Sunday's six-pack
-- Giants beat Cleveland 1-0, scoring their only run in 7th inning on balk called by (who else?), Balkin' Bob Davidson.
-- Crowds of 38,744 in Kansas City, 39,483 in Pittsburgh show value of interleague play. How many times Royals draw that much at home?
-- Red Sox lost last four games against Padres/Pirates. Don't look now, but Tampa Bay has hung in the playoff race as the halfway mark nears.
-- Evan Longoria started hitting better this week when he stopped using batting gloves. Whatever works.
-- A's have allowed most unearned runs in MLB this season, but their defense Saturday was better, partially because they used four guys in the infield who are all second basemen.
-- Amateur Patrick Cantlay shot +2 72 Saturday after shooting a 60 on Friday; he's five shots out of the lead at the Hartford Open, trying to be the first amateur in 21 years to win on the PGA Tour.
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Sunday's List of 13: Looking back at 2005's best prospects........
Notes from the 2005 Baseball America Prospects Handbook
13) This book had four guys list their top 50 prospects; three of the four named Joe Mauer #1, the other guy had Felix Hernandez #1 and Mauer #2. Delmon Young was listed at either #2 or #3 by all four guys (ouch).
12) Couple of wealthy first basemen were underrated by the experts; Ryan Howard’s rankings were 26-16-38-22. Prince Fielder’s were 20-17-9-14. Fielder’s dad being a good major league hitter helped his rating.
11) Los Angeles Angels were judged to have the best minor league prospects; Casey Kotchman was their #1 prospect; he’s finally realizing that potential now. Angels’ top nine prospects that year are all in the big leagues expects for Dallas McPherson, whose spent decent amount of time there but is now in AAA.
10) Cardinals were rated with the worst prospects; other than Adam Wainwright, Skip Schumaker and Brendan Ryan, their top 30 prospects in ’05 are mostly nowhere to be found now.
9) Six years ago, current Toronto slugger Jose Bautista was the Pirates #12 prospect, just ahead of Freddy Sanchez; the Bucs actually lost Batista twice—first, in the ’03 Rule 5 Draft to the Orioles, then in an ill-advised trade with the Blue Jays for the immortal Robinzon Diaz (139 big league AB’s). Do we wonder why the Pirates have been awful every year? No. Pittsburgh is an improved team this season.
8) Andre Ethier was listed as the A’s #16 prospect; he has turned out be way, way better than that. Oakland’s #20 prospect in ’05 was an outfielder named Alexi Ogando, the same Alexi Ogando who is 7-2, 2.66 in 14 starts as a pitcher for division rival Texas this season. Lot can happen in six years.
7) Pitcher Adam Loewen was the Orioles #1 pitching prospect back then, the highest-drafted Canadian ever; six years later, after going 8-8, 5.39 in 29 career big league starts, he’s an outfielder for the AAA Las Vegas 51’s, trying to get back to the big leagues as an outfielder with the Blue Jays.
6) Wonder why the Mets are struggling? You look at their top 30 prospects six years ago, guys who should be contributing to a big market team now, and all you see are Philip Humber (having first solid year in bigs this year), Jeff Keppinger, Carlos Gomez and Angel Pagan. Of those four, only Pagan is still a Met.
5) Adrian Gonzalez is really rich now; six years ago, he was #8 prospect of the Rangers, who had acquired him from Florida for the immortal Ugueth Urbina. Sadly for Texas, they dealt him to San Diego in a trade that netted the Rangers Adam Eaton and Akinori Otsuka. Ouch. Padre fans better hope the haul they got for Gonzalez (Patterson-Fuentes-Kelly-Rizzo) is a hell of a lot better than what the other teams got. It is remarkable that Gonzalez has been traded three times.
4) Lucky for the Bronx Bombers they can buy anyone they want, since their top 30 prospects look like a listing from the Witness Protection Program (except for Robinson Cano, and to lesser extent, Phil Hughes/Melky Cabrera).
3) Then there are the Braves, who were ranked in top 7 in prospects in 2005 for fifth year in row; Jeff Francoeur was the biggest prospects, but they also had Brian McCann/Kelly Johnson/Jarrod Saltalamacchia/Charlie Morton and Martin Prado.
2) Here are the RedSox’ top six prospects in 2005; tell me why they’re strong now (besides having thick wallets): Hanley Ramirez (traded for Beckett/Lowell), Brandon Moss (bust), Jonathan Papelbon, Jon Lester, Anibal Sanchez (was also dealt to Florida in Beckett trade) and Dustin Pedroia, who was a SS back then.
1) I still think its funny that the White Sox traded Gio Gonzalez not once, but twice; the first time he got traded to the Phillies with Aaron Rowand for Jim Thome. Philly then traded him back to the Pale Hose with Gavin Floyd for Freddy Garcia, before the Sox dealt Gonzalez again, this time with Ryan Sweeney for Nick Swisher, who was dismal in his only season on the South Side. Gonzalez is a really good pitcher now. Hard to believe he got traded three times.
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