Baseball in Fort Wayne

Posts Tagged ‘Angel Mercado’

The Fort Wayne TinCaps made some roster moves today, adding two highly touted prospects to the roster and moving two others. Outfielder, Jaff Decker and infielder Andy Parrino were added while outfielder Angel Mercado was promoted to high-A Lake Elsinore and infielder Kevin Hansen was transferred to extended Spring Training.

Decker was the the 2008 Arizona League MVP. He was the 42nd overall pick in the 2008 draft, selected by the San Diego Padres as a supplemental first round pick. With the AZL Padres, he hit .352 with 5 home runs and 34 RBIs in just 49 games. His .513 on-base percentage led all of Minor League Baseball. The 19-years-old prospect is rated the third top prospect in the Padres system according to Baseball America.

Parrino (left) returns to Fort Wayne, where he spent all of 2008 and was a Midwest League All-Star. The Brockport, NY native hit .275 before the All-Star break and finished the season with seven home runs. Parrino becomes the first switch hitter on the TinCaps roster and can play second base, shortstop or third base. He opened the 2009 season with Lake Elsinore, where he went 8-for-26 at the plate (.308) in seven games.

• Michael Cuddyer, the lone Twins player from the Wizards affiliation with Minnesota is likely done for the season after a line drive pegged him during a minor league rehab game. It’s unfortunately because he was expected to provide a boost to the Twin’s playoff run.
• Oliver Perez continues to befuddle and confuse. He’s always been assocated with unrealized potential, but Oliver Perez has become known as “Big Game Ollie” and seems to come up big when it counts. It just so happens that every game counts right now, and since June 29, Perez is 3-2 with a 1.71 ERA in eight starts. He’s also 7-0 with a 2.28 ERA in games against above-.500 teams.
• Wade LeBlanc and Kellen Kulbacki are the subjects of a rising star update at Friar Forecast.
• Angel Mercado hit the first home run of the Wizards’ season. He now leads the Northwest League in dingers while playing with Eugene. Alex Gabriel has a nice (subscriber only) for MadFriar’s profile of the slugger who is also near the top of the team in total bases and slugging percentage.
• Speaking of MaFriars, John Conniff has posted his interviews with Andy Parrino and Jackson Quezada.
• Wynn Pelzer and Kellen Kulbecki have been honored by the Padres organization as Pitcher and Player of the Month (hat tip to Friar John).
• Finally, Geoff from Ducksnorts spotlights Lake Elsinore; which includes many former Wizards.

• Former Wizard – the one who got away from the Padres – Joakim Soria finally showed signs of vulnerability. David Eckstein’s one-out single ended Soria’s streak of retiring 24 batters in a row. But he still has no ERA to accompany his six saves and 11 strikeouts.
• Matt Latos made his first start of the season for the Wizards and pitched very well. Some see him moving up to Lake Elsinore before the season is out. While I hope Latos pitches well (and I believe he will), I hope those folks are wrong.
• Wade LeBlanc picked up his first loss this year. He allowed seven earned runs on 10 hits and five walks over 3.1 innings. It was the worst outing of his career. It follows another bad start that saw him giving up six runs on eight hits. (hat tip to Denis Savage at MadFriars) Wonder what’s going on there. Speaking of LeBlanc, it appears that the Cubs had tried to get him in return for Matt Murton. As much as I would love to see Murton get a chance with a team willing to give him one, and as much as I would have loved to see LeBlanc with the Cubs, I don’t blame the Padres for turning that one down.
• Angel Mercado homered in his first game off the disabled list. Mercado had been out the last nine games but the hit extended his on-base streak to eight games. He also homered on Opening Night.
• It appears that Jake Peavy has pitched the idea of brining veteran outfielder, Kenny Loften, in to help shore up the Padres offense. But it seems that Padres’ GM, Kevin Towers would rather give some of the former Wizards now playing in Portland a shot.
  

  . . . some of the players Towers is most eager to promote would warrant demotion if judged solely on their Triple-A statistics. Chase Headley, the left fielder of tomorrow, is hitting a soft .236. Matt Antonelli, the heir to second base, has been hovering near the Mendoza line. Though Antonelli has drawn 12 walks in 16 games, his batting average is .212. Closest to a call-up, Towers said, is probably catcher Nick Hundley, who has hit four home runs in 11 games and whose arm would represent an improvement on Padres’ regular Josh Bard.

  “Hundley’s a guy I think our pitching staff felt fairly comfortable with in spring training,” Towers said. “He’s got a chance to be an offensive catcher and he’s somebody we feel comfortable enough to where we could put him back there (as much as 40 percent of the time) and not kill Bard.”

• Michael Cuddyer has returned to the Twins’ lineup.

Outfielder Danny Payne joined the Fort Wayne Wizards today while outfielder Angel Mercado has been sent the disabled list, the San Diego Padres announced prior to a six-game Wizards homestand.

Payne was selected by the Padres in the supplemental first round, 64th overall, of the 2007 draft out of Georgia Tech. He spent most of that season with the Eugene Emeralds, hitting .279 with eight doubles, three triples, 21 runs batted in, 17 stolen bases and a league-best 53 walks. Payne appeared in two games with the Wizards at the end of 2007.

Payne was a two-year starter at Georgia Tech, batting leadoff and starting in centerfield. He was a pre-season candidate for the Brooks Wallace Award, the college baseball player of the year and a pre-season second team All-America. In 2006, Payne was a member of the first-team All-ACC (Atlantic Coast Conference), leading the Yellow Jackets with a .356 batting average, along with 11 home runs, 14 doubles, 44 RBI and 20 stolen bases.

Mercado has appeared in 10 games, mainly as the designated hitter, hitting .250 with one double, one home run (which came on Opening Night) and has nine runs batted in.