Apologies for going incommunicado on you. Between not having Internet access at home and spending most of my waking hours building and fixing other people’s web sites, finding time to update my own site has been tricky of late. So while I have a moment let’s see if we can catch up on some things.

USDHS alum Mark Prior made his big-league debut for the Cubs last week and pitched great. Doesn’t look like he’s headed back to the minors anytime soon.

Oakland traded hitting machine Jeremy Giambi to Philly for bench jockey John Mabry. This sure looks to me like a terrible trade for Billy Beane and the A’s, but there is another possibility, and that is that Giambi isn’t as good as a lot of us — statheads in particular — think he is. Beane’s got a good track record, so I’m not prepared to rip him just yet. I will say that on the surface it looks horrible. We’ll see.

In Padre news, lefty Oliver Perez was promoted to Double-A Mobile, where he proceeded to dismantle the Birmingham squad in his debut this past Tuesday. He worked six scoreless innings, allowing just two hits, striking out seven and walking three.

Pedro De Los Santos, who had been hitting .259/.326/.333 at Lake Elsinore while playing second base, third base, and the outfield, returned to the Midwest League. In nine games at Ft. Wayne, playing the outfield, he’s hitting .323/.447/.452 with nine steals in as many attempts. De Los Santos is an exciting player to watch and figures to be among the Pads’ Top 15 prospects next year.

Right-hander Justin Germano continues to excel at Ft. Wayne. I have to think he’ll be up at Elsinore before too long. Another guy making some noise in the Midwest League is lefty Cory Stewart. Another of Kevin Towers’ indy league refugees, Stewart is dominating hitters, having allowed just 23 hits in 32 2/3 innings while registering 59 punchouts. At age 22, he’s not particularly old. Right-hander Blair DeHart, a year older, sports a 1.99 ERA over 22 2/3 innings. Even more impressive are the 30 strikeouts against zero walks. Neither of these guys has near the upside of Germano, but they’re worth keeping an eye on.

USD alumni Greg Sain, still mostly DHing, is hitting .282/.342/.423. With Xavier Nady moving up to Portland any day now, might Sain move up a level to Elsinore?

Speaking of Nady, his elbow still isn’t quite right, although you’d never know it from his .278/.382/.580 numbers. Two guys going in opposite directions at Elsinore are Tagg Bozied and Jake Gautreau. Bozied, who started the year on fire, has cooled off significantly. He’s still hitting .299/.392/.561, and some scouts think he’s a better hitter than Nady. Gautreau, meantime, has come on very strong after a slow start. After a huge game last night against Rancho Cucamonga, he’s now hitting .322/.366/.463. He still needs to draw more walks.

Also at Elsinore, signs of life from lefty Mark Phillips. Thursday night he allowed just one hit in a start for the third time this season. This time, though, he lasted more than five innings and walked fewer than seven batters. Perhaps the previous outing, his worst of the year, served as a wakeup call. Hopefully this is the start of bigger and better things from the immensely talented but inconsistent young southpaw.

Righty Ben Howard moved up from Mobile to Triple-A Portland this week. Howard, up with the big club earlier in the month, battled his control in his first start at Tucson, allowing six runs on eight hits and four walks, with just one strikeout this past Tuesday.

Finally, lefty Kevin Pickford, called up last week, makes his first big-league start tonight at Milwaukee. He’s taking Bobby Jones’ turn in the rotation. Kevin Jarvis, meanwhile, isn’t expected back anytime soon, which means that Dennis Tankersley may stick around a while.

That’s it for now. With luck, I’ll be able to get back onto a more regular schedule. Thanks for your patience…