It's going to take more than a couple swaps to remove the stench from the Sox bullpen. Matt Thornton showed that
in tonight's game by entering the game with a five-run lead and promptly walking Robinson Cano on five pitches. He didn't even make the .272-hitting second baseman take the bat off his shoulder.
At this point, I'd rather see 85-m.p.h. fastballs for strikes than 95-m.p.h. balls. At least they'd be putting the onus on the hitter to avoid making an out. If Cano goes deep, it's a 6-3 game, and the tying run is still in the dugout, but the chances of Cano getting himself out are still far, far greater when he actually has to, you know,
swing.
Thornton eventually allowed that runner to score, the 11th time an inherited runner has crossed the plate on Thornton's watch. He allowed 13 all of last year, and the sad thing is that even though he's well ahead of last year's pace, he's still faring far better than his bullpen mates:
- David Aardsma: Allowed 5 of 20 inherited runners to score in 45 appearances in 2006; has allowed 6 of 15 to score in 22 appearances in 2007.
- Mike MacDougal: Allowed 5 of 20 inherited runners to score in 29
appearances in 2006; has allowed 6 of 22 to score in 27 appearances in
2007.
Boone Logan and Nick Masset aren't bailing out their teammates all that well, either, but Logan's been better as of late, and Masset just
isn't that good to begin with.
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Kenny Williams likes the cut of Josh Fields' jib, so much so that he's
considering getting Fields up at the major-league level one way or another:
"I think if he was here right now he would be an
impact-type guy. We're going to have to start exploring ways to try and
get him up here.
"More thought needs to be careful thought because the issue with me is
Joe's back. Taking Fields off of third base and then Joe happens to go
down. Now we don't really have the everyday guy to go there, and if
Fields has been spending most of his time in left field, for instance,
now you try to put him back, how much has he lost?
"How fair is that to the kid? That's the difficult decision to make."
Down in Charlotte, Casey Rogowski started in left field. I don't think it'd kill Fields or anybody else to see him play every third game there.
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Minor league round-up:- Indianapolis 4, Charlotte 1
- Fields had two of the Knights' five hits and the lone RBI; Wiki Gonzalez, Jason Bourgeois and Rogowski had the other hits.
- Brian Anderson had his third straight day off. I can't find official word, but I do know he was playing with shoulder issues before.
- Heath Phillips pitched much better this time around, though it'd be hard for him to avoid that. He threw seven OK innings -- four runs, eight hits, one walk, three strikeouts.
- Tennessee 8, Birmingham 1
- Gio Gonzalez threw only 2 1/3 innings in which he didn't allow a run -- I'm guessing a 48-minute rain delay ended his start prematurely; Corwin Malone took the loss, and Edwardo Sierra was hit hard as well.
- Victor Mercedes went 2-for-4 with the Barons' lone extra-base hit.
- Winston-Salem 5, Frederick 4 (12 innings)
- Micah Schnurstein went 3-for-6 with a solo homer and three runs scored; Paulo Orlando, Javier Castillo and C.J. Lang also had multi-hit games.
- Aaron Cunningham went 0-for-6. Ouch.
- Kyle McCulloch threw a quality start, and not much more. Joseph Torres, John Lujan and Jason Rice threw scoreless relief outings.
- Kannapolis 7, Greenville 6
- Brandon Allen continued his hot hitting, going 3-for-5 with two doubles, a homer and three RBI. He has a homer in three of the last five games, and a 10-game hitting streak.
- Maurice Gartrell went 3-for-4 with a homer and two RBI; John Shelby, Anderson Gomes and Scott Madsen all had multi-hit games.
- Justin Edwards struck out eight in 5 1/3 innings, but walked four and gave up three runs, two on one swing. Clevelan Santeliz picked up the mess left by Steven Spurgeon and picked up his first win.