Cleveland Sports Forum

Every time I check more of the Lynchburg roster appears and it now looks complete:

http://www.milb.com/roster/index.jsp?sid=t481

One interesting rather unheralded member of the team is 19-year-old middle infielder Ivan Castillo. That's awfully young for High A. His offense is not yet spectacular; 2014 slash line: 260/293/365 but that wasn't bad for a kid as young as he is. He walked all of 11 times over the course of 80 games, and not a basestealing star, 11/17 for the Captains

Absence of Levon Washington from all rosters suggests that the No. 2 draft pick of some years back must once again be injured.

Opening Day for the Minors is more fun for me than the majors; 4 teams all debut and new guys appear at new levels, if they're any good. This year our most interesting team will be the new Lynchburg Hillcats in the Carolina League with most of our best position player prospects. And three high ceiling teenagers highlight the Lake Captain lineup. The organization is very thin on pitching but again most of the best are with Lynchburg and the highest rated overall is another teenager in Eastlake, Justin Sheffield. Akron has almost no one of interest outside of Erik Gonzalez. Columbus has an excellent young infield and not a lot more prospects. At least other than at catcher and Bruce Chen the Clipper veterans are youngish retreads.

Possible lineup for Lake County something like this:

1. Greg Allen RF
2. one of two 2B of not much interest
3. Yu Chian Chang SS
4. Bobby Bradley 1B
5. Francisco Mejia C
6. Dorsyss Paulino LF
7. maybe Sicnarf Loopstock DH with the best name in baseball
8. Grant Fink 3B
9. Bobby Ison CF
Pitching: Justus Sheffield high ceiling lefty

Power hitters are all concentrated at Lynchburg. Last year's tallies include:

Nellie Rodriguez 22 HR in Lake County
Eric Haase C 16 HR in 2/3 season at lake County, none in Carolina
Clint Frazier CF 13 HR in Lake County
Paul Hendrix 2b/ss/3b 12 HR in Lake County
Brad Zimmer 6 HR total in under 200 AB with Mahoning Valley and Lake County and plenty in college before the draft
Mike Papi 3 HR in 135 AB in Lake County and lots of them in college ball at Virginia
Even SS Ivan Castillo had 5 homers in 84 G in Lake County, and Luigi Rodriguez had 6 in about half season with Carolina

Everything about the day felt right to Captains manager Shaun Larkin, his coaches and players.
On April 8, at Classic Park, the Captains got in their next-to-last full workout in advance of the April 10 season opener in Michigan against the Lansing Lugnuts.

In weather that was passable for this time of the year in this neck of the woods, Larkin put the Captains through their paces on the field and in the batting cage fieldhouse. On the field, PFP, short for pitchers’ fielding practice, was followed by hitters getting in their work against live pitching.

When the field work was done, Larkin and hitting coach Larry Day took the position players into the fieldhouse for spirited rounds of batting practice. The cracks of balls flying off bats mixed with cheers, chatter and country music.
In the clubhouse, pitchers filled plates with a pasta dinner and spoke to reporters who turned out for media day. The hitters would soon join their teammates and take their turns with reporters.

"It’s baseball — you gotta love it,’’ said a smiling Dace Kime, the sturdy right-hander from Defiance who will get the start in the season opener against Lansing.

The Captains have yet to play a game that counts in the Midwest League standings, but Larkin, making his minor-league managerial debut, likes what he has seen (and heard) since the Captains pulled into town April 5. “Out of the gate, there’s a good feeling in there,’ Larkin said, sitting in the manager’s office and gesturing toward the locker room.

Larkin has a great frame of reference on what it means to be one of those players. Twelve years ago, he sat in that same locker room as the starting third baseman on the inaugural Captains team. At this juncture of the season, Larkin said, team chemistry is just beginning to coalesce.

“It comes down to working together, understanding each other, giving each other space and allowing for temperaments,’’ Larkin said. Thomas Pannone, the left-hander from Rhode Island who will start the home opener April 12 against the Bowling Green (Ky.) HotRods, was asked for his early read on this team’s mindset.

“We get along well together and enjoy each other’s company. But on the field, it’s strictly business,’’ Pannone said. “We’re here to win a championship.’’ Larkin likes the mix of youth and experience on his roster.

The youngest player is 18-year-old first baseman Bobby Bradley. At 24, third baseman Grant Fink is the oldest. The average age is 21.2. The 25 players on the active roster come from 13 states and four foreign countries — Aruba, Czech Republic, Dominican Republic and Taiwan.

“It’s an interesting group that is right where it needs to be at this time of the year,’’ Larkin said.

The player from Taiwan, 19-year-old shortstop Yu-Cheng Chang, is a frontline prospect with an extremely limited command of English. Nevertheless, Chang was able to field questions from reporters with the assistance of Yung Chu, an Arizona resident who is serving as his interpreter for the first few weeks of the season.

One of the nuggets mined from the conversation with Chang is Chipotle is his favorite U.S. food at the moment. When hit with a hankering for something that approximates home cooking, Panda Express gets the job done.
To watch Chang interact easily with his teammates on the field and in the clubhouse, it seems clear they all speak the international language of baseball.

Here are capsules on the entire Lake County roster. It's kind of long, but here for your reading or skipping pleasure

Way too much trouble to reformat. try the link, it's easier to read than I can make it:

http://www.news-herald.com/sports/20150 ... f-profiles

J.D. Feyeirson is probably not a prospect but he does have a nice bio:

Baseball America’s top Division III prospect going into 2014 season. In 15 appearances at Mahoning Valley in 2014 covering 17 innings, was 3-0 with 0.00 ERA, four saves, one walk and 24 strikeouts.

Designated Smart Guy:

David Speer, one of many lefties on this team: As a junior at Columbia, was 7-2 with 1.86 ERA and was Ivy League Pitcher of the Year

Designated Feel Good Story:

Bobby Ison: Overcame a childhood bout with Guillain-Barre Syndrome that threatened the function of his legs. With rookie-league Arizona in 2014, batted .240 in 32 games with nine RBI

Most familiar name:

Steve Karsay, Pitching coach
The former Tribe pitcher (1998-2001) returns for his second stint as Lake County pitching coach. He spent the 2013 season with the Captains.

New home town for our Carolina team so a new hometown newspaper: the Lynchburg News Advance. Top sports story is about NASCAR and Liberty University sports comes next. But there's also a local hook to the Indians farm team:


After the 2014 season had finally concluded and Mike Papi had a chance to reflect on all the baseball he played, he couldn’t help but smile at all the things he had a chance to experience.

Papi had the emotional highs of being selected by the Cleveland Indians with the 38th overall selection and he was a key piece of the University of Virginia’s run to the College World Series final against Vanderbilt. Things couldn’t have looked any better.


But he had to quickly turn his attention to transitioning to the competitiveness of Minor League Baseball. Papi barely had a chance to get acquainted with his teammates at Mahoning Valley — two games in Short-Season A — before a promotion to Class A Lake County where he was teamed with highly touted outfield prospects Bradley Zimmer and Clint Frazier.


It was a whirlwind few months for Papi, who begins this season with Class A Advanced Lynchburg and is one of the Indians’ top-rated prospects. The Hillcats open their first season as an Indians’ affiliate against Potomac at 7:05 p.m. Thursday at Pfitzner Stadium in Woodbridge.


“It definitely was a whirlwind for me. It was a lot of back and forth after the draft, going to Cleveland, going home, going to Mahoning and right to Lake County. It was a lot to take in,” Papi said. “I took my first year as more of an experience and gaining experience of how the whole professional baseball world works. I did play a little bit of summer ball in college, which was sort of the same type of thing you do here — long bus rides, play that day, play every day, live in hotels. I feel strong and I feel like I have the experience to be successful in the minor leagues.”


Papi, who Baseball America ranks as the Indians’ fifth-best prospect, will play in right field for the Hillcats, a position he manned during his freshman season in Charlottesville before playing in left field as a sophomore. He moved to first base as a junior and was tied for the ACC lead with 11 home runs.


He led the ACC in batting as a sophomore with a .381 average.


“When we had him play out there last year, he played mostly right field and it really was an easy transition from what I saw,” Hillcats manager Mark Budzinski said. Budzinski was Papi’s manager in Lake County last season. “He took good routes to the ball, he knows where to go with the ball, he throws really well. It wasn’t a whole lot to do there other than fine-tune some things. It’s a credit to him. He put his work in at college and continues to do so.”


An area Papi will look to get back on track is his batting average. He hit .178 at Lake County and finished with three home runs and 15 RBIs in 135 at-bats. Baseball America tabbed him as the player in the Indians’ farm system with the best strike-zone discipline.


“The pitching really isn’t that much different. You’d be surprised,” Papi said. “It’s more of you’re facing a Friday starter every day. You’ve got to go up there and you’ve got to grind out at-bats. You’ve got to want to attack the pitcher, you don’t want him to come after you.”


The left-handed hitting Papi should benefit from the wind blowing out to right field at City Stadium for home runs and plenty of doubles to the extended outfield walls.


Papi said he hadn’t reached out to former UVa teammate Reed Gragnani yet about what to expect in the Carolina League. Gragnani hit .300 last season with the Salem Red Sox and is starting this season with Double-A Portland of the Eastern League.


But as far as expectations are concerned, Papi is making sure to take every day in stride and not get too far ahead of himself in the crowded outfield with Zimmer and Frazier.


“Every season is important; every at-bat to me, every pitch is just as important as every season is,” Papi said. “For me, it’s coming to the ballpark every day with a good mental mentality and staying positive and not riding that rollercoaster, trying to find the most consistent path. When you find that path, the stats and all the wins take care of themselves.”

That was one of the biggest empty spaces in stories posted on the Forum. Methinks Civ fell asleep while posting it, woke up, then finished it.

I was expecting one HELL of a punchline ... or maybe a bikini.

OK I woke up and deleted the white stuff. I think it was snowing in Lynchburg VA