Baseball Chatter 06/13

Draft

The Reds passed on their opportunity to draft Derek Jeter in 1992. Last night they drafted a shortstop who was actually named after Derek Jeter. Jeter Downs was the Reds competitive balance pick at 32nd overall.

Instead of drafting Aaron Judge with the 31st pick overall, the Braves selected a right-handed pitcher from Oklahoma State, Jason Hursh. He has been called up three times this season and has pitched as a reliever in one game. He was sent back down to make room for Sean Newcomb

Instead of drafting Reggie Jackson with the number one pick overall, The Mets drafted Steve Chilcott. He played 18 games at Triple-A over six long seasons

The Marlins drafted A-Rod’s nephew with pick 52, infielder Joe Dunand

Injury Updates

Madison Bumgarner threw off a mound for the second time in three days, hang tight people. He is determined to come back.

Tom Murphy has to be activated from the disabled list by June 23, and Ryan Hanigan has no options left. Will they send Murphy down to Triple-A or expose Hanigan to waivers?

Josh Reddick suffers concussion symptoms after he ran into the wall yesterday We don’t know if it will require a 7-day stint on the disabled list yet, but Reddick has hit the wall hard so many times…

Lance McCullers is hurt, can you imagine?

Teams

The Rockies have lost two straight and 3 of their last ten. They still have the best record in the National League

Brewers relievers have more losses than any other team, and their 4.48 ERA ranks 20th. They have also thrown more innings than any other team, 231 innings

Players

Jerad Eickhoff pitched at least six innings in 33 of his first 44 major league starts. He struck out six batters last night for the first time in a month, and made it through six innings for the third time in his last ten starts. It doesn’t help that he gets the worst run support of any starting pitcher in baseball. His BABIP is high at .327, and runners are only getting stranded on base 66 percent of the time.

Justin Wilson:

The Cardinals are 3-10 without Kolten Wong in the lineup, and 23-19 when he starts. He has improved at the plate.

He’s kind of been a spark. We talk about the top of the order and having guys on base and in scoring position, a lot of that is the way Kolten is putting together his at-bats. He’s taking walks. He’s working deep counts. And he’s making things happen.Mike Matheny on Wong

Randal Grichuk will likely get called up today after the Cardinals optioned Paul DeJong yesterday. Grichuk was hitting .222 with a .276 on base percentage, striking out 29.8 percent of the time before being sent to the minors to get his head on straight.

Don’t expect him to strike out any less as he has never had great plate discipline, not even in the minors. He can’t hit the ball to the opposite field either.

Hitters are fouling a ton of pitches off Justin Verlander. His velocity is not down and his spin rate is normal. My issue is his walk rate and his hard contact rate. They say he could also be tipping his pitches. My other issue is that he has pitched so many innings…

Did you know that Verlander threw a total of eight innings in the minors. It was in 2015.