Curve and Bay Sox Prospects
Myworld was at Prince Georges stadium last night to watch the Altoona Curve down the Bowie Box 4-1. We left in the eighth when the rains came. Some comments on the players:
Pedro Alvarez - He’s looking pretty chunky, looking more and more like a Miguel Cabrera. Unless he gets devoted to a conditioning program he will need to move to firstbase. On the couple balls hit to him he looked pretty stiff, making one error on a poor throw.
Ray Chang - He had a good night, though he made one error at shortstop. It looked like he had one homerun taken away from him but finished the day with two RBIs. He appears pretty confident about himself, which is not a bad thing and may be a result of his Olympic experience, but at 26 his best bet is as a utility player. If his major league career does not go well China would probably pay him well to coach one of their teams. He played shortstop for China in the Olympics last year.
Gorky Hernandez - He looks smooth out in centerfield and hit a double to the base of the fence. He may not show enough power to play the corner so it will be interesting to see what the Pirates do with him. With McCutcheon and Hernandez in the outfield they would cover a lot of ground.
Donald Veal - Pitched two innings of rehab, the Pirates selected him from the Cubs in the Rule V. His fastball was a good 94 but he seemed to slow his arm speed when delivering the curve. He pitched two innings of shutout ball. He should be effective in the pen.
Yoslan Herrera - He got his 10th win against one loss but at 28 the Cuban defector should be dominating AA. Expect the Pirates to give him a September opportunity. He has a good mix of stuff, changing speeds and location.
Josh Bell - Got my first opportunity to see Josh Bell and though he didn’t get any hits he certainly swings hard. He tried to make a barehanded pickup on a ground ball and proved that he was a long ways from being in the Ryan Zimmerman category. The jury is out whether he can stick at third.
Steve Johnson - The other player acquired from the Dodgers in the George Sherril trade. He doesn’t seem to have overwhelming stuff, with a fastball in the 88-90 range. He did strike out six but I wasn’t dropping my jaw with his secondary stuff. Some hitters swung at pitches that went in the dirt and there were some taken third strikes so he fools hitters at the AA level. He needs to improve his pitches to have that success at the major league level.