"like butterflies with hiccups"
Something for you to think about as you enjoy the long weekend (or even if it’s a normal work weekend for you).
I had one active duty serviceman tell me once that you can thank him on any other day of the year and he’ll buy YOU a cup of coffee.. but on this one day, don’t thank him for somehow being lucky enough to be the one who came home instead of someone else.
That has really stayed with me.
The Cedar Rapids Kernels passed the midpoint of the first half of their 2015 season over the past weekend, making it an appropriate time to get manager Jake Mauer’s assessment of how their season is progressing.
There’s not a lot for the manager to complain loudly about, with his team vying for the second best record in the entire Midwest League. Then again, his guys have consistently remained several games behind Western Division leading Quad Cities in the standings, so there’s certainly room for improvement, too.
If the Kernels can maintain distance between themselves and the other Western Division challengers behind them, they’ll lock in a postseason spot as the Division’s first half runner-up, even if they can’t overtake Quad Cities by mid June.
In a conversation last weekend, Mauer quickly identified the primary reason for the Kernels’ success so far.
“Starting pitching has been good, for the most part,” Mauer said. “The bullpen’s been really good, for the most part and the defense has been good.”
It’s not a coincidence that those two aspects have led to wins on the scoreboard.
“It goes hand in hand,” Mauer explained. “The pitchers throw strikes and the boys get a chance to catch it. If (pitchers) don’t throw strikes and we’re standing for a while, when they do hit it, sometimes we’re not ready for it. It’s not an excuse but that’s what happens.
“Defense has been good, for the most part. We’re making the plays that we should and I think that’s the reason we’re pitching so well.”
Kernels shortstop Nick Gordon, the Twins’ first round draft pick a year ago, seconded his manager’s opinion on the value of the team’s defense this season.
“Pitchers like to throw strikes when they know they’ve got good defense behind them,” Gordon said on Saturday.
There’s one aspect of the pitching game that has surprised Mauer and it’s a component that defense has nothing to do with. More than half of the pitchers who have toed the rubber for the Kernels have averaged at least a strikeout for every inning pitched, led by reliever Cam Booser’s 1.75 strikeouts per inning.
“We’ve struck out a lot more guys than anticipated, which is probably a little bit of a surprise,” Mauer admitted. “We thought we’d have a couple of guys that would be able to strike guys out. Booser, obviously, and (Zach) Tillery, some of the guys that have some pretty good stuff. But for the most part, the pitching’s been what’s kept us going.”
He wouldn’t be a manager of young players if he couldn’t find room for improvement, of course.
“Still way too many walks,” Mauer said, concerning a few members of his staff. “We’re not taking that step forward, which is a little disappointing.”
Coincidence or not, since Mauer said those words, the Twins have sent several new pitchers to join the Kernels.
At least one case, of course, had nothing to do with a pitcher walking too many batters. Opening Day starting pitcher Mat Batts was rewarded for his strong work this spring with a promotion this week to Class high-A Fort Myers.
Pitching alone doesn’t win games, however. You need to score some runs, too, and the Kernels have outscored all but three teams in the Midwest League this year.
“The middle of our lineup is really starting to produce, which is huge,” Mauer observed, in regards to his lineup. “We’re starting to see some of the offensive guys hopefully get their legs underneath them and start going. We need some more contributions, especially from the bottom half of the order. I’d like to get our top half going again, but the middle’s been pretty good as of late.”
The “middle of the lineup” that Mauer referred to includes first baseman/outfielder Trey Vavra, who leads the Kernels in all three of the “Triple Crown” offensive categories, batting average (.353), home runs (6) and Runs Batted In (25), as well as almost every other offensive category that involves the use of his bat.
The Kernels haven’t faced any of the league’s Eastern Division teams yet, while seemingly matching up with the last two teams in the Western Division standings, Beloit and Wisconsin, at least every other week. Both of those clubs have younger rosters than many of their MWL competitors, including the Kernels.
That may have something to do with their early success, the manager will admit, but he’s not stepping up to volunteer to give back any of the wins against those teams, either.
“We’ve feasted on some of the pitchers we’ve needed to feast on, there’s no doubt about it,” Mauer observed. “We’re supposed to do that.”
But the manager doesn’t feel his guys have been bad against the better pitching they’ve faced, either.
“What we’re looking for is just a little more consistent approach at the plate.”
Gordon summed up the approach that he and his teammates are taking as they enter the final weeks of the season’s first-half.
“Our goal is to win so we’re out to compete and give our best,” the shortstop offered. “As for me, it’s been a learning experience for me to come out here and play against great competition every single night. You’ve got to make adjustments, you’ve got to learn. I feel as a team, we’re doing a pretty good job of that.”
– JC
I have posted this one before but it’s just so great, it was time to dig it out again! (it feels a lot more personally familiar this time around.. LOL)
A year ago, Cedar Rapids Kernels starting pitcher Michael Cederoth was neither a Minnesota Twins prospect, nor was he a starting pitcher. But times change.
Cederoth was wrapping up his college career at San Diego State in May of 2014, looking forward to entering the June amateur player draft and getting his professional career started. The 6’ 6” tall pitcher spent his junior season as the team’s closer and his 20 saves tied the Aztecs’ school record.
A year later, he’s a starting pitcher in the Kernels’ rotation with a 1-2 record, a 3,75 ERA and 24 strikeouts in the same number of innings pitched over five starts. On Saturday, he threw six innings, giving up just two runs, in the Kernels’ 5-2 win over Beloit in the first game of their doubleheader sweep over the Beloit Snappers.
Cederoth was the Twins’ 2014 third round draft pick last June and soon after found himself in the starting rotation for the Twins’ rookie-level team in Elizabethton, Tennessee.
At San Diego State, Cederoth pitched for the late Tony Gwynn, who lost his battle with cancer last year. His face lights up when asked about playing for the Hall of Famer.
“Wow. I mean, imagine playing for any HOF baseball player. It’s something that every kid wants to be when they grow up and to have that as a coach at the college level is a great opportunity. I was blessed with the fact that he gave me the opportunity to play underneath him and I’ll never forget all the memories I got with him and playing underneath him.”
What can a pitcher learn from a guy who made his fame and fortune swinging a bat, rather than throwing the ball? Plenty, according to Cederoth.
“We definitely picked his brain. You’ve got one of the best hitters in baseball ever to play the game. Of course you’re going to want to know what’s in the hitter’s mind, so it really helps having that as a pitcher. Because we know what we’re doing out there – we want to know what (hitters) are thinking and he’s the best guy to ask.”
Cederoth had a reputation with scouts as being a hard-thrower (occasionally hitting 100 mph on the radar gun) who could be a fast riser with the right organization. One national prospects writer even projected him to have the potential to reach the big leagues as a bullpen arm by the end of 2015.
Instead, Cederoth is spending 2015 in the class A Midwest League with the Kernels as the Twins attempt to make a starting pitcher out of him.
And that’s just fine with Cederoth.
“He wants to do it,” Kernels pitching coach Henry Bonilla said, of Cederoth. “He definitely wants to be a starter. I think he enjoys the nuances that go with it. He has to prepare every day for that one day that he gets his day (to pitch).”
When you ask Cederoth, he makes it clear he’s dedicated to whatever role the Twins see as the best fit for him within the organization.
“Growing up, I’ve always been however I’m needed, that’s what I’m going to do,” he said.
“If they want me to be a starter, then I’m going to do my best to be a starter. If tomorrow they tell me they want me to be relief, then I’m going to do my best to be a reliever,” he added. “They’re giving me this opportunity so I’m going to show them, ‘OK, If you want me to be a starter, I’m going to try my best to be the best starter I can be.’”
It’s not like the starting pitcher role is totally foreign to Cederoth, after all.
Cederoth was a successful starting pitcher his first two years at San Diego State and converted to the bullpen for his final year on the Aztecs’ staff.
The Twins have made a practice, in recent years, of drafting strong-armed college relievers and giving them experience in a starting rotation, at least at the lower minor league levels.
Bonilla admitted that helping a pitcher make that transition isn’t always easy.
“It’s a problem if the kid doesn’t want to do it,” he said. “It’s a little harder when you try to make a guy a starter and he wants to be a 1-2 innings blowout kind of guy.”
Bonilla also provided some insight in to the organization’s thinking when they consider whether to try to turn a successful college reliever in to a professional starter.
“A lot of times you’ll see a guy and you’ll go, ‘ok, at worst, he’s going to be a reliever. Let’s see what we’ve got.’”
Bonilla thinks Cederoth definitely has the potential to make it as a starter because he not only has the high-velocity fastball in his arsenal, but is developing other quality pitches, as well.
“He’s got a mix (of pitches) to him. He can spin the ball. He’s got both the curveball and slider and with that velo, can he maintain it?”
And if, later, it turns out Cederoth returns to the bullpen, the effort has not been in vain, according to the pitching coach.
“The good thing about it, as a reliever he’ll get 1-2 innings of experience at a time. Here he’s getting 6 innings, 7 innings, 100 pitches at a time. It gets him out of his element. A lot of these guys, they’re comfortable doing one thing. When they’re uncomfortable, you see their true colors. So you’ll see him starting something new and he really has to adjust, you can see his mental capacity and what he really is.
“He (Cederoth) is doing a really good job of transferring to the starting position. It’s hard.”
For his part, Cederoth isn’t interested in even discussing any potential Plan B the organization might have.
“I really didn’t think about that,” he said. “I can’t think about that. They didn’t tell me that. Honestly, they told me they want me to be a starter and I’m really trying to be the best starter I can be. I’ve been working a lot and trying to hone my mechanics and my delivery.”
Having served in both roles in college, Cederoth is more prepared to make the switch than other college relievers who have seldom started a game above the high school level. He comes in to the process already aware of adjustments he has needed to make.
“A lot of it is routine, that’s really the similarity,” he explained. “But the difference is, what are the routines? So that is really what I had to transition with. I knew how to do a routine, I knew how to get in to a routine, but now it’s the routine as a starter.
“As a reliever, every day could be your day. So every day is kind of the same thing. As a starter, you have a routine. Every day is different, but it’s the same thing every week. The game you’re starting you throw 6 innings. The next day, what’s that day? And then the following day after that?
“As a reliever, you might have to pitch that day so you do everything you can to get ready to pitch that day. Did you pitch that day? Well you have to do the same thing the next day. If you pitched that day, well, you might have to pitch the next day. So, it’s the same thing every day. That’s really the physical part.”
There are differences in the mental approach, as well, according to Cederoth.
“As a reliever, your job is to come in there and get three, six, maybe nine outs. At most nine outs, hopefully. Because you want to throw the next day,” he explained.
“As a starter, you want to flip the lineup at least twice. It’s really a chess game. You’ve really got to plan out how you’re going to pitch. What did you give the guy his first at bat? What did he show you when you threw this pitch? You’ve got to keep that in the back of your head.
“It’s not just a bulldog mentality of go after him bang – bang – bang. You have to plan out what kind of game you’re going to go in to and what kind of hitters they have, unless you’re just gifted with the fact that you can just do the same thing over and over again and get guys out. If you’re on your game, then great, then you can do that. When you’re not always on your ‘A’ game, you’ve got to deal with what the day gives you.”
Tall pitchers, like Cederoth, often are challenged to develop consistent, repeatable deliveries and that’s something he’s working on with Bonilla this season. He’s also working to improve his secondary pitches.
“Curveball and change up right now. My curveball has come a long way,” Cederoth said, of the pitches he’s specifically working to integrate in to his game plans. “You’re facing guys twice. You go fastball – slider to one guy. Maybe the next time you face him, you throw a curveball at him. Completely change their whole game plan.”
Striking out batters has never been an issue for Cederoth and through five starts for the Kernels, he has averaged more than a strike out per inning. Ultimately, however, the ability to develop several effective pitches will likely determine whether Cederoth – or any starting pitcher – will have success in a big league rotation. He’s well aware of that.
“There’s some guys that can survive on just three pitches,” he said, adding, “I believe that I can get four good pitches. My change up is something that I’m really trying to get. If I can get that down, I can have more success getting early outs and dropping my pitch count. That’s been my problem, the pitch count. So getting that quick out, just getting a guy to roll over, is something I’m really trying to work on. Right now, it’s not totally ready, but it will be soon.”
Cederoth is also working on his mechanics with his pitching coach and he’s clearly pleased to be getting another opportunity to work with Bonilla, who had the same role for the Twins’ rookie level team at Elizabethton a year ago.
“Don’t get me wrong, I had amazing pitching coaches in college, but when I came to Elizabethton last year, I worked with Henry Bonilla. We had a great relationship in rookie ball.
“My problem has always been my balance in my drive leg. There’s so much going on in my wind up that it’s not always consistent. My body is leaning a different way every time instead of always going toward home. I’ve always had to try to adjust in mid pitch and that’s why I’ve been so inconsistent. So what we’ve focused on (is) the plant leg getting right and make sure everything is going towards home.
“So, yes, mechanically, I’m becoming a little more sound and I’m happy about it.”
– JC
You might not guess it just to look at him, as he patrols centerfield for the Cedar Rapids Kernels, but there’s a good chance that Tanner English is among the most athletic ballplayers on the roster.
Sure, he measures just 5’ 10” tall and is listed at just 160 pounds, but don’t let his size fool you. English has athletic skills.
For example, how many of his team mates do you think could do a standing back-flip in the middle of the field?
More to the point, how many do you think have actually DONE a standing back-flip in the middle of the field?
Now that he’s trying to earn a living playing ball, you might not see English repeating the feat, but, as this video proves, he has certainly demonstrated he’s capable of it.
Yes, you may have noticed that the back-flip wasn’t the only oddity in that video, from his time with the Harwich Mariners of the Cape Cod League in the summer of 2013. English also was the pitcher who recorded the final out of that game.
Neither pitching nor back-flips have been part of the 22-year-old’s repertoire since he signed with the Twins after being drafted in the 11th round last summer following a three year career at the University of South Carolina.
“No, the team we were playing that night in the Cape, that was their last game and we were going in to the playoffs,” English explained, while laughing. “Our bullpen was kind of spent and we had about a two-hour rain delay that night, so our coach was looking for people who could pitch. Me and another outfielder said, ‘hey, sign us up. We’ll do it.’ I just got up there for fun and threw some strikes.”
And the back-flip?
Again, the laugh, before the explanation from English.
“We were kind of messing around the whole game, playing rain-delay games and stuff. Then a whole bunch of the guys on the team bet me I wouldn’t do it (the back-flip). So I showed them that I would. I proved them wrong.”
English isn’t looking to make a name for himself as a pitcher – or a gymnast – at this point. Instead, he’s continuing to build his reputation on being a reliable center fielder who gets on base regularly and knows how to move along the basepaths once he does.
In fact, English is tied for the most stolen bases for the Kernels this season with seven swiped bases. He’s likely to pull in to the lead, too, since the player he’s tied with is Zach Granite, who was promoted to class high-A Fort Myers last week.
As for his skills in the field, English’s outfield defense has already landed him on ESPN’s “Top 10 Plays of the Day,” for the diving catch captured in this video:
“That was probably my number one goal, going to college,” he recalled. “’Man, I just want to get on ESPN’s Top 10 one time.’ I had a couple of opportunities to do that, so that was pretty cool.”
For some young players, playing in front of a few thousand people on a night that Cedar Rapids’ Veterans Memorial Stadium is packed is a new experience, but that’s nothing unusual for English.
South Carolina’s baseball program has been a big-time Division I program for years and English got to experience the thrill of playing in the finals of the 2012 College World Series with the Gamecocks as a freshman.
“That was probably one of the coolest experiences of my life,” English recalled, despite the fact that his club lost to Arizona in the finals. “Shoot, 30,000-plus fans at the game, everyone was going nuts. I know that every kid that plays college baseball, that’s their dream is to get there and I’m one of the rare few that can say that got to play there and play for a championship.”
With the promotion Granite to Fort Myers, English is likely to be the primary leadoff hitter for the Kernels. It’s a role he feels he’s ready for.
“I’ll hit wherever they want me to hit,” English said. But he’s aware his role is changing following Granite’s promotion and he’s working with Kernels hitting coach Tommy Watkins to be prepared to be the club’s table-setter at the top of the lineup.
“Really just trying to shorten things up, because I have a tendency to get a little bit long and try to hit the ball a lot further than I should, obviously, now as the leadoff hitter. That’s one of the big things I’ve been working on with Tommy and Jake (Mauer).”
Watkins believes English can handle the spot at the top of the Kernels’ batting order.
“Yeah, I think so. I’m a big fan of his. He’s got tools,” Watkins said, of English, over the weekend. “We’re trying to get him to trust himself – believe in his abilities. He can play baseball.”
“I think there is a difference when you lead off,” Watkins added, “but just talking to Tanner about slowing things down a little bit and not using his body as much. He’s been doing a good job with that. Hopefully, he just keeps getting better – keep progressing on cutting the body down and using his hands a lot more.”
English acknowledged that he and his fellow position players are going to need to step up their games if the Kernels are going to be successful. Early in the season, the club’s pitching has largely been carrying the bulk of the load on the field, while the offense has been sporadic.
English is confident the hitting will come around.
“We probably need to stop missing our pitch, as a team. We have great hitters on the team, but I don’t think we’re hitting to our fullest potential right now. We just need to get to a point where everyone’s in that groove and feeling comfortable and getting to where we can barrel everything up.
“I know that baseball is hard, but just kind of do a better job in certain situations.”
If he and the Kernels can do that, the Kernels’ chances of competing for a third straight Midwest League Championship will improve significantly, but don’t expect to see English doing any celebratory back-flips on the field.
Then again, don’t bet him that he won’t do it.
– JC
Ok, I KNOW I am not the only geek in these environs.. you know how I know? Because the Twins are running a pretty fantastic promo for those people who are able to join them in their battle against the dark.. er.. A’s.
Tonight they are handing out a “Hughes the Force” (‘use the force’, if you needed assistance) bobble head highlighting tonight’s starting pitcher, Phil Hughes, of course. Instead of their ‘first 10K people’ usual procedure, they set it up with special seating and a special ticket you had to purchase to be a recipient, and yeah, those tickets are all sold out so it must be a popular idea!
They are also inviting fans to come in their favorite Star Wars paraphernalia. BUT if your meme of choice is “Han shot first” please be aware they will not allow blasters in the park. Safety first. *snort*
Honestly, I think it all sounds like a BLAST. 😉 And for that matter, the bobblehead is actually pretty cool too. Game time is 7:10 pm!
Go Wild!
