THE FLYING TIGERS ... Lakeland dropped two of three to Daytona and has now lost four of its last five and seven of its last ten. The Flying Tigers are now 12-14 on the season and are in fourth place in the North Division, 6.0 games behind Clearwater. Rawley Bishop is third in the Florida State League with a .360 average and Brent Wyatt is 10th at .325 on the season. The Flying Tigers have the best earned run average in the league at 2.92 while the team batting average of .247 ranks ninth.
DUNEDIN BLUE JAYS ... The Blue Jays were swept by Tampa and were outscored in the series 23-4. Prior to the Yankee series, the club had won five of six including a three-game sweep of the Flying Tigers in Lakeland. Dunedin is 14-12 on the season and are in third place, 4.0 games behind the Threshers. Matt Rizzotti leads the Florida State League with a .379 average while teammate Cody Overbeck is right behind at .372 to go with his league-leading eight homers and 35 hits. Overbeck is also tied for second with 21 runs batted in. Dunedin is tied for fifth with a .260 team batting average while the staff ERA of 3.70 ranks seventh.
LAKELAND PROBABLE STARTERS:
THURSDAY - MARK SORENSEN (2-2, 4.30) ... has allowed four earned runs in each of his last two starts after giving up three in his first three starts ... was 2-0 with a 1.52 ERA and 15 strikeouts in first three starts and is 0-2 with a 10.80 ERA and 1 strike out the last two ... righthanders are hitting .196 against him ... had longest outing of 6.0 innings in win against Brevard on April 20 ... struck out season-high seven batters in no-decision outing vs. the Manatees on April 14.
FRIDAY - BRAYAN VILLARREAL (2-3, 2.86) ... leads the FSL with a .190 opponents batting average ... third in the league with a 11.44 strikeouts per nine innings ratio ... was 2-1 with a 2.35 ERA, 26 strikeouts and 1 walk in first three starts and is 0-2 with a 3.46 ERA, 10 strikeouts and three walks his last two starts ... has 36 strikeouts and five walks in 28.1 innings ... longest outing of 8.0 innings came in complete game loss at Daytona on April 27 despite allowing just three hits in the game ... twice struck out season-high nine batters on April 15 and April 21 ... righthanders are batting .167 against him while lefties are hitting .217... he is limiting opponents to a .190 batting average.
SATURDAY - ADAM WILK (0-2, 3.41) ... has not factored in a decision since dropping his first two starts ... has allowed two or more runs in each of his five starts ... struck out seven in first two starts, but just three since ... walked five his first three starts, but none in his last two outings .... longest outing of 7.0 innings came versus Daytona in last start on May 3.
PINCH-HITTING POUNDS ... Bryan Pounds pinch-hit for Chao-Ting Tang in the 7th inning of Wednesday’s game vs. Daytona and singled to collect Lakeland’s first pinch-hit of the season.
HIGH WATER MARK ... The Flying Tigers’ second Education Day on May 4 brought 3,543 fans to Joker Marchant Stadium, the largest crowd of the 2010 season and the ninth largest crowd in the last four seasons. That day’s crowd also marks the fifth gate this season in excess of 2,000 fans.
FIRST TIME FOR EVERYTHING ... The Flying Tigers collected doubles by Rawley Bishop and Gustavo Nunez in the May 4 game vs. Daytona along with a triple by Bryan Pounds and a home run by newcomer Julio Rodriguez. The combo marked the first time this season that Lakeland has had the cycle in one game.
HIT STREAK EXTENDED ... Rawley Bishop homered on Wednesday in his last at bat to extend his hit streak to eight games. He is 15x33 (.455) since April 28. Bishop had two or more hits in four straight games prior to Wednesday’s game and now has 12 multi-hit games on the season. The homer was his fourth of the season, putting him in a tie with eight others for second in the league.
ANOTHER STREAK SNAPPED ... Gustavo Nunez had his six-game hit streak on Wednesday. In his six games prior to Wednesday, Nunez was 10x24 (.417)
ALRIGHT ALDEN ... Alden Carrithers is 12x35 (.433) in his last nine games dating back to April 24.
HELLO, JULIO ... Newcomer Julio Rodriguez made his Lakeland 2010 debut a memorable one with two hits including a home run on Tuesday, May 4.
WILD WYATT ... Brent Wyatt collected three hits on Wednesday versus Daytona to become the first Lakeland player this season to twice have three hits in one game. He also accomplished the feat on April 25 against Tampa.
THRICE IS NICE ... Through their first 23 games, the Flying Tigers had just four triples. Lakeland has now tripled in three straight games.
SOMEBODY GET ME HOME ... Dating back to April 30, Lakeland has stranded 57 runners - an average of 9.5 per game.
BULLPEN GETTING IT DONE ... Although they have made a couple of the last few games interesting in the late innings, the bullpen now has a 0.89 ERA in the last nine game, part of the reason why Lakeland now leads the Florida State League in earned run average.
A NO-NO WOULD HAVE BEEN NICE ... Charlie Furbush took a no-hitter into the fifth on May 4 against Daytona before Josh Vitters singled up the middle to lead off the fifth inning. The last time a Lakeland club had a no-hitter came on July 19, 2008 when Rick Porcello, Robbie Weinhardt and Cody Satterwhite combined on the no-no. The last Lakeland pitcher to toss a complete game no-hitter was Rob Haas who accomplished the feat on April 14, 1989 versus Clearwater. Matt O’Brien tossed a one-hitter on Mar 3, 2008 shutting out St. Lucie, 6-0.
WAY TO GO, WILKIN ... Former Flying Tiger Wilkin Ramirez was honored as the Eastern League Player of the Week for the week ending May 2. Ramirez hit .500 (11x22) with two doubles, three home runs and nine runs batted in last week for AA Erie.
Complete statistical packages for this series and past series for the 2010 season are available at http://issuu.com/mocman/docs
_____________________
Views expressed in “Mission Notes” are solely those of the author
and do not necessarily reflect those of the Lakeland Flying Tigers.
No comments:
Post a Comment