Rochester Red Wings

In part 2 of my series on the Twins organization for the month of April i will be looking at the Rochester Red Wings. Rochester went 13-14 for the month of April and did some good things and some things they need to work on.

• Starting Pitching: The starting pitching has been as good as advertised leading the international league in team era with a 2.95 era. They were led by starters Brian Duensing who was 2-3 with a 2.75era and Kevin Mulvey who was 2-2 3.21era. The only negatives in the starting starting staff were Glen Perkins who walked 15 batters in only 28 innings of play and Philip Humber who has a 5.63 era and was recently sent to the bullpen. Overall the Starting pitching has been very good and should continue to be good the wildcard is Francisco Liriano as he trys to recover from Tommy John surgery and if he can get it going it will be a short stay for Rochester. Grade:B+

• Relief Pitching: The relief pitching has been very good also with a bullpen era of 2.78 as a team led by Bobby Korecky before he got recalled by the Twins and now Tim Lahey they have only given up 27 runs in 94 innings. The only disappointment has been Julio Depaula who has walked 12 batters in only 15 innings so far. They will be helped out by the imminent return of Korecky and the good left handed work of Gomez and Barrett. The bullpen of Rochester is something i have been really happy with and probably the strength of the team along with the starting staff. Grade:A-

• Hitting: This has been terrible this year there has been maybe 2 or 3 hitters that have actually done what you expected them to do and thats the problem with journeymen minor leaguers their in the minors for a reason. On the good side of things after a slow start Jason Pridie really did some good things hitting .311 for the month with 13rbi's and Darnell Mcdonald when he came off the DL was really good hitting .318 with 14rbi's. The disappointments are many but the biggest one was Jose Morales who many thought, myself include, was still a good prospect and he's only hitting .234 with only 5rbi's he needs to do better than that. Also Randy Ruiz had a good spring training and since then he has done nothing for Rochester hitting only .266 with 1hr. I guess i shouldnt be surprised in him because he is a journeyman but i was expecting more. Overall it was terrible hitting by the Red Wings only averaging 4.1 runs a game. I know the pitching has been good but they need to do better than that because it puts too much pressure on the pitching. Grade:D-

• Defense: Now this has been the ugly part of the team with 29 errors in only 27 games this far. Nobody has been spared from committing errors the worst have been Matt Macri with 8 and Alexi Casilla with 5. There is no excuse not to make the plays defensively because if any of them think they are going to make it to the majors they need to fix this or they won't make it guarantee. With the Twins you can by with not hitting much or not being too fast but you can't survive with making errors. Hopefully, its just an anomaly and will even out but right now its bad. Grade: F-

• Baserunning: The Red Wings have been decent running the bases with 22 stolen bases in 27 April games. They have alot of speed and have taken advantage of it led by Jason Pridie's 9 sb and Denard Span's 5. I think they should be running more with the speed they have. They are in most games so they have the ability to steal bases so they should steal 2 to 3 bases a game. Grade C

• Overall- The Red Wings have done some good things and some things that they need to work on to contend for a division title. They have pitched really good and need to continue that, but if they dont hit better it won't matter how good they pitch. I think they have some talented players but i would like to see them jettison the journeymen and give real prospects a chance to see what they can do at a higher level. Grade C

• Player of the Month: Jason Pridie- Jason got off to a really slow start but as the month went on he got better and better. For the Month Jason hit .311 with an obp of .443 which is really good. He hit 1 hr with 13 rbi's and stole 9 bases for the Red Wings. He was really solid for the month and the interesting thing is to see if he can keep it up for a whole season.

• Pitcher of the Month: Brian Duensing- Brian doesn't get the pub that the rest of the pitchers get but he is the most consistant. Brian went 2-3 with a 2.75era in 36 innings. He walked 6 and struck out 20. Brian is going to keep you in the game pretty much every start and give up 2 or 3 runs and you won't notice it until after the game. He has developed into the leader of the staff and i think will continue to give the Red Wings a chance to win.