy Frye, looked pretty good but his shimmer just died...

4th round pick by the Seattle Mariners in 2002...never played in the majors, never played above single A ball...he didn't play at all in 2004 due to injuries, which made his chances of doing any better beyond his recovery quite slim.

Want a feel good story? That's not happening today. How about a feel better story?

My daughter pulled this 2013 Panini Prizm Shelby Miller. OK, do you feel better now?

Official Program (featuring Chris Dominguez) and Scorecard

Ticket (features Neftali Soto)

Bat Chat and Gameday Stats

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Sunday, June 14, 2015

6/14/2015 Durham Bulls 3, Louisville Bats 2

Louisville Slugger Field, Louisville, KY

Game 4 of 4

My buddy Abe finally got to come to a Bats game with me. So #kVlt.

My scoresheets, using my pitch-counting method! Read about it HERE, download the scoresheets for free HERE!

DUR OF Mikie Mahtook, 1st round draft pick by the Rays in 2011, faces LOU RHP Josh Smith

My hero, LOU 1B Steve Selsky, faces DUR LHP Scott Diamond

LOU SS Hernan Iribarren vs. Diamond

Mahtook helped get things going for the Bulls, here he's facing Smith in the 6th (with CF Corey Brown on first).

Mahtook doubles to send Brown to 3B; JP Arencibia drives Brown across the plate in the next AB with a G6-3 to tie the game, Richie Shaffer plates Mahtook to give the Bulls the lead.

My pick in the Mystery Rookie Card game: Brian Burgamy, 9th round pick of the Padres in the 2002 Draft.

He had a hot start for Class-A Eugene that year, and maintained serviceable numbers for the Padres through 2005, but never played above AA. He was a Phillie from 2006-2007, yet again never played about AA ball. For the next 6 seasons, aside from an 8 game stint with the St. Lucie Mets in early summer 2008, he would drift from one Indie league club to another, appearing in a few Mexican and Dominican leagues, appearing in affiliated ball again for the first time in 2014 with the Eastern League Binghamton Mets. He was last seen in the states last summer with the Tulsa Drillers and Oklahoma City Dodgers, and started the 2016 season with the Rieleros de Aquascalientes.

Abe got lucky and picked Jeremy Sowers, who famously hailed from Louisville (Ballard High School, a 1st round pick by the Reds in 2001 that did not sign) and was a first round pick by the Indians out of Vanderbilt in 2004. Sowers was always a sad-faced kinda dude, it figures that his career would end up being sad-faced as well.

Other than the fact that I know a few folks who have remodeled Sowers' parents home here a few times over the years, it occurs to me that everybody is really close to forgetting Sowers altogether. He hasn't pitched in a Major League game since 2009 and has been a free agent since 2011, that usually moves the loss of memory along for most folks. So where in the world is Jeremy Sowers? It's hard to tell...after his injury-plagued career, Sowers fell off the map fairly quickly and didn't pitch in any pro ball during 2011 and 2012. He appeared on the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs' roster in the independent Atlantic League for 8 games in 2013, but that's the last blip outta him on the map. Sure, he was Baseball America's #2 prospect in the Indians organization in 2005. That won't buy him any coffee nowadays.

Official Program (featuring Chris Dominguez) and Scorecard