Via Carolina

8/20/08-Augusta @ Kannapolis

2008-08-24T11:30:00.000-07:00

I wanted to go to Kannapolis the following night to watch Bumgarner pitch or another night to see Scott Barnes pitch, but my schedule wouldn't allow it, so I "settled" for Wednesday night's game....

I was looking forward to seeing Gordon Beckham play. I know quite a few Giant fans were convinced this guy was going to be our first round pick in the 08 draft.

I was immediately struck by how small the guy is. I don't see how he will keep up his college power numbers, he is just too small. That being said he has a really fluid, pretty swing. He looks like he uses a really light bat, it looks like a toothpick, but he sure has great control over the bat. He had two hits on the night and both of them were hard hit balls to right field. In his second AB he lined a fastball into the right field gap on a fastball and in his third AB he lined a slider through the hole between the second baseman and the first baseman. His fielding looked to be pretty smooth and his arm strength looked OK, but his accuracy was suspect at least on this night. He threw one ball away and the first baseman had to scoop out another poor throw from him. One thing is for sure about the kid, he is a really nice kid, plays the game hard and enjoys himself. Any coach would want this kid playing on your team.
As for the Giants.....Angel got the game off, he was in the on-deck circle as Nestor Rojas struck out, so I didn't get to watch him play any. Nick Noonan had a great game. He drew two walks, which is quite a feat for him. He also made one of the plays of the year in the field.....Let me explain.....

There is a runner on first with Kannapolis batting, the batter hits a ground ball deep into the hole between first and second. Noonan is playing second for Augusta and goes to his left into the hole, into shallow right field to field the ball on the run. You expect him to jump up and try to throw out the guy who is running to first, right? Nope, without even looking Noonan jumps and in midair guns the throw across the diamond to third as he somehow knows the baserunner on first will round second and go to third....

8/13/08-Norfolk @ Durham

2008-08-13T20:12:00.000-07:00

Last night Tim Beckham, tonight David Price...I can't lie though, I was a lot more excited to see Price pitch....It drizzled all day, but about twenty minutes before first pitch everything cleared up and it was time to play ball. Maybe the rain all day threw David Price off, maybe it was all of the guys with cameras stalking him during his bullpen, but it wasn't Price's best night. He got hit hard all night. No dinks or dribblers, just a bunch of solid line drives and hard ground balls that were mostly hit right up the middle. It was my first time seeing the kid pitch, so I am going to chalk it up to nerves.
His fastball velocity was there all four innings he pitched. It sat 91-95 all night, but his location was not. He would catch too much of the strikeone and the ball would get smacked right back up the middle. His slider looked pretty good, he got a lot of swings and misses and strikeouts with it. That pitch has a lot of potential. There were four Rays' bigwigs sitting right behind homeplate and all of the Bulls' would sneak a glance at them when they were on deck. It was obvious they were there to see if Price was ready for Tampa Bay. I think his next start will be telling. He might have been a little too amped up tonight. Let's see how he fares next time out....

8/12/08-Princeton @ Burlington

2008-08-12T19:29:00.000-07:00

If you are a baseball nerd and live in the Research Triangle of North Carolina the next two days are pretty special....Tim Beckham is playing in Burlington and David Price is pitching Wednesday in Durham...Not bad, huh? I went out Tuesday evening to check out Mr. Beckham....
His first AB? Home run on a no-doubter to LF. Not a bad first impression. The next batter? Burt Reyolds (-the moustache, see below)....Another homer....
I was a little confused with the post home run celebrations. After Beckham's home run nobody really seemed to congratulate him. After Reynolds home run the entire team met him at home plate. Maybe it was just a coincidence and maybe Beckham is viewed as some sort of brat by his teammates, or maybe I am just speculating.
Anyway, Beckham has a lot of fun when he is playing. He usually has a smile on his face, which is always nice to see. A lot of the predraft hype labeled him as a potential "five-tool" player. I saw four tools on display, He looks solid with the glove, he flashed some power, showed some speed (stealing second base), showed off his bat with another base-hit, but I didn't see much of an arm out of him. I don't think it is that big of a deal, but this is the only potential flaw I noticed in him.
It is pretty neat to think that I saw Tim Beckham's first home run in professional baseball. I am looking forward to see what David Price does tomorrow night....

8/9/08-Augusta @ Greensboro

2008-08-10T12:16:00.000-07:00

I have waited all year for my schedule to allow me to see Madison Bumgarner pitch. It finally happened Saturday night. Thanks to a heads up from commonsnse I made it. There were a lot of people there to watch Madison pitch. His family, scouts and media and me. He started off doing some long toss in RF....
Then he headed to the bullpen where there were a bunch of people hanging over the rail watching him throw. The other guys in the bullpen appeared taken aback at all the attention Madison was getting.

He started off the game pretty poorly. If it weren't for a pickoff and foul bunt the Grasshoppers would have gotten some runs. He ended up throwing eight scoreless innings and he settled down to retire the last fifteen guys he faced which is pretty fucking impressive. I was sitting right behind the Greenjackets dugout so I had a really good view of him pitching. The stadium radar gun, which worked Thursday night, was not working Saturday night. So, I decided to move amongst all the scouts sitting directly behind home plate. His fastball sat 92-94 all night long. The highest reading I saw on a gun was 94, but there were probably some 95s or 96s mixed in there. In the bullpen he threw three pitches, a fastball, slider and change. In the game he threw mostly fastballs, but he did use the slider somewhat. He has great control with his fastball and moves it all over the strike zone. He got some generous calls from the ump, but that is what happens when you are around the zone all night. He looked a lot more comfortable using the slider against LH batters. It is obviously a pitch that is a work in progress. He didn't get many swings and misses with it and most guys made pretty solid contact with it. The pitch is inconsistent and is more of a slurve than a slider. Sometimes it would sweep through the zone sharply and other times it tumbled and was flat. The kid needs time to work on the pitch.

I am not a scout by any means, so my opinion should be taken as such. There were Baseball America people sitting all around me, so I will be interested to see what they have to say about Bumgarner. I would say that I advocate taking it slow with him as he still has a lot of work to do with his off speed stuff. We will see what happens...

8/7/08-Augusta @ Greensboro

2008-08-10T11:59:00.000-07:00

First, let me start off by saying that minor league baseball is alive and well in Greensboro, NC. I live fifteen minutes from Durham, NC and go to a lot of Bulls games. It is common knowledge that Durham loves the Bulls, but I think Greensboro might love the Grasshoppers even more. They both have beautiful, new downtown stadiums that are packed. It was "Thirsty Thursday" and there had to be at least a thousand people just drinking and hanging out in the bar area in left field. Anyway, onto the game....

This was the best game I had seen Angel have. He broke his bat on his first AB but the ball landed in LF safely for a hit. The kid is so strong, the bat made it to LF, as well. His next AB was pretty poor, he looked lost. The first pitch was a slider for a strike, the second pitch was another slider that he was way ahead of and swung and missed. The third pitch was another slider and he was way ahead of it and grazed the ball for a weak groundout to the pitcher. As bad as his second AB was, his third AB was that good. He knew the pitcher was going to throw him offspeed junk, so he sat back on a first pitch slider and smashed it down the line for a double. That is what I call growth, the kid is coming along....

The star of the game offensively was Nick Noonan....He had a nice opposite field double and a HR to right. I really like Noonan a lot. He doesn't talk or have any expression at all. He just shows up and plays hard. You know the Giants braintrust loves the kid because of his "gamer" attitude. He has played very solid defense in every game I have seen him play and he runs very well. He just needs to learn to take some more pitches, takes some walks and become more selective.

7/1/08-Augusta @ Hickory

2008-08-10T10:35:00.000-07:00

This was my second time back to Hickory. There were more people there at this game than the first one. I would guess there were 300 people at the first game, this time there might have been a thousand. Madison Bumgarner grew up 10 miles up the road. I talked to some of the guys who work at the stadium and they said when he pitches the stadium sells out. My schedule didn't work out to see Bumgarner pitch in Hickory, but I saw him pitch in Greensboro if you check that post.

Angel Villalona and Thomas Neal look a lot alike. Maybe the Giants have a thing for big, strong kids who can hit the ball a long way. They both have that big through the hips build. They both still run very well, though. As they age I would guess there running speed will suffer because of thier build, we will see how that plays out....To be honest, the first time I saw Thomas Neal I thought it was Angel....

The pitcher for the Hickory Crawdads was Brad Lincoln. He was the Pirates first round pick in the 2006 draft, ahead of Tim Lincecum. He started off the game really strong, but faded fast.

4/23/08-Augusta @ Hickory

2008-08-10T08:28:00.000-07:00

This game was three and half months ago, but I thought some people might want to see the pictures. The game took place in Hickory, NC which is in the foothills of western North Carolina. It makes me laugh that the first time I saw the supposed future of the San Francisco Giants, who is a 17 year old kid from the Dominican Republic, who presently plays for the Augusta Greenjackets was in a tiny city in middle of western North Carolina. Below is Angel Villalona....

The other reason I was excited to see the Greenjackets was to see last years first round picks Nick Noonan, Jackson Williams and Charlie Culberson. I have been to four Greenjacket games and I still haven't seen Culberson play yet. Anyway, here is Nick Noonan...

Jackson Williams got promoted to San Jose, somehow, but he started the year in Augusta....He hit a home run in this game...Here he is...