A Critical Look at the Phillies Organization and Minor League Baseball
This is the interview I have looked forward to the most since I started this series. Given how many Reading games I watched and listened to this year, I have heard Mike Ventola’s voice more than any other baseball radio/TV person out there. Chris LaBarge wrote here this summer before starting his own site and … Read more
We jump out of order to go to Lehigh Valley before we wrap our series up with AA Reading. No Phillies affiliate has been as hard hit by the talent glut and subsequent rebuild as the IronPigs. They have been lucky the past few years to get a single good prospect (much like having Maikel … Read more
It was a weird year in Allentown. The team started with Maikel Franco and a lot of AAAA players. Its pitching staff was mostly patched together with guys whose best hope was getting a spot start for the Phillies to augment some pitchers with fringier stuff trying to find their way to major league debuts. … Read more
The first half version of the 2014 Clearwater Threshers was one of the worst teams assembled in affiliated baseball. They improved in the second half playing host to J.P. Crawford, Roman Quinn, and Aaron Nola. The 2015 squad was a much better team from day 1. The starting pitching had big promise early, but stumbled … Read more
For most fans, Florida remains a blind spot for prospects and development. It makes us reliant on people based out of Florida to really carry a large burden of reporting, and they do incredibly well. Today we have interviews with two of those people. The first is the voice of the Clearwater Threshers Kirsten Karbach, … Read more
Simple transaction line, J.P. Crawford has been replaced on the Glendale Desert Dogs roster by IF Drew Stankiewicz. All the reports have said that Crawford looks like himself, just a really exhausted form of himself. No reason was given for the switch, Drew is from the Arizona area so the switch to him makes some … Read more
Listening to baseball on the radio is something that will never really get old for me, it is the ultimate story time. You never going to scout a player by listening to the radio, but it will help fill in the details you are missing. For those telling the story they need to be on … Read more
In many ways Lakewood was the forgotten affiliate in 2015. It didn’t get much help to start from a 2014 draft devoid of high school players (though it did get 4th round pick Chris Oliver and 5th round pick Rhys Hoskins), and for the most part it was full of under the radar players. Those … Read more
No reason was given but the Phillies have replaced Dylan Cozens on the AFL roster with Aaron Brown. Cozens finished the year strong with Reading and was playing in the Florida Instructional League as recently as a few days ago. Like Cozens, Brown also missed time in the middle of the year while playing for … Read more
Throughout the season I am interacting with many people watching Phillies’ prospects everyday and this series was my way of bringing that to all of you. Mitch Rupert and Ian Catherine have been my go to people on the Williamsport Crosscutters everyone of the three years I have covered the system. They combine a near … Read more