Thursday, August 27, 2009
Mariners make progress
As the Pulaski minor league club wraps up the season, manager Jose Moreno said improvement was the key.
MATT GENTRY The Roanoke Times
Pulaski Mariner Brandon Haveman, a 29th-round draft choice out of Purdue University, was hitting .348 with five home runs this week.
MATT GENTRY The Roanoke Times
Pulaski Mariners shortstop Gabriel Noriega, who played briefly in Pulaski last year, established himself as one of the Appalachian League's top middle infielders this year.
Ray Cox covers recreational, high school and college sports in the New River Valley. If you have information you’d like featured,
e-mail ray.cox@roanoke.com or call 381-1672
Ray Cox
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PULASKI -- Jose Moreno can handle most any baseball question you ask him.
Tactics, situations, proper form on the mound, in the field or at the plate -- he has the thinking man's answer to any of that stuff.
That's what the Seattle Mariners pay him to do. The manager of the Pulaski ballclub of the rookie Appalachian League has to be an expert on all things baseball.
A lot of young players and their budding career depend on the expertise from him, hitting coach Rafael Santo Domingo and pitching coach Nasusel Cabrera.
However, there is one question that Moreno absolutely, positively can't answer.
"Say Jose, which one of the players on your first team here at Pulaski is the most improved from when he started in June to the present, the last week of the season?"
Moreno lays off that one like he would advise his players to do -- with high pitches out of the strike zone.
"They all have improved," he said.
A glance at the results confirms the first-year Pulaski manager isn't just passing out idle compliments.
The Mariners won't finish anywhere near the mighty Danville Braves in the league standings (as of Tuesday, the fourth-place Mariners were 14 12 games back of the front-running Braves in the East Division). Nevertheless, there were few, if any, of the league's ballclubs that exceeded the Mariners in the improvement of its players.
There is no more compelling proof of that than this: After an anemic and ultimately fatal to high hopes start of 3-12, Pulaski has gone 23-18 since.
"Everybody on the team has had a real good second half," Moreno said. "It's not any one particular player. Everybody has improved. You can tell it from the way they played in the first half and the way they're playing right now."
The greatest strides were made at the plate. A team that in the beginning was swinging not much of an effective bat has developed into the fourth-ranked offense in the league.
Pulaski's 49 home runs were the third in the league behind big boppers the Elizabethton Twins, the top team in the West, and Johnson City Cardinals.
True, the pitching has lagged for the Mariners. The staff earned run average, 4.94 this week, trailed the league.
Even so, part of the reason for that was the organization's tendency to promote pitchers to a higher league once they started pitching well at this level.
Brandon Maurer was the runaway leader among those who remained in innings pitched (64 13). No fewer than 16 pitchers had at least 14 innings of work by this week. The Mariners were able to evaluate a bunch of arms. It appears there are many able ones.
One indication of the regard in which an individual is held by the organization is whether he is invited to fall instructional league. Of the pitchers, Maurer, Nolan Diaz, James Gilheeney, Chris Sorce, John Housey and Kyle Sorce are on the guest list.
The position players include shortstop Gabriel Noriega, third baseman Vinnie Catricala, catcher Steve Baron and possibly first baseman Tim Morris.
Noriega, who played briefly in Pulaski last year, established himself as one of the league's top middle infielders. Baron was a supplemental first-round draft choice who signed late. Baron, who played high school ball in Miami this spring, struggled at the plate against professional pitching.
"Behind the plate, he's real good right now," Moreno said. "At bat, he's going to get better. He's under a lot of pressure. His problem is he wants to be perfect.
"Nobody can be perfect. He's going to have a real good career. He's just 18 years old. He's going to be fine."
Also having notable years at Pulaski was leadoff guy Brandon Haveman, a 29th-round draft choice out of Purdue University who they couldn't keep out of the lineup.
Haveman was hitting .348 with five home runs this week. Outfielder Dwight Britton played well before being promoted. First baseman Jharmidy DeJesus showed flashes but didn't have quite the sort of year that earned him recognition by Baseball America as the ninth-best prospect in the Northwest League last year.
