Easy choices at the end of Spring
For once there wasn’t much agonising over the last few spots on the 25-man roster, it fact only one spot went down to how had options left. We were helped no doubt by two of the ones that almost certainly have got roster spots on the IL. Mike England will be out until early May with a fractured cheekbone and it will probably be early to mid-June before Chris Sackett is recovered from his shoulder inflammation.
Phil Cole’s first ever pro spring training justified all the hype about last year’s number one overall pick. Five starts he had made, and he was one batter short of pitching the full 20 innings. Only in his first ever BBA level start did he throw over 50 pitches and without the five hits and four runs Montreal managed off his final spring innings his ERA would have been around the 0.50 mark. His 15/3 K/BB augers well too. Ironically Cole was the only 2046 rotation arm to be tagged with a loss in spring training arm and at a 2.29 spring ERA he had two other starters with an ERA below 2.00.
Gerald Sizemore, last year’s rookie ace will take the #2 spot, posted a 2-0 record but won’t be happy with his seven walks allowed in 14 IP. Ramon Guerrero, he of the 5-19 record in 2045 will be the #3 batter, he got tagged by Calgary earlier on in spring for five runs in 0.2 innings but only allowed two more runs all spring and had an 11/2 K/BB ratio. Jose Montoya who had eight wins in 2045 (that’s good for El Paso) will take the #4 spot in the rotation, he was rather let down by his eight walks allowed and only one strikeout. He didn’t allow a run in his four relief appearances so maybe that’s a way to go if we can fill up the rotation without him? There were a few candidates for the last spot, but in the end Sumitomo Takahashi grabbed it, he was tagged for five runs also early on but kept it tight after that for the rest of his spring outings. Jorge Garcia had a rough rookie year in 2045 and that probably sent him to the long man role despite seemingly improving this spring and Josh Hayworth narrowly lost out and will lead Albuquerque’s rotation instead.
The one spot where the options came into play was in the bullpen where Mike Allain was out of options, after only allowing two runs and two walks in 10 outings we felt he wouldn’t pass through waivers. So, it ended up with Chase Walter heading for Albuquerque instead where he with try his hand in the rotation. The three at the back of the rotation, Reynold Voermans, Augusto Ramirez and the returning Tony Alomar should be a good combination that will save more than a few games for El Paso. Adrian Garcia at 36-yrs-old will be back to add to his 802 career BBA innings pitched while at the other end of his career, 27-yr-old Bill Gaston will be looking to make his BBA debut after EL Paso selected him from Rockville in the Rule 5 draft. Our other pitching Rule 5 selection, Gurmu Icharia, didn’t quite make the cut. He didn’t have that great a spring and at 34-yrs-old we felt it wasn’t worth taking a punt on him.