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SF Giants Minor Lines, 5/25

Austin Slater bashes his way into some heavy company.

By Roger

In the annals of unexpected multi-HR games, Austin Slater's might well be near the top, seeing as how he just spent 250 PA in the Cal League posting a .100 Iso and hitting just 3 HRs. Apparently it was just taking him a year or so to shake the Stanford out of his swing. Now I certainly bow to no one in  my early and full-throated appreciation of Slater's ability to hit, but even I'm flummoxed at the way he's whacking the bejeezus out of the ball these days. Happily flummed, of course.

HIGHLIGHTS: Austin Slater went 3 for 4 with 2 HRs;

Sacramento beat Colorado Sky Sox (Brewers), 6-0

Name

AB

R

H

RBI

2B

3B

HR

BB

SO

BA

OBP

SLG

CF

Gorkys Hernandez

3

1

1

2

0

0

0

1

1

.257

.342

.337

LF

Mac Williamson

4

1

1

0

1

0

0

0

1

.297

.331

.542

1b

Grant Green

4

1

2

1

0

0

0

0

1

.288

.312

.454

Name

IP

H

R

ER

BB

K

HR

HB

WP

ERA

Clayton Blackburn W 2-3

6.0

2

0

0

1

5

0

1

0

4.66

Sergio Romo

1.0

0

0

0

0

1

0

0

0

4.50

Jake Dunning

1.0

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

6.10

Clayton Blackburn's first start since May 8 was his best one of the year, allowing just two hits over 6 shutout innings. Blackburn kept the Sky Sox off balance all game long and was remarkably efficient, completing his 6 innings in less than 70 pitches. He only had one inning (the 5th) in which he faced more than 3 batters. Hopefully this return to the rotation can be a springboard for him to find his 2015 form the rest of the way. Here he is finishing off his night in style by striking out BA's #8 overall prospect Orlando Arcia.

All of the RiverCats damage came in a single inning of work, their six-run 2nd. In the inning they sent 11 men to the plate and collected six runs on just three hits, with three walks and an error helping out substantially.

After Blackburn finished up his outing, Sergio Romo got in another rehab appearance. It went well!

Romo is scheduled to finish up his rehab on Sunday or Monday and be back with the Giants next week.

RiverCats finish up their four game series tonight with a chance to win 3 out of 4. So get out to Raley Field and be part of their enthusiastic support. It's good for you!

* * *

Richmond won at Binghamton Mets, 11-2

Name

AB

R

H

RBI

2B

3B

HR

BB

SO

BA

OBP

SLG

CF

Austin Slater

4

3

3

4

0

0

2

0

0

.323

.407

.516

LF

Tyler Horan

5

2

3

2

1

0

0

0

0

.283

.333

.455

SS

Rando Moreno

5

0

2

1

1

0

0

0

1

.229

.276

.288

1b

Myles Schroder

5

1

2

1

0

0

0

0

1

.270

.330

.358

Name

IP

H

R

ER

BB

K

HR

HB

WP

ERA

Andrew Suarez W 1-1

7.0

8

1

1

3

3

0

0

0

4.42

Jake Smith

1.0

0

0

0

1

1

0

0

0

5.52

Yeah! Two in a row! Time for a winning streak!

So let's roll call some of Austin Slater's current achievements. He's first in the Eastern League in BA at .323. He's second in the EL in OBP at .407. And rather stunningly he's 5th in the league in SLG, and he's 5th behind some pretty heavy prospect hitters. The only guys in front of him? BA's #85 prospect Kyle Zimmer, #44 prospect Clint Frazier, #39 prospect David Dahl and the Phillies slugging former 2nd rounder Dylan Cozens. Pretty good company the 8th round pick Slater's keeping. He's 4th in the league in OPS, shoving Zimmer down a notch.

For the month of May, Slater is now hitting an absurd .439/.500/.737 in 57 ABs and has 9 BBs against 10 Ks. Pretty amazing. You know how we do here at Minor Lines. Two HRs? Two highlights!

Andrew Suarez' night was hardly pristine. He allowed a hit in the 1st.  A single, double and a walk in the 2nd. A line-out walk and two singles in the 4th. A double in the 5th. Back to back singles in the 6th. But Suarez is a Crafty-Old-Lefty-in-Training, and he danced through the raindrops inning after inning, allowing just a single run in his 7 traffic-filled innings.

And the Squirrels needed Suarez escape act, as the game was close throughout the early and middle innings of the game. It was still 4-1 entering the top of the 7th, but Richmond produced three runs in both the 7th and 8th and added another in the 9th to make it a blowout. In all they had 16 hits, along with two walks and two HB as the offense really came to life. This was now the 4th time in the last 7 games that they've scored 6 or more runs.

Richmond has a chance to win the series with a morning game today, and that game will have a very interesting development associated with it:

* * *

San Jose lost at Visalia Rawhide (Diamondbacks), 3-2

Name

AB

R

H

RBI

2B

3B

HR

BB

SO

BA

OBP

SLG

CF

Ronnie Jebavy

5

0

2

0

0

0

0

0

0

.247

.308

.361

3b

Jose Vizcaino, Jr

3

0

2

0

0

0

0

1

0

.242

.310

.294

LF

Daniel Carbonell

4

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

.000

.000

.000

C

Ty Ross

4

1

1

1

0

0

1

0

1

.263

.382

.386

Name

IP

H

R

ER

BB

K

HR

HB

WP

ERA

DJ Snelten L 2-4

6.0

10

3

3

2

6

0

0

0

4.14

Jose Reyes

2.0

0

0

0

2

2

0

0

0

4.67

Well, as always, should have saved some of those runs Tuesday night. If only. One night after an offensive explosion, the Giants' struggled to bring home the runs. They got plenty of runners on base with 11 hits, a walk and two HB (both Brandon Bednar, Ouch!), but a couple DP and 2 for 7 with RISP led to 10 LOBs.

Ronnie Jebavy continued his recent tear with two more hits. He also stole his 6th bag of the year. Jebavy started the year getting CS on 5 of his first 6 attempts. But he seems to have righted the ship and now has 4 successful attempts in a row. More importantly, he now has 9 multi-hit games over his last 14 played. Turning things around.

Ty Ross, who now figures to see the bulk of the playing time at C with Garcia out, hit his first HR of the year for half their scoring. And Daniel Carbonell saw his first action of the year replacing Johneshwy Fargas on the roster. If he hits like he typically has in the Cal league he'll be a nice addition to the potent SJ lineup.

But in all this love we're throwing at this offense, it's worth remembering that the pitching is doing it's part in the drive to first place as well.

As always, it's worth noting that SJ really should always lead the Cal in ERA because they have a decided advantage in home field environment over a significant part of the league. Still it's good to see them actually doing it. San Jose has surrendered by far the fewest runs in the league with 177. Only three teams in the league have allowed fewer than 200 runs, and the closest is Rancho Cucamonga with 190.

Big rubber match game tonight. With a win San Jose can leave town in a 1st place tie with Visalia.

Veteran San Jose infielder Brandon Bednar joined Joe Ritzo to discuss the hot streak last night:

* * *

Augusta lost at Columbia Fireflies (Mets), 7-4
getting swept in their three game series 0-3

Name

AB

R

H

RBI

2B

3B

HR

BB

SO

BA

OBP

SLG

DH

Miguel Gomez

3

0

2

1

0

0

0

0

0

.355

.394

.516

RF

Jean Angomas

4

1

2

0

2

0

0

0

0

.200

.257

.277

C

Adam Sonabend

2

1

1

0

0

0

0

2

1

.175

.283

.175

CF

Seth Harrison

4

1

2

0

1

0

0

0

2

.252

.329

.371

Name

IP

H

R

ER

BB

K

HR

HB

WP

ERA

Grant Watson L 2-4

4.1

7

5

5

1

1

0

1

0

4.26

Tyler Cyr

2.2

1

1

1

2

2

0

1

0

2.65

Connor Kaden

1.0

2

1

1

0

1

0

0

0

5.34

Grant Watson got trapped in a 5th inning he couldn't work his way out of and the Greenjackets brief 3-1 lead slipped away into a three game sweep. The key AB in the game came against Tyler Cyr, when this shot from power-hitting Patrick Mazeika barely eluded Jalen Miller's grasp and all three runners came around to score:

The Greenjackets spread 10 hits throughout the lineup, most of them singles. But their swing and miss ways often stopped rallies in their tracks. The team also had 10 Ks in the game and two runners CS. One guy who keeps on hitting though is Miguel Gomez who just barrels up everything in sight. His single up the middle gave Augusta it's biggest lead of the day.

Tough time to get swept as the team fell to the bottom of the group that's all jockeying around for second place. The team licks it's wounds and returns home to face first place Charleston tonight, now 8.5 games back.

* * *

Morning baseball for Richmond and everybody else is at night.  Since it's a Giants' off day remember you can watch all the Sacramento and Richmond games on MiLBtv, along with select San Jose and Augusta games (though neither of those two are videocast tonight). You could be watching Dan Slania's starting debut right this minute!

Today's Pitching Matchups:
Sacramento: Chris Heston vs. Hiram Burgos
Richmond: Dan Slania vs. Robert Gsellman (who apparently needs to buy a vowel)
San Jose: Jordan Johnson vs.  Taylor Clark
Augusta: Cory Taylor vs. Tefrey Ramirez

Have fun at the ballyard, however you like to do it!

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