Colorado Springs: Kaz Matsui went two for three in his first rehab start, as we count down to the day we no longer have to see Jamey Carroll and his .496 OPS gracing our starting lineup. Kaz also walked and stole a base, but somehow wasn't able to get around to score despite batting leadoff. Maybe it has something to do with Cory Sullivan batting behind him. Anyway, with any luck this person will also be called up by the end of this weekend. Having John Mabry's left handed bat does nothing for us if he can only muster a 4/33 performance against right handers. Barker is 27/63 against them this year, with almost half those hits being for extra bases.
Oscar Rivera's first AAA start went a lot like his Spring Training starts, in that if there was some way to take away the three run blast from the box score, it would look quite decent. As it was, Rivera allowed four runs in four innings on five hits. He walked two (both scored on the homerun) and struck out four. It's looking like he'll probably be on his way back to Yucatan shortly. Heading the other direction soon, LaTroy Hawkins pitched a scoreless rehab inning with two K's.
Tulsa: Samuel Deduno's line looked similar to Rivera's, but MLB teams are a lot more forgiving when your fastball is 94 mph compared to 80. Deduno took the loss after giving up seven hits in five and a third innings, including a homerun, walking two and striking out seven. The Tulsa offense couldn't get more than two hits off a very wild Mitchell Boggs. The Drillers drew five walks, and got hit by pitches twice but only scored once so I guess you could say they were kept guessing as to where he was going with things.
Modesto: The lone affiliate to get a win yesterday, the Nuts had to take thirteen innings to accomplish the feat over the Dodgers' Inland Empire affiliate. Eric Young drove in four of Modesto's nine runs (three off a bases clearing triple) and scored three more, including the both the tying one in the bottom of the ninth, and the winning one on a pair of Daniel Carte singles. Young stole two bases, but was also caught straying too far off third in the fifth for a CS.
The Mod Bee points out that a couple of down on their luck relievers were big contributors to the victory yesterday. Darric Merrell became the surprise starter when scheduled starter Tomas Santiago strained his abdonimal during warm-ups, and Dave Arnold pitched better than he has all season in three innings late in the ballgame. I haven't heard any word yet on who will replace Santiago on the roster, but we'll keep you updated.
Asheville: Costly errors derailed the starting pitchers of this contest, once in the first inning as Andrew Kreidermacher's own miscue led to a Grand Slam, and then again in the ninth, as a potential no hitter from Mike McClendon was broken up by Hector Gomez with one out and Jay Cox on second. Cox had gotten there thanks to a throwing error on what should have been a ground-out, who knows what McClendon does against Gomez with two outs and nobody on. Cox scored a batter later on a Daniel Mayora ground-out and the final score wound up being 8-1.