Tenacious D

I’m not sure he’s received much attention here, but C Josh Crouch has hit very well in Lakeland. Excellent K and BB rates and hitting for average. Not sure about his defense, but his offensive profile (so far) is the opposite of Rogers and Dingler. Will be interesting to watch. I suspect he’ll move up to Erie if/when Dingler goes up to Toledo.

Keith > Pacheco. Pacheco’s swing and miss tendencies will likely become more of an issue as he moves up. The only knock against Keith were concerns about how much power he’d have, which I think he’s addressed. I’d rank the hitters this way: 1. Keith 2. Wenceel 3. Pacheco 4. Carpenter 5. Campos 6. Dingler 7. Santana

Agree. I’m not worried about Jobe, nor second guessing the pick.

Repost: The dearth of elite college pitchers in this draft is going to work against the Tigers. Not because they should take another, but because of serious arm injuries (some are TJ) to 3-4 guys who likely would have been top 15 picks, means that the 11 teams ahead of us will be drafting position players, some of which might have fallen to us. Saw a few mocks where Brock Porter, a local pitcher from Orchard Lake St. Mary HS, will be the first pitcher drafted. By whom you might ask? According to the mocks, the Tigers will take him with their 12th pick. I don’t think that will happen, but it’s just the Tiger’s luck that the best position players will likely be gone before they pick.

Nice to see—I would imagine the adjustment to AA pitching might present some challenges.

Tyler Anderson of the Dodgers is pitching a no-no through 8 for any night owls. He’s at 117 pitches-will be interesting to see how many they let him go to finish this.

The fact that we need Harold in our lineup every day is the biggest indictment of this season.

I hate that some of you have put me in the position to defend Avila, but I think most here gave him pretty high marks for this past offseason, including myself. All of the players he acquired through trades and free agency had a track record, including pretty good seasons in 2021. There was reason to be optimistic around our 3 young starters, who had shown promise last year. ERod’s signing was hailed by national writers as one of the best of the offseason (prior to the shutdown). Two things have happened to put the team in their current despair. The first is an unusual number of injuries to players we had counted on to significantly contribute. The second, which is inexplicable to me, is all of our hitters struggling for an extended period of time with no signs of improvement. Austin Meadows and Robbie Grossman do not have a HR between them in over 280 AB’s—they each hit over 20 last year. Is this the front office’s fault? it would be very easy to blame Avila for this, but I also think it would be wrong. I don’t see what firing him at this point will accomplish, except to appease fans who want blood. signed, Mrs. Avila

Well, someone has to play first. Hittin’ Harold?

I’d like to see Tork go down to Toledo. Allow him to get back on track. Put Schoop at 1B and give Clemens some more AB’s at 2B.

Have tickets, too, but bailing due to the heat. Hope you see a good show.

I’m 56 and lived through the mid 70’s, 90’s black hole, 2003 historically bad team, but nothing feels as bad as this. I’m mostly indifferent, which is probably the worst for a fan. I don’t like or care about this team.

The dearth of elite college pitchers in this draft is going to work against the Tigers. Not because they should take another, but because of serious arm injuries (some are TJ) to 3-4 guys who likely would have been top 15 picks, means that the 11 teams ahead of us will be drafting position players, some of which might have fallen to us. Saw a few mocks where Brock Porter, a local pitcher from Orchard Lake St. Mary HS, will be the first pitcher drafted. By whom you might ask? According to the mocks, the Tigers will take him with their 12th pick. I don’t think that will happen, but it’s just the Tiger’s luck that the best position players will likely be gone before they pick.

Hinch has an out-clause in his contract, but not sure how that would apply to Fetter. It would also be an incredibly bad look for Hinch to bail on his team, which is why I don't see it happening. After the cheating scandal, I doubt he'd want to take on more needless heat. I'm also fairly confident he had a hand in on how this roster was assembled--they don't sign Baez and Eduardo, trade for Meadows and Barnhart without his blessing. We have had an insane number of injuries (basically our entire rotation, except for Skubal) and a head-scratching lack of offensive production (that seems to be going around MLB)

Not sure why Hinch and his staff are given a free pass. These are mostly established major leaguers with track records. How is this all on Avila? If he wants to leave, good on him.

Haven’t seen anything about an injury, so assuming it was pitch count related. Have to figure he’s heading to Toledo sooner than later. Maybe Madden or Smith move up to take his spot?

Calling a Meadows HR today.

I would be surprised—Hinch doesn’t seem like he would scapegoat someone.

Part of this is roster composition—we have multiple guys who are 125-150 K hitters over the course of a full season (Grossman, Baez, Meadows, Candy and Schoop). All are being exploited, along with a rook (Tork) with one on the way, who K’d a ton last year (Greene). If we draft another high potential hitter with a propensity for “swing and miss,” i.e., Parker Meadows and Gage Workman, then we clearly will not have learned anything.

There are a lot of star/very good players that are having poor offensive years relative to their historical performance, but it seems more prevalent and pronounced on our team. It’s baffling.

I don’t think it should take many years to turn this around (we were abysmal in 2003 and in the WS in 2006), but I don’t think Avila is the guy to get us there.

“Hey, Beau, you realize that whatever doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger, right?. Hope that helps.”

He keeps pitching like this and they’ll need to start calling him Cy Madden, I reckon.

Not sure the extent of his injury, but Keith was put on the IL because it’s 2022.