Dugout Dirt 2051.3

[jjw]

The Jacksonville Hurricanes felt the sharp jostle of reality -- to steal historian E P Thompson's phrase -- this past week, going 3-3 after a startling 10-2 start, and also losing 2 out of the 3 one-run games after going 6-0 in such games the first two weeks (yet still averaging 3 one-run games per week, or 50% of their games, which seems quite out of the ordinary). But it's still early days. Three weeks of play do not a season make, nor even a decent sample. We'll have to wait at least until, say, week 8 or 9 to have enough games for reasonable extrapolations.

The Canes also lost one of their best hitters so far, left fielder Júlio Uribe (slashing 327/362/509 with 9 RBIs in 16 games), to a back injury. Uribe's herniated disk will take an estimated 5 weeks to heal sufficiently to get him back on the field. However, there are rumors that Jacksonville might be putting Uribe on the trade market due to not having a suitable replacement on their present roster or in their farm system; they're looking, then, for an experienced outfielder (with hopefully more power) whose defense won't be a liability. And the rumor mill also has it that Charlotte's Pedro Huerta might be just the guy that fits the bill.

Uribe's injury certainly did not help the club in week 3, but the 3 losses are mostly attributable to the bullpen coming back to earth after some over the top relief work in weeks 1 and 2. Closer Alejandro Chávez continues to excel, having not yet given up an earned run after 7.1 innings of work, but Seung-cheol Kim had two shaky outings, getting the loss for one of them, Todd Shroeder gave up 5 runs in one inning in a 9-2 loss to Rockland (also ending up with a blown save there), and starting pitcher and otherwise designated-hitter Peter Dean was knocking around in his one start against Montreal (although reliever Juan García got the loss in the 6-5 defeat, and Dean continues to hit fairly well, slashing 333/375/433 to date). On the plus side, the team finished the week strong, blowing out Montreal by 11-4 and 14-4 scores.