Before we get to the minor leagues, a few ruminations on the weekend’s activities at Petco:

• Jake Peavy spun a masterpiece on Saturday. Bugs and Cranks thinks he may be doctoring the baseball. With any luck, word will get back to opposing hitters, and they can have one more thing on their minds when they step in against Peavy.
• In that same game, Josh Bard made a terrific sliding catch on a pop foul near the Dodgers dugout. Unfortunately the slide took him partially into the dugout, invoking the horribly misguided Rule 7.04(c):
  

  If a fielder, after having made a legal catch, should fall into a stand or among spectators or into the dugout or any other out-of-play area while in possession of the ball after making a legal catch, or fall while in the dugout after making a legal catch, the ball is dead and each runner shall advance one base, without liability to be put out, from his last legally touched base at the time the fielder fell into, or in, such out-of-play area.

  So, yeah, Bard’s catch allowed Rafael Furcal to trot home from third base and score the Dodgers’ only run of the afternoon. It also resulted in Bard’s being charged with an error (because you have to justify Furcal’s advancement somehow). In other words, Bard’s mistake was in catching the baseball. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe fielders typically are encouraged to catch the baseball.

  The rule makers need to go back and fix this one. Now would be good.

• Did you see Chris Young pick off James Loney in the sixth inning on Sunday? Young did a great job of varying his move to first and caught Loney wandering off a little too far. Young was working on his move in spring training and it appears to be paying dividends. Still, he’s not going to shift his focus from the hitter to the baserunners. Quoth Young in a snippet aired during Sunday’s telecast:
  

  I’m just trying to be a little bit quicker to the plate without sacrificing the quality of my pitches. It’s obviously an area of my game [where] there’s room for improvement, but at no point will you ever see me sacrificing the quality of my pitch to the hitter for that runner on first base… Guys are going to steal, it’s just part of the game. I’ll take my chances getting the hitter out and leaving that runner out there on second base.

• Finally, a 4-3 homestand isn’t bad, but the Padres easily could have finished 6-1. Some sloppy work on the bases early came back to haunt the Padres in Sunday’s finale against the Dodgers. Also, Scott Hairston smoked a ball right at Furcal to end a threat in the eighth; if Hairston hits the ball 6 inches higher, the Padres take a 3-2 lead. But again, it never should have come to that.

Okay, that took a little longer than I’d expected it would. To the minor leagues…

Triple-A — Fresno 9, Portland 1

Matt Antonelli: 0-for-2, BB, HBP, E
Chase Headley (LF): 0-for-4
Nick Hundley: 1-for-3, BB, E
Will Venable (CF): 1-for-4
Cesar Ramos: 2.2 IP, 3 H, 4 R, 1 HR, 4 BB, 4 SO (85 pitches)
Kevin Cameron: 2.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 HR, 0 BB, 2 SO

The homer Ramos served up was to ex-Padre Justin Leone.

Rain Delay was at the game and offers these bullet points:

• Cesar Ramos started for the Beavers. Horrible command, long at-bats were his undoing. Oh and throw in a 30-minute rain delay… he just looked lost out there at times. Not to mention he doesn’t have anything you’d call an out pitch… Not sure what he’s doing at the AAA level.
• Now, Mr. Antonelli. He’s a stud, no doubt about it, may not show in the box score, but he had solid contact on a number of pitches — just wasn’t able to do much with them. In the field is another story; he looks like he’s trying too hard. One play he was ranging to his right toward the bag, backhanded the ball — it really was a nice stop. But he should’ve put it in his pocket; instead he tried to get the runner at first (he had no chance as by the time he had released the ball, the runner was at the bag), which led to an error (he totally air mailed it). Then Nick Hundley went after the ball and tried to nail the runner advancing from first on the throwing error — Hundley air mailed it to center field. All in all it looked like a Little League game where you want to yell at the top of your lungs “JUST HOLD THE DAMN BALL!”
• Luis Rodriguez looked good at shortstop and had a good day at the plate, going 2-for-3. He didn’t look nearly as lost at the plate as some of the other Beavers did.

Thanks, bud! More coverage at the Portland Oregonian.

Double-A — Tulsa 7, San Antonio 2

Chad Huffman: 3-for-4, 2 2B
Craig Cooper (RF): 1-for-3, BB
Kyle Blanks (1B): 0-for-4
Colt Morton: 1-for-3, BB, E
Steve Garrison: 5 IP, 7 H, 3 R, 0 HR, 0 BB, SO 4

Garrison threw 73 pitches, 51 (70%) for strikes. He cruised through the first four innings before running into trouble. One of the culprits was Eric Young Jr. In other news, infielder Marshall McDougall has been reassigned from Portland to accommodate Jody Gerut. McDougall takes the place of infielder Brett Dowdy, who was placed on the disabled list due to a strained oblique.

More coverage at the San Antonio Express-News.

High-A — Lake Elsinore 8, Rancho Cucamonga 7

Cedric Hunter: 0-for-5, BB, SB
Mitch Canham: 3-for-4, BB
Drew Miller: 4 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 0 HR, 1 BB, 2 SO

A day after starting at DH, Hunter returned to his more familiar spot in center field.

Low-A — Lansing 6, Fort Wayne 4

Luis Durango (DH): 0-for-4, BB
Bradley Chalk: 2-for-5
Justin Baum: 1-for-5
Yefri Carvajal: 3-for-4
Felix Carrasco (1B): 3-for-3, 2B

The Fort Wayne Journal Gazette has started a Wizards blog. Great to see some of the minor-league affiliates getting their own blogs. I’ve added this one to the sidebar as well as to PadreBlogs.com.

Tagged as: bugs and cranks, jake peavy, james loney, josh bard, minor leagues, rafael furcal