In doing the Astros season preview earlier this spring, a big topic of discussion, not only in my story, but with the player development folks in Houston was the fact that their farm system was soooooo thin. They hadn't drafted well in recent years and they traded away many of their remaining prospects in deals this past winter. Assistant general manager Ricky Bennett acknowledged the farm system's shortcoming but pointed to the likes of Bud Norris and Brad James as two players who could keep help keep the system afloat with productive seasons.
Score for one for Bennett, at least in the early going, because both James and Norris have gotten off to hot starts for Corpus Christi, which started the season at 7-3. Norris is 2-0 and has pitched brilliantly in two starts, allowing only one earned run while striking out 16 in his 10 innings of work. James, meanwhile, is 0-1 in his two starts but has a 2.45 ERA and has held the opposition to a .205 average.
Whether the Hooks keep up this pace for the season remains to be seen. And who knows if James or Norris will keep pitching as well as they have through the first two weeks of the season. I'm man enough to eat a little crow so, Houston affiliates are 19-21 thus far but Corpus has looked good and Salem is in first place in the Carolina League's South Division. Congrats to them.
Sticking in the Texas League, Northwest Arknsas is in first place despite being two games under .500. The whole North Division is under .500 while whole South Division is at .500 or better (Midland has started the season on fire by the way). Blake Johnson got the win for the Nats on Sunday, throwing six shutout innings. He allowed five hits, struck out five and didn't walk a batter in a nice rebound outing from the disastrous first start he had last week at Corpus.
Frisco has gotten off to a hot start as well but they are currently a team that does have some issues. IF Chris Davis, who was such a basher last season, has missed three consecutive games with a sore wrist after a collision on the base paths last week. If he's out for a prolonged period of time the RoughRiders will suffer.
The RoughRiders may suffer anway if the catching tandem of Taylor Teagarden and Max Ramirez don't start heating up. The pair are hitting a combined .204 with eight RBIs heading into Monday's action. Ramirez does lead the team with two homers. He's shown throughout his career that he can hit -- he has a career .304 average -- so odds are that he'll pick it up. Sooner woould be better than later. Teagarden, meanwhile, had some wrist/hand issues that kept him on the shelf for much of spring training. It would seem he just needs to get some more playing time under his belt because he's also demonstrated that he knows how to hit.
Binghamton is off to a solid start at 6-4 in the Eastern League with four players hitting .400. Mike Carp and Dan Murphy are both at .474 while Nick Evans is at .444. Jose Coronado is at .400. All good stuff. This is Carp's second season in Binghamton so I would expect him to be able to handle the league but .474 is better than even he could have probably imagined.
Murphy is a 13th-rounder from the 2006 draft who had a solid season last year in St. Lucie, hitting .285 with 11 homers and 78 RBIs. It doesn't appear as if he's having trouble making the leap to Double-A. Evans is a 2004 draft pick and has made a slow but unremarkable climb through New York's system. Maybe this will be his breakout year. This is Coronado's second year at Binghamton -- he hit .212 in 307 at-bats last year. While he may have made some adjustments, odds are he won't hit much higher than his .235 career average when all is said and done.
The one player who isn't tearing up the Eastern League, though, is uber prospect Fernando Martinez. The young outfielder upon whom many New York fans have heaped a big helping of hopes is hitting .225 with a .304 OBP.
Down South, there was a great pitching matchup Sunday in the Florida State League. Clearwater's Joe Savery and Lakeland's Rick Porcello locked horns and the Phillies' top pick got the better end of the deal. He pitched eight shutout innings, striking out four and walking only one for his first win of the season. He has a 0.90 ERA in three games and he only walked one batter, which for him is probably the most important aspect of the outing. He won't be in Clearwater long if this keeps up.
Porcello, meanwhile, suffered his second loss in three outings. Again, he didn't pitch poorly, allowing only one earned run.and has a 0.64 ERA in three games. But he's on a tight pitch count and until the Tigers let him pitch deeper into games -- which won't happen anytime soon -- he's going to come up on the short end a lot.
While Lehigh Valley has one of the coolest nicknames in the minors, the Iron Pigs don't appear to have one of the better teams.They are 0-11, the only winless team left in the lower leagues heading into Monday's action.
I'm going to try and provide some thoughts on a daily basis, time permitting. I'm looking forward to hearing what you folks have to say so get back to me when you can.