Arizona Fall League Action

[Guest sharpie]

He was mentioned during the game last night as an option if they move Cabrera.

[Valadius]

For this dude, they ought to move him.

[Frayed Knot]

There's an on-line article on Brandon Wood in today's Baseball America

http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/2005afl/051017notebook.html

He did have a ridiculous season. It's still only High A ball - although Wright jumped from that level to the majors in just half a season.
And while you should tone down those numbers a bit - seeing as how the California Leauge is sort of the polar opposite of it's east coast counterpart (Fla St League) in that most of the sites there are in those high/hot/dry inland California cities making them tremendous hitter-friendly parks - those are still some sick stats..

[Theoldmole]

Where does this Lastings Milledge journal come from?

[seawolf17]

TheOldMole wrote: Where does this Lastings Milledge journal come from?

Edgy is really Lastings Milledge; he's done a good job of covering it up so far, but HA! We're onto you now, buddy.

[Guest Edgy DC]

I've been breaking into Lastings' desk. He caught me doing it once, so I whacked him in the heel and ran for it.

Actually, [u:c5ccbdc10b]here[/u:c5ccbdc10b]'s the AFL homepage. [u:c5ccbdc10b]Here[/u:c5ccbdc10b]'s the journal.

I've been trying to get myself OK with copying and pasting articles. I don't like when I do it, but I know that stuff will be gone, and I want archives of it, for the forum's sake and my own.

And that's some pretty insipid journal-writing, but one detail in it may someday provide link in a great story.

[MFS62]

Which detail?

[Guest Edgy DC]

I have little idea.

[Guest Edgy DC]

October 19th.

Grand Canyon 5, Peoria (Saquaros) 4. Box. Wrapup.

Good news in that Lastings Milledge is back quickly. Bad news is that Matt Lindstrom is really off the rails, coming on in the seventh inning and coughing up the Rafters' 4-1 lead and blowing a vicotry for Nick Ungs, a questionably-named prospect for the Marlins.

The Player of the Game is Ungs, who went five and struck out give, while giving up only three hits and two walks. The Mets Player of the Game is Andy Wilson., who reached in all three of his plate appearances and scored a run.

[MFS62]

Is that Jeff Duncan playing third for the Seguros?

Later

[Frayed Knot]

No, that would be "top" MFY prospect Eric Duncan ... top being a relative term here
(Jeff, you may remember, throws left-handed).

Eric was drafted in the late 1st round the same year as Milledge (#28 or so to Milledge's #12). He signed quicker and got off to a fast start which was used as ammo in a Bill Madden article (which was critically discussed here at one point) lambasting Met minor league director Gary LaRoque.
(paraphrasing) 'the rest of baseball was "stunned" when the Mets chose Milledge over the superior Duncan' claimed Madden in a NYDN piece, a claim that holds little water since;
a) 15 other teams then passed on him too
the pre-draft buzz put both players right around where they were eventually drafted
c) Madden did himself little good when he referred to the NYY prospect as "Chris" Duncan. (Yo Bill, if you're going to take dictation from your Yanqui front office friends, at least copy down the name correctly)
d) Duncan stumbled this year while Milledge progressed nicely and will almost certainly be higher on everyone's prospect list next Spring.

[MFS62]

Yep, I was thinking of Mets third base prospect Shaun Bowman.

Later

[Guest Edgy DC]

What Elster88 doesn't get is how users got unregistered. If we lose memory, then posts disappearing makes sense, but if even any account set up from a certain date is lost then that's shady. Is it even possible to back-up accounts?

[Frayed Knot]

Milledge was already as high or higher than Duncan on the pre-'05 lists, prolly based on him playing a premiere defensive position.
Duncan has a nice swing according to those who follow such stuff but it's questionable whether he can stay at 3rd and a move to 1st means he'll really have to hit. An average that plummetted into the .230s this year won't help his star (although he's still just 19 and in AA) and the gap between him and Milledge will almost certainly grow in the next round of assessments.

]i don't quite remember that article or that thread

It was one that Doc-Sal-Bret used as an excuse to jump all over many of us about. Seems that our opposition to Madden's conclusion was proof not only of our swallowing the Wilpon kool-aid but also a blatant acknowledgement that we selectively accuse journos of making up their facts only when it suits our agendae.

[Guest ScarletKnight41]

Ooh - MK had a close encounter with Eric Duncan in June. His Little League had a group event in Trenton with the Thunder, and 9 kids got to be on the field for the national anthem - one at each base with a Thunder player. MK was at third base with Eric Duncan. Thus, even though Duncan is an MFY-in-training, the superceding rule is that I can't dis players who have been nice to my kid (and MK reports that Duncan was nice to him).

BTW, I know I posted a photo of MK and Duncan together. I can't find the thread, though. It was some time after June 30 (unfortunately, the Little League doesn't link to the photos anymore). I'll give five cyberbucks to anyone who can find it for me. Thanks.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Jeremy Hill has been pulled from the roster, according to Bryan Hoch, and replaced by Henry Owens. Hill apparently has injured his elbow, though I don't know to what extent.

Hill reportedly throws as hard as anybody.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Met hitters are coming back to earth, but the pitchers have been battered. It's the story of the whole team, with only four current Rafters (leaving out the injured Hill) sporting ERAs under 7.36.

Milledge, despite the injury, has seen more time than any Met batter.

Player	G	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	TB	BB	SO	SB	CS	AVG	OBP	SLG	OPS
Lambin	8	29	3	8	2	0	1	3	13	2	7	0	0	.276	.323	.448	.771
Wilson	5	14	3	4	0	0	0	0	4	2	6	0	0	.286	.375	.286	.661
Milledge	10	41	9	13	2	0	2	8	21	2	9	2	1	.317	.349	.512	.861

Player	W	L	ERA	G	GS	CG	SHO	SV	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	SO
Hill	1	1	6.75	4	0	0	0	0	5.1	4	4	4	1	2	3
Lindstrom	0	0	14.40	4	0	0	0	0	5.0	12	9	8	2	5	3
McLane	0	2	9.90	3	3	0	0	0	10.0	19	15	11	3	4	8
Owens	0	0	40.50	1	0	0	0	0	0.2	4	3	3	1	1	2

McLane is in the process of just getting noticed as a prospect (great K/BB ratio), so it'll be interesting to see what he comes away with.

[Guest Edgy DC]

More chillin'. I swear I've never met anybody who chills so much.

Some useful stuff here for MbtN. Also, a cool biographical detail.

Journal: Milledge well heeled Everything felt good when I came back from the bruised heel. I decided to take a little time off and take things slow, so I took a couple extra days off to make sure. And then when I did come back (Tuesday), it was 100 percent. http://www.minorleaguebaseball.com/images/2005/09/30/aHCounQF.jpgI stole a base in that game and the heel never crossed my mind or bothered me at all. It's totally healed. In today's game, I homered (in the first inning). I'm seeing the ball fine, same as usual. So I'm chilling with my normal group of guys (Glen Perkins, Denard Span, Reggie Abercrombie and Robert Andino). In the last journal, I mentioned I had previously forgotten Glen. He was happy that I finally did. So everybody's covered. Everything's good. In fact, we're in the mall right now ... again ... doing some shopping. We're going to go to a fancy restaurant tomorrow, so we had to get something nice to wear. Haven't gotten anything yet, though. But there's still time to answer your emails before the shoe salesman comes back. Lastings' Mailbag / Send Lastings an email > I have been hearing rumors that you might be included in a deal for Manny Ramirez. I hope that isn't the case, and that (Mets general manager) Omar (Minaya) is too smart to do that. What are your feelings on being mentioned in trades and coveted by other teams? -- John G. It's definitely an honor hearing your name come up in connection with players like that. It means I'm doing something right on the field. To be put up with Manny Ramirez, a guy who is going to be in the Hall of Fame, and to be compared to bigger names like that really is an honor. Your uniform number in the Arizona Fall League is 20. You wore uniform number 23 with the St. Lucie Mets. I am not sure what number you wore with the Binghamton Mets. What is your favorite uniform number? -- Arthur Probably 00. I just want to do something different than everyone else. So that's the plan, hopefully some day I'll be wearing 00 in the big leagues. I don't even have a backup number. Big fan of yours. My only question is about your first name, Lastings. I am curious as to where it came from. Is it a family name or does it mean anything? -- Adam It was because I was the last child, Adam. When I was born, that was it, so that's how it went down. Mom wasn't going to have any more kids, so she came up with it -- Lastings for the last one. It was all Mom. I like my name. What do you guys do for fun to break up the routine here in Phoenix? -- Scott M. We go the mall. We just sort of chill at the mall all day. We don't really go to the movies. We don't really get recognized at all. We're little guys, we blend in.

[Guest Johnny Dickshot]

Good question, Arthur!

There's a story on mlb.com about Evan McLane today. I'd link it but that site is murder on my crappy outdated OS and lousy connection here.

[Guest ScarletKnight41]

No rookie should try to take Mr. Met's number from him.

[Guest Johnny Dickshot]

F Mr. Met. He didn't even have a number till a few years ago

[Guest sharpie]

I assume that if were to wear 00 he would be the first to do so in Met history. Who else has ever worn it anywhere? I remember Al Oliver always wore 0 and I seem to remember Rey Ordonez briefly wore it (and maybe Jose Oquendo on the Cards) but Lastings has no O in his name so that justification doesn't work for him.

[Guest Yancy Street Gang]

If I was a ballplayer, and I wanted a really unique uniform number, I'd pick Q or X or Z or something like that.

[Guest sharpie]

Commissioner's office would probably veto it. Eddie Gaedel, the midget hired by Bill Veeck for one at-bat wore number 1/8.

[Guest Edgy DC]

There's precedent forr 00. Rick White wore it this year with the Bucs. I'm sure he's not the first. Benito Santiago wore 09, fer crying out loud.

[Guest ScarletKnight41]

I don't think the guy from Mets By The Numbers will mind if I post these items -

0 - I was just going to sneak this number in with Rey Ordonez (1996-97) in the 10's until it was pointed out that Terry McDaniel wore No. 0 in 1991. Rey-Rey says he switched to 10 from 0 because, "I want to be more than nothing." Oh, he's that. And more.

00 - This unusual number was issued to reclaimation project Tony Clark, who made the team in 2003's spring training. With such a big group in camp when Clark arrived, he was offered the choice of 00 or 88 and he said, "I didn't want to hear any wide-reciever jokes." Clark gave up 00 midseason after being informed by Met fans that those digits belonged to Mr. Met (that's partly accurate. Mr. Met for many years had no number, and despite 40 years in the game, has yet to officially get into a game.

A word about Spring Training numbers: Dwight Gooden donned Number 00 during Spring Training workouts (along with Roger McDowell, who wore 0) in 1989, but both were back in their respective 16 and 42 when the games started counting. John Franco also wore No. 00 during some 1993 workouts (along with 76, 77 and 92). Gooden in 1993 wore 64 during Spring Training -- a tribute to the form he hoped to reacquire when he was assigned 64 during his first Major League Spring Training back in 1984 (it was only so effective).

[Guest Edgy DC]

Of course. Tony Clark.

[Guest Edgy DC]

October 25: Grand Canyon 10, Phoenix 3
Wrap ● Box

The Rafters continue their offensive onslaught, finally getting their bullpen to hold a lead wtihout too much heartache

PotG: Eric Duncan (Yankees), who went 4-4, including two two-run singles and three runs scored. Duncan also scored once. Other excellent work was turned in by firstbaseman Andy Wilson (Mets, see below), starting pitcher Nick Ungs (Marlins), with five innings of one-run ball), and reliever T.J. Beam (Yankees), with four strikeouts in six batters.

Mets PotG: Andy Wilson, who played first and went 2-5 with a double and a run scored. Chase Lambin also played shortstop and walked twice, scoring both times. Lastings Milledge played centerfield and went 1-5 with a runs scored.

Most Curious Opposing Prospect: Phoenix Devil Dogs thirdbaseman Jonathan Schuerholz. Braves GM Jon Schuerholz would get more cynical criticism for drafting so many players from within his team's home state if he wasn't so damn successful doing it. Let's see if he has some success by drafting from within his living room.

[Guest ScarletKnight41]

Better late than never - MK with Eric Duncan at third base in Trenton -

[Valadius]

You guys didn't remember the whole Tony Clark thing? Wow. That little kid made him switch to 52 from 00 because of Mr. Met.