9.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 2 BB (both intentional), 8 K vs. Nebraska.
Had a perfect game thru 6, gave up singles in the 7th and 9th. Game was tied 0-0, so leadoff hit in the bottom of the 9th led to sac bunt and then two intentional walks. But the two singles were the only damage off Cole.
For the season: 1.16 ERA, 23.1 IP, 11 H, 3 ER, 4 BB, 25 K
Cole's opposing pitcher was Jon Keller, who was an 11th-round pick by the Mariners in 2010, but turned them down. Keller was really good, too (6.0 IP, 0 R, 8 K, but 4 BB).
Here I've been writing about Cole for the last few weeks and I didn't even know until lunch time today that he was pitching just 50 miles from where I sit. Could have planned to go see him, but it was nasty cold anyway. Oh well.
UCLA ended up winning 1-0 in 11 innings.
=== Baker's 'Around The Blog-O-Sphere' ===
Geoffy has been dealing out the pub to us 'net rats pretty heavy. He can get like 8,000 viewers to his video notebook alone, so this is a little bit like the Atreides family passing literjons of water out the back door of the palace to the masses of Arrakis...
If you hit the actual video reel, as Baker discusses the day's net rat-tage, he opens with SSI's Paxton series and deadpans to his huge audience that "Clarke would trade eight Taijuan Walkers for one James Paxton. Remember, Walker was a first-round pick himself..."
Yeah, he was aware that my (very) little quip was tongue-in-cheek, but we see that he's not above giving some grief with the free pub...
I'll take it... :daps:
.................
If you're a bit of a holdout to the Baker Fan Club, ask yourself which other MSM guys have directed traffic over to the internet voices.
Ask yourself why they don't, and why Baker does.
..................
Also at the Bakery, he scores an interview with John Hart, who was the Cleveland GM during the glory days of Manny, Thome and Belle ...
He goes right to the same questions that you and I would ax.
- Would a GM be punting 2011 in Seattle? ("Depends on the owners.")
- Have the M's given themselves a shot this winter? ("Their moves were not impact moves.")
- Has Zduriencik revitalized the farm system? ("It's still lousy.")
- How long till the M's are good? ("As long as the owners allow you. It may not be for awhile.")
- Are Ackley and Pineda automatically in AAA because of service time? ("That doesn't weigh as heavily as you think.")
He could have asked stuff like, "Boy, isn't Eric Wedge well thought of?" ...
......................
Baker has been recommending that the M's keep perspective on the rebuild, which goes to the question of Pineda's Super Two status...
The MLB crew, Hart, Plesac & Co., raised and reraised Baker's judgment on that one. No chance this year, say they. Rebuild all the way.
.
Cheerio,
Jeff
Comments
Cole certainly seems to be stepping up as the top pitching prospect in the draft. The thing I might like the most is that his makeup/health/mechanics/history go completely unquestioned. I was automatically a fan already just due to the fact that he shot down the Yankees. If Rendon and Cole keep it up, the M's might actually prefer having the #2 pick; then they don't agonize over needing to choose. Don't want to jinx it, but the thought of a Big 3 of Felix/Cole/Pineda - all homegrown, all pitching at Safeco - could be historic.
...over Cole. Simply for the injury issue. It's closer because Rendon keeps breaking his leg and is at risk for problems later a la Ventura, but the odds of Cole throwing a pitch and never being effective again are just much higher.
That said, Cole is definitely putting his stamp on this college season thus far as a starter. We're not gonna be able to compare what he does against these new bats to what former #1 pitchers did in their draft seasons, but out of the gate he still looks like the cream of the crop.
He's a lifelong Yankees fan, but that just means I respect his decision to turn them down even more.
Article on the story of that (where he didn't even let the Yankees give him an offer or tell him what ballpark figure they were looking at):
http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/baseball/news?slug=sh-coleucla062710
Right now, I'd say Cole's our guy if we're handicapping the pick. I like Purke, but his motion is...interesting. I could be very, VERY happy with Purke, but he's looking at Cole's tail-lights right now in this race.
The fun part for me is what happens if the Pirates decide NOT to move Pedro Alvarez off 3B and go instead for the ready-in-3-months Gerrit Cole as their #1 selection. Both Cole and Rendon are repped by Boras, so none of us gets a break either way there. Purke isn't, but he's gotta climb over a couple of potential guys first before we worry about that.
Cole, Rendon, Purke or Starling. We have good choices, and I'm glad for it. Still, maybe Cole keeps putting in the kind of year that makes it not a choice at all.
Go, Gerrit, go...
~G
I was automatically a fan already just due to the fact that he shot down the Yankees.
... similar to one of my big reasons for being so fond of Bedard.
Good to see that you're raising and re-raising on Pineda. If he scorches the Arizona earth and is in the rotation, where are you taking him among AL starters? I might go in the 12-18 range.
All the M's need is for -ANY- college player (aside from Rendon, of course) to do a Secretariat on the rest of the field. As was the case with Ackley.
If Cole jells, fine ... if not, we just need for SOMEbody to jell. "The Field" with this pick is pretty tasty.
Dr. D, are you aware of the damage Dylan Unsworth did in his first round of pro ball? In 50 innings, he had 44 strikeouts and only ONE walk. And he was only 17. Yet he wasn't mentioned in Churchill's Top 30. How is that possible? I'm sure Churchill would respond by saying that he has underwhelming velocity or whatever, but there are tons and tons of mediocre pitchers of all ages who pass through the minors and they don't put up those kinds of video game numbers. Is there really any way that he isn't a serious prospect? I can't imagine there being 30 players better than him in the M's system alone.
...he's 17...which means he's got about 8 years of young arm injury risk to plow through. At least three of which will be in the minors if the Mariners are as careful as they've been with other minor league arms. I think he's under the radar because he's so far away from making an impact.
The walks are microscopic, but in order to keep them low he's getting hit around. 73 base runners in 50.1 IP in Rookie League is not good enough to achieve top prospect status on stats alone. Carlos Silva had some years where he didn't walk anyone at the MLB level, but that didn't make him a top SP. Certainly nice to have as many 'interesting' minor leaguers (like Unsworth) as we can in our system, but at this point he's not someone on the radar.
Actually...he kind of reminds me of Doug Fister. I bet Sandy would have a few words to say about hit H/9 in low A ball.
If he only walked one guy, that means every single pitch was in the strikezone so it's not surprising he was giving up hits. Even Felix is hittable if he challenges too much, as Dr. D has pointed out. However, even with all the hits he only gave up ONE home run (in stark contrast to the results Felix got with that approach) and struck out over 20% of the batters faced. That suggest he's got some quality stuff. It certainly seems to me he should be in the top 30 M's prospects.
Churchill would have no problem ranking a teenager highly, and in fact has done so with Taijuan Walker who is a similiar age as Unsworth.
...with kids who have gigantic physical ability. Unsworth isn't one of those.