Miscellaneous Thoughts from the Pelicans last home game

In Commentary And Analysis by Obstructed View Staff79 Comments

A once-every-three-years guest post by BVS.

Sunday night was the last home game of the year at TicketReturn Field, home of the Cubs A+ farm team. The Pelicans divebombed the Lynchburg Hillcats (CLE) 8-3 to even the Mills Cup series at 1-1.  I don’t know why it’s called the Mills Cup, and am too lazy to look, but that’s the Carolina League Championship. They lost game one 4-3 in the 12th inning so this was a nice rebound.  They head to Lynchburg to resume the series Tues, Wed, and Thurs if needed.

I posted a few updates in the game thread comments during the game the other night. Here are some additional thoughts in a modified 3-up, 3-down format.

Addisons*

Woo-hoo. Eloy Jimenez was promoted to A+ and the Pelicans discovered offense. Eloy debuted with a very serviceable game at DH. 1-3 with two walks.  Run scoring ground out to tie game in 1st. Single in 3rd with no one on. Walks in 5th and 7th innings. Long fly out in 8th with 2 men on and 2 runs already in. No K’s. My amateur eye said he knows what he’s doing. Lynchburg wasn’t pitching to him. Jimenez replaced Yasiel Balaguert, the Pelicans leader in HR and RBI. Balaguert pulled his hamstring beating out an infield single in Friday’s Division series win.

David Bote was 2-4 with 3 rbi after going 4-5 Saturday night. This kid (age 23) played 12 games in Iowa and a few games in Tennessee. He had a strange year in terms of assignments: started with Myrtle Beach, then on DL for a month in April-May, then activated to Iowa for 2 weeks, then to Myrtle Beach for 3 days, then to Tennessee for 2 weeks in late June and finally back to MB for the rest of the season. I don’t recall seeing him on any major prospect lists, but he was the Cubs player of the month for August (.367/.439/.541).

Bullpen.  The starters for the Pelicans have been so-so all year. Trevor Clifton, Zach Hedges, and Erik Leal have been pretty good, 1.1-1.2-WHIP starters, but Jake Stinnett, Johnathan Martinez, and Jeremy Null have not been good. 84K, 87 BB+H, 84.2 IP, 1.91 ERA since Aug 19 (18 games).  Tonight the pen pitched 5 innings, of 1-run ball with 7 Ks.

Pelican’s Grounds Crew.  The 6:05 start was delayed 1:18 due to a thunderstorm. But the field didn’t have any puddles once the tarp was off.  Also the OF grass looked much better than the post-concert OF grass in Wrigley.

Pelican’s Grounds Keeper.  The base path to first must be dead level. Jesse Hodges dropped a bunt with no out and a man on 2nd in the 8th inning.  The ball hit the ground about 3 inches inside the foul line and it rolled about 60 feet staying 3 inches inside the line.  The Pelican’s favorite offensive strategy is bunting, so the grounds keeper is pitching in to help the team. Hodges is a slick fielding 3B with a .512 OPS who is probably headed to great career coaching high school.

Minor league baseball. Oh so fun! I’ve lived in Single A territory most of my adult life and so I’ve seen a lot of crazy stuff. No lead is safe.  No play is routine. Also I love how you can hear every word when the home plate ump warns the visiting team to shuts their traps after a close call at first. The crowd responded with an “Ooooo” just like junior high. LOL.

The Pelican’s record in the 2nd half was 46-23, the best half-season record in the league in 10 years. The Cubs extended their agreement to 2020 a few weeks ago. Hooray!

Lillibridges*

Buddy Bailey Bunt-a-thon. I guess the Pelican’s manager must have gone to the Dusty Baker college of offense. This team bunts at least 4-5 times a game.  In fact, every team might as well play their 3B in if there is a man on first. I can’t see giving up an out to put a guy on second when the best OBP in the bottom of the order is .297 and none of those guys are fast. Ugh. Worked for Hodges tonight, but that’s the exception rather than the rule. So many times I’ve seen the lead off guy get on, sac bunt to advance to second, then K, K or grounder, K. I guess putting the ball in play is better than a strike out, particularly in A-ball where errant throws are common, but how about teaching a batter how to get a hit?

Jeremy Null.  No sooner did I comment he was fire, then he started getting smoked. He was shaky in the first, but settled down in the second and third, only to give up hard contact to 5 of 6 batters in the fourth. He was selected as the best late-round draft pick for 2014 by Baseball America. He has exited the game when his team was ahead only 8 of 22 times this year.

Consistent strike zone.  I feel for the batters. The strike zone is a moving target. But the umps are minor leaguers too.

Play-off crowds and schedules.  About 1840 people at the game tonight, which I think counted a lot of tickets that were sold to no-shows.  About 1780 last night.  The Pelicans average around 3000.  Pretty quiet when 2/3 of the stadium is empty.  But the division series ended at about 10:15 p.m. Friday night, so you really had to pay attention to know that Pelicans won Friday and would therefore play at home Saturday and Sunday.  And of course Sunday is a school night, so a 3-hour game (if it’s quick) with a 6:00 p.m. start makes it tough to bring younger kids. (My 4th grader stayed home Sunday, but went Saturday.)

Jason McLeod’s

Three scouts at the game tonight.  One I recognized so I assume he’s a Cubs internal scout. Didn’t recognize the others but they were younger than the scouts who were at the games in late July.

*I know I can pick higher profile MVP-candidate-type players for the “Ups” but it’s my column, and I love how Russell plays. Plus Addison starts with A.  Lillibridge?  Remember him? One of my previous guest columns mentioned him, so I thought I’d be consistent.

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Comments

  8. BVS

    Edwin,

    Thanks. Brigadoon. (dying laughing). Let’s just say that family and changing jobs took up a lot of free time in the last few years.

    Also, I should note how much easier it is to comment here again with the the simpler web host. Whenever that change (reversion?) occurred, it made things much easier for me.

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  19. dmick89

    I’m really not looking forward to year two of Heyward’s contract. Or any year after that. If it’s even possible, the Cubs should do just about anything to trade him this offseason. Sucks. He seems like a great guy and he’s a great defender, but he sucks offensively.

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  25. EnricoPallazzo

    dmick89,

    maybe this is a dumb question but why are people so quick to assume that the previous 6 years were a fluke, instead of thinking that the previous 6 years were normal and this year is the fluke? because the latter seems much more logical to me…

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  40. Rizzo the Rat

    First Lester has a start pushed back until after a Brewers series. Now he has a start pushed up to before a Brewers series. I can’t help thinking his problems controlling the running game are a factor here.

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  42. Edwin

    If the Cubs would just send down more of their players, I think they’d really have a shot at winning some of these minor league championships.

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  60. Edwin

    My vote is Hendricks-Hendricks-Hendricks for the divisional round, and then Hendricks-Hendricks-Hendricks-Hendricks the rest of the way.

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  69. Rizzo the Rat

    I couldn’t watch that game, but it looks a lot more enjoyable than yesterday’s. At least I didn’t miss the clincher.

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  78. EnricoPallazzo

    BVS,

    that’s great. pelicans and emeralds both win the pennant and south bend finishes in first.

    tennessee and iowa both understandably sucked after losing a million players to the mlb team but who cares.

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