Results tagged ‘ Starlin Castro ’
1/10 Winter league update & roster moves
Cubs prospect Junior Lake was 0-for-3 in Estrellas’ 11-3 loss to Aguilas on Wednesday in the Dominican round-robin playoffs. Estrellas is now 2-9, and faces the Toros (6-5) on Thursday. Also, there was a report on Thursday that Cubs shortstop Starlin Castro plans to play for Escogido, but does need to get permission from the Cubs front office. Escogido is 7-4 and tied with Aguilas for first in the round-robin playoffs.
* Luis Valbuena was 2-for-4 in Lara’s 7-1 loss to Zulia on Wednesday in Venezuela winter league playoffs. On Tuesday, Valbuena hit a three-run double and scored twice in an eight-run seventh inning rally in an 8-5 win.
Roster moves:
* The Rockies signed right-hander Manuel Corpas to a Minor League deal with an invite to big league camp. He was the Rockies closer in 2007. Last year, Corpas made 48 appearances for the Cubs, but was a free agent at the end of the season after refusing an outright assignment to the Minor Leagues.
* Kosuke Fukudome will play in Japan again. He has signed a three-year deal believed to be worth $5.5 million with the Hanshin Tigers. Fukudome, 35, batted .171 in 51 plate appearances with the White Sox last season before he was released. He posted a career .258/.359/.395 numbers at the big league level with the Cubs, Indians and White Sox.
* In case you missed it, pitcher Randy Wells has signed a Minor League deal with the Rangers, and pitcher Justin Berg has signed with the Rockies.
– Carrie Muskat
1/6 Checking in with Theo
Theo Epstein tells the Boston Globe that the Cubs have made progress from one year ago. “We’re certainly farther along than we were last year at this time,” Epstein told the Globe. “When we got here [in late 2011], we identified one core player [Starlin Castro] and now we can look around and see Anthony Rizzo, Darwin Barney, Jeff Samardzija and others. We do have more positional prospects than pitchers, so we felt [Edwin] Jackson will be with us for many years to come.”
Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe also says if Matt Garza shows teams that he’s healthy in Spring Training, the Cubs will consider offers for the right-hander. However, Cafardo says it’s hard to read the Cubs’ intentions, especially after the Jackson signing.
On Jan. 11-12, Epstein’s Foundation to be Named Later will host the “Hot Stove Cool Music” weekend, which includes a roundtable discussion on Jan. 11 at Fenway Park. This year’s topic is “Changing a Culture in Baseball” and will feature Epstein, Orioles manager Buck Showalter, Red Sox GM Ben Cherington, Red Sox manager John Farrell, and others.
On Jan. 12, there will be a concert at the Paradise Rock Club in Boston, featuring the Hot Stove All-Stars, the Parkington Sisters, Christian McNeill & Sea Monsters, Chad Hollister Band, and Reigning Monarchs. All proceeds go to the non-profit partners as well as scholarships, which send high-need, high potential young people to college.
Epstein and Hall of Fame baseball writer Peter Gammons founded the Hot Stove, Cool Music event, which began in 2000.
– Carrie Muskat
12/31 One more look back at 2012
* Feb. 21 in Mesa, Ariz. It was one of the strangest transactions in Cubs history as pitcher Chris Carpenter said goodbye to his teammates after he found out he was going to the Red Sox as the player to be named as compensation for Theo Epstein. Said Carpenter: “I guess my name will go down in history.”
* Feb. 24 in Mesa, Ariz. On the first day Starlin Castro worked out at Fitch Park, manager Dale Sveum was standing near the shortstop, offering some tips on defense. Sveum didn’t let up all season. Castro did commit 27 errors, but also showed improvement in the field.
* March 18 in Las Vegas prior to game vs. Rangers. Infielder Adrian Cardenas is as passionate about playing baseball as he is about working on his degree at New York University. Cardenas wants to write a novel about his parents and how they came to the U.S. from Cuba. He was most likely the only player in Spring Training who read three Albert Camus books in a two-week period. Said Cardenas: “I’m a better baseball player because of it.”
* April 27 in Des Moines. I talked to Brett Jackson, Josh Vitters and Anthony Rizzo, who were on Triple-A Iowa roster, and could hear their enthusiasm in their voices, see their work ethic, and feel the energy.
* May 18 at Wrigley Field. Rumors were flying pre-game that this would be Kerry Wood’s last game. It couldn’t have been scripted any better. The right-hander threw three pitches, all strikes, for his final strikeout, then walked off the field and was greeted by his son, Justin. Wood didn’t disappear. His Wood Family Foundation was active, and treated students at Nash Elementary School on Chicago’s west side to coats, gloves, hats and gifts as well as a visit from Santa in December. It was a pleasure to cover Wood’s career from start to finish.
* June 26 at Wrigley Field. Anthony Rizzo is promoted from Iowa, and gets two hits in his Cubs debut, including a tie-breaking RBI double, in a victory over the Mets. Four days later, Rizzo hits his first home run for the Cubs, a go-ahead two-run shot, in a 3-2 victory over the Astros. On July 29, Rizzo notched a personal milestone, hitting his first walk-off home run in a 10-inning win over the Cardinals. Said Alfonso Soriano on Rizzo’s impact: “He’s changed everything.”
* July 4 in Atlanta. Cubs pitching coach Chris Bosio reveals he has a deal with closer Carlos Marmol. The pitcher is not allowed to shake off his catcher on any pitch, and if he does, Marmol owes Bosio a case of wine. Marmol compiles a 1.52 ERA in the second half.
* July 22 at St. Louis. Dale Sveum asked his starting lineup to click their heels as they took the field in a tribute to Ron Santo, who was inducted posthumously into the Hall of Fame that day in Cooperstown. It was a terrific moment — and repeated at Wrigley Field on July 27 when the Cubs returned home.
* July 23 in St. Louis. It was Super Hero day, and players, coaches and Sveum dressed up as their favorites. Best costume? Jeff Baker and Reed Johnson as Epstein and Jed Hoyer, complete with cell phones to their ears.
* Aug. 5 in Los Angeles. Jackson and Vitters are promoted from Triple-A Iowa. Both struggled at the plate, but Jackson showed his value in the field Sept. 7 with an amazing catch then crash into the center field wall at PNC Park.
* Aug. 18 in Appleton, Wis. I watched Cuban outfielder Jorge Soler go 4-for-5 for Class A Peoria. He hit two singles, a double, and a very impressive home run to straight away center, drove in two runs, and stole a base. Can’t wait until he’s in right field at Wrigley.
* Sept. 8 at PNC Park, Pittsburgh. This was Jeff Samardzija’s last start of the season, and it showed how far he’s come. The right-hander gave up four hits in his first complete game, striking out nine. He could be the Opening Day starter in 2013.
* Oct. 3 at Wrigley Field. Bryan LaHair delivers a walkoff RBI single for a 5-4 win over the Astros in the Cubs’ season finale. It was a roller coaster ride for LaHair, who went from starting first baseman to All-Star to reserve. During batting practice on one road trip, a fan yelled congratulations to LaHair for making the All-Star team. Said LaHair: “No one can take that away from me.”
* Oct. 6 at Mesa, Ariz. I went to Instructional League to watch the young Cubs play, but this time was different. There was more energy, more noise — players and coaches picked their favorite song and it was part of batting practice background music — and lots of work. Watching the enthusiastic kids gives one optimism for the future.
* Sadly, said goodbye to Cubs Minor League pitching coach Tom Pratt and Wrigley Field umpire clubhouse attendant Jimmy Farrell. RIP.
– Carrie Muskat
12/4 Sveum on Jackson, Castro & more
Cubs manager Dale Sveum met with the media on Tuesday at the Winter Meetings. Here are some highlights from his session:
* Brett Jackson spent time with Sveum and the Cubs hitting coaches in Mesa. Jackson apparently made “huge, huge strides” and has completely overhauled his swing. Sveum said the young outfielder could be in the mix in 2013.
“I think he’s got a good base to work with going into the rest of the winter and going into Spring Training to understand the art of hitting, so to speak,” Sveum said. “Sometimes it gets lost and taught the wrong way.”
* Darwin Barney also spent time with Sveum in Mesa. The second baseman didn’t have to make huge, drastic swing changes, but the coaches did emphasize driving the ball.
“I think his on-base percentage will gradually get better with experience,” Sveum said. “We all know the glove he has but we have to get that OPS up and he knows that.”
* Sveum was happy Bryan LaHair signed with a Japanese team.
“He had a nice first half for us and it was kind of a unique situation that doesn’t happen every year that a guy makes the All-Star team and basically doesn’t play much the second half of the season, especially after [Anthony] Rizzo got there,” Sveum said. “It wasn’t going to be a super good fit in the outfield because of the speed factor. We want to be more athletic in the outfield. obviously, you’ll miss that kind of bat. I think he made some adjustments the last month of the season to where it’s going to help him. I’m glad he’s going over there, get some money and play, and hopefully has a nice career.”
* Starlin Castro still has work to do.
“The biggest thing with him is we know the talent, we know the ability, the 200 hits,” Sveum said. “We saw huge strides defensively. … What I want to see out of him is keep progressing mentally and understand the process of becoming a winning player and not a hit seeker. [We want him to become] more of a winning hitter, situations, drive runs in, understand the situations. Defensively, I think he came a long way but still has to concentrate more. I think we got him, just throwing a number out there, [concentrating] probably 80 to 85 percent of the time. We’ve got to get that to that 95 percent. I don’t think anybody ever focuses 100 percent — I think you’d be lying if you said that. He took a lot of pride in that and got much better for a 22-year-old kid.”
* The Cubs were happy to add Dioner Navarro as a backup catcher. Said Sveum: “He’s still a young catcher. He switch hits, gives you good at-bats. He’s probably the best backup catcher available out there.”
* Matt Garza, sidelined after 18 starts with a right elbow injury, is on his regular offseason schedule, and should be ready to go in Spring Training. He was expected to start throwing by Christmas.
* Does Sveum expect the team to have a better record in 2013?
“When you lose 100 games, you better go into it with a little more optimism,” he said.
– Carrie Muskat
10/23 Happy anniversary
Over the weekend, Theo Epstein and his young son Jack walked around Wrigley Field, and saw how the ivy on the outfield wall had changed colors from deep summer green to autumn’s reds and golds.
“It just flashed to how great it would be to be playing baseball at this time of year at Wrigley,” Epstein said Tuesday. “That’s the goal to get there and to get there in a way that allows us to do it year in and year out.”
Friday marks the one-year anniversary of when Epstein took over as the Cubs’ president of baseball operations. He didn’t plan on celebrating — the Cubs did lose 101 games in his first year at the helm — and said he was enthused by what’s transpired so far.
“I have a lot more gray hair now than I did a year ago — my wife reminds me of that all the time,” Epstein said. “I do feel really energized by a lot of the things that are going on here.”
One year ago, Epstein felt the Cubs had one player who projected as part of the core they’re trying to develop and that was shortstop Starlin Castro. Today, he feels there are at least half a dozen in the organization, including pitcher Jeff Samardzija, first baseman Anthony Rizzo, and prospects Javier Baez, Albert Almora and Jorge Soler.
What also was encouraging was watching future Cubs players in Instructional League in Arizona.
“That was a really nice feeling to be down there and see a lot of dedicated Cubs baseball [operations] personnel, some new, some old, all buying into the collective ‘Cubs way’ of doing things that they helped define, impacting a really talented group of young players,” Epstein said.
“I also wake up every day and recognize we lost 101 games and understand how painful that was for everybody, including me, and that provides further motivation to get out of this position that we’re in,” he said. “I think there were a lot of positives. That core, at least in my mind, went from one player to half a dozen, and if we can do that again in 2013, and we look up and we have close to a dozen players in our core, I’ll feel great about the overall health of the organization. I also want to make the playoffs and I understand that’s a big challenge, so I hope we hit on a few guys this winter and get off to a good start and we have one of those unexpected seasons.”
– Carrie Muskat
10/3 Cubs Ironman
Starlin Castro today will become the first player in Cubs history to play at shortstop in all 162 games in a season. The previous single-season mark was 160 games, set by Ivan DeJesus in both 1978 and 1979. This also will be Castro’s 161st start at shortstop, which is a franchise record. DeJesus (1978) and Don Kessinger (1968) shared the previous mark of 158 starts at shortstop in a season.
Castro will become the first Cubs infielder to appear in all 162 games in a season since Hall of Famer Ron Santo did so in 1968.
Only three players in the big leagues have played 162 games at shortstop during the last 10 seasons: Baltimore’s Miguel Tejada (2003 and 2004), Montreal’s Orlando Cabrera (2003) and Philadelphia’s Jimmy Rollins (2007).
With Wednesday’s game, Elias Sports Bureau says Castro will have played in 195-consecutive games, the longest active streak in the National League and the second-longest active run in all of baseball trailing only Detroit’s Prince Fielder (342 entering today).
– Carrie Muskat
10/2 One more to go
The Cubs appear to have shutdown the offense for the season. They were shutout Tuesday for the second straight game, the first time they’ve been blanked in back to back games since July 21-22 at St. Louis. They’ve lost 29 straight games when scoring three runs or less, dating to a 3-2 win against the Cardinals on July 28. They’d like to end with at least one more “W.”
“Whenever you go into the winter when you finish good as a starter, whether you’re swinging the bat really well, you have a lot better winter, you sleep a lot better,” Dale Sveum said. “It makes a big difference how you finish.”
This was the first meeting between two teams with 100 losses since Sept. 30, 1962, when the Cubs and Mets squared off in the season finale at Wrigley Field. The Cubs won, 5-1, and closed the year, 59-103. That was the Mets’ first season, and they finished 40-120. Chicago and Houston close the 2012 campaign on Wednesday.
On Monday, the Cubs managed two hits. On Tuesday, they mustered four, and went 0-for-7 with runners in scoring position.
“Deja vu [from] last night,” Sveum said. “Not a lot of good at-bats, not a lot of quality at-bats again and left some guys, striking out with guys in scoring position. It kind of typifies the whole season these last two nights, swinging the bats.”
Sveum will shake up his lineup for Wednesday’s finale, and use the reserves. Expect Starlin Castro to start at shortstop, which would be Game No. 162 for him, but Adrian Cardenas, for example, will start at second.
“For the most part, the season didn’t go very well, obviously, but a lot of these guys deserve to kick back,” Sveum said of his regulars. “Just let them sit back and watch a game for once. I asked [Alfonso Soriano] if he wanted 110 RBIs or whatever, and he said, ‘No, I’m fine.’”
One more to go.
– Carrie Muskat
10/1 Castro’s hot streak
Starlin Castro will tie the single-season franchise mark of 160 games played at shortstop with his start Monday night. The mark was set by Ivan DeJesus in both 1978 and 1979. Monday’s game will mark Castro’s 159th start at shortstop this year, surpassing the single-season franchise mark of 158 starts at shortstop set by DeJesus (1978) and Don Kessinger (1968). Castro aims to become the first player in franchise history to play in all 162 games at shortstop.
Castro looks to become the first Cubs infielder to make at least 161 starts at a single position since Bill Buckner at first base in 1982. The last Cubs infielder to appear in all 162 games was Hall of Famer Ron Santo in 1968.
Only three players in the big leagues have played 162 games at shortstop during the last 10 seasons: Baltimore’s Miguel Tejada (2003 and 2004), Montreal’s Orlando Cabrera (2003) and Philadelphia’s Jimmy Rollins (2007).
According to Elias Sports Bureau, Castro enters the game having appeared in 193-consecutive games, the longest active streak in the NL and the second-longest active run in all of baseball, trailing only Detroit’s Prince Fielder (340 entering Monday’s action).
9/27 Extra bases
As of Thursday, Starlin Castro has played in all 156 of the Cubs games this season. Manager Dale Sveum doesn’t plan on giving his shortstop a day off.
“That’s what you want,” Sveum said of Castro’s durability. “When you get to a point and you have young players capable of doing it health wise, you want them to play every day.”
Castro has set career highs with 12 triples and 25 stolen bases, and is the only player in the Major Leagues with at least 10 home runs, 10 triples, 25 stolen bases and 75 RBIs. He’s the first player to do so in the National League since Jimmy Rollins in 2007. Since Castro’s debut in May 2010, he leads all NL players in hits.
But Sveum wants Castro to get better, especially on his defense. Among the things he’d like the shortstop to work on is to not rely on his arm so much. Sveum likes to call such infielders “grass huggers” because they don’t want to leave the grass, their arms are so strong.
* In his 30 years in the game, Sveum had not seen a baserunner get thrown out at third trying to advance on a sacrifice fly to left, but the Cubs have made the gaffe twice in two weeks. Joe Mather did so Wednesday.
“If you brought it up in a group session, there would be a lot of eyes rolled, but unfortunately, it’s been a reality the last couple weeks,” Sveum said. “It’s almost a learning tool — it’s like, all right, don’t be rolling your eyes, this actually happened the last two weeks.”
* Travis Wood will open the Cubs series on Friday at Arizona, and said he’s ignoring his record, and focusing on what he’s learned this season.
“Forget the numbers,” said Wood, who is 6-12 with a 4.23 ERA. “The experience is the key part. Everybody tries to finish strong, and you want to take that into the offseason and get ready for the next season.”
– Carrie Muskat
9/20 Extra bases
* Jason Berken can’t help but keep tabs on his buddies with the Orioles. The right-hander, whom the Cubs claimed off waivers on Sept. 7, came up with the O’s, who are battling for a playoff spot.
“I’ve got a lot of good friends on that team and they deserve everything they get,” Berken said. “It’s a great city, great organization. I don’t think anybody is surprised, including myself. I’m very happy to be here. I want to take advantage of it as much as I can. I’m thrilled to be a Cub. It means a lot to be here. The opportunity I’m getting is appreciated. I have to do my part and pitch well and give us a chance to win.”
* Starlin Castro leads all NL players with 517 hits since his Major League debut May 7, 2010. On Thursday, Castro tripled, and is now the sixth Cubs player to total at least a dozen triples in a single season in the last 50 years. He’s the first to do so since Juan Pierre hit 13 triples in 2006.
* Anthony Rizzo posted his 26th multi-hit game of the season and second in as many days.
* The Cubs have lost 23 consecutive games when scoring three runs or less dating to their 3-2 win against the Cardinals on July 28.
* Thursday’s crowd of 25,891 was the smallest of the year at Wrigley Field.
– Carrie Muskat
mlblogsmuskat1
Recent Comments