Las Vegas 51s Weekly Report

Since we last checked in with the 51s last Tuesday the Blue Jays triple-A team has gone an impressive 6-2 and is currently riding a four game winning streak. They wound up taking three of four early last week in Sacramento and then came home to Las Vegas for a Friday-Monday series against Fresno and picked up three more wins in that four game set. The home stand continued last night against Salt Lake who’s record dropped to 7-5 after last night’s 4-0 defeat at the hands of the 51s.

The good form has the 51s sitting on a 9-4 record this morning just a half game behind the 9-3 Reno Aces. Vegas’ offense currently sits eighth in the league with a 5.62 runs scored per game average and the team has collectively hit .302, the fifth best batting average in the league, and drawn out 49 walks, also the fifth highest total in the Pacific Coast League. The 51s have hit just nine homers but are third in the league with 33 doubles. They might also might want to think about cooling it a bit with the base stealing as they’ve stolen just eight bases but have been caught a league high nine times already.

The pitching and defense has allowed the sixth fewest runs per game in the PCL, they’ve let the opposition touch home plate an average of 4.54 times per game so far. WHIP, or walks and hits allowed per inning, is usually attributed as a pitching statistic but it has quite a bit to do with team defense as well. After all, a good defense lets less balls fall in for hits in the outfield and less grounders squirt through the infield. The 51s pitching and defense has faired well in WHIP with a 1.24 mark that’s second best in the league. The pitching staff hasn’t missed many bats though, only striking out 6.7 batters per nine innings, a rate that’s fourth from the bottom of the league in that category.

Last Tuesday’s win against Sacramento saw the bullpen shine as Wilfredo Ledezma and Josh Roenicke worked a combined five innings of two hit, shutout ball in relief of starter Scott Richmond who allowed three runs, all earned, in four innings of work. Ledezma and Roenicke combined to strikeout seven batters and didn’t get burned by the two walks a piece that each one handed out. Offensively, Brett Lawrie, Brian Jeroloman and Chris Woodward each had a two hit day and the only two extra base hits, both doubles, came off the bats of Mike McCoy and Woodward.

The pitching struggled a bit on Wednesday in a 6-5 win against Sacramento as 51s pitchers combined to walk five batters and allow five runs, although only three were earned. The bullpen closed the door again with three shutout innings to end the game, this time with Winston Abreu and Rommie Lewis teaming up to shut the opposition down. Woodward was the hitting star of the day picking up two more hits, both doubles, and a walk. He was only retired once on the day.

The final game in Sacramento saw the 51s lose a close 2-1 game as they pushed just one run across the plate despite ten hits. The hits were all singles though, and Loewen and Lawrie picked up three a piece. The pitching was led by starter Brad Mills going seven innings and allowing one run on one hit. He walked and struckout three and took a no decision in the team’s loss with a performance that almost always nets one a win in the run scoring happy PCL.

Upon returning to home to Las Vegas last Friday the 51s dropped their second game in a row with an 11-7 loss to Fresno. The 51s went into the ninth inning holding a slim 7-6 lead before Rommie Lewis had a complete meltdown on the mound as he allowed all four batters he faced to reach base on a hit and three walks. He wound up being credited for four runs allowed and sunk the 51s chances of winning. Lawrie had another three hit day with a double and Thames picked up three hits of his own, including a pair of doubles, as well. Loewen went one for three but also picked up a pair of walks.

The skids were quickly put on the losing streak the next game on Saturday as the 51s kicked off their current four game winning streak in style with a 7-0 victory. Mike MacDonald delivered a scintillating pitching performance with a complete game, two hit, no walk and seven strikeout shutout. MacDonald threw a mere 85 pitches, an average of less than ten pitches per inning and picked up fifteen groundball outs against just three flyouts. Eric Thames led the offense with two hits, one triple and one double, and Ryan Shealy picked up a pair of doubles himself.

Sunday saw Vegas pickup a 4-3 win thanks to a couple of homers, one each from Thames and David Cooper and a solid outing from Scott Richmond who went five innings, allowed two runs, earned, on a walk and three hits while setting down six batters on strikes. Wilfredo Ledezma held the line out of the ‘pen with three scoreless innings in relief of Richmond from the sixth through the eighth innings.

Fresno was sent packing in a back and forth offensive battle on Monday that saw the 51s hold on with a 9-8 victory. Only Jeroloman went hitless for the 51s, and Manny Mayorson had a triple, Adam Loewen, amazingly given the score, hit the games only homer and Eric Thames had himself a day with four hits in six at-bats. McCoy reached base six times with three hits and three walks in his six trips to the dish.

The home stand continued last night with Salt Lake rolling into town and dropping the first game in the series to their hosts, 4-0. No one on the 51s had more than one hit but Mayorson and Woodward made theirs count as they both went yard. Brad Mills turned in another great start going eight shutout innings in which he allowed four hits and walked three but mowed down seven batters and left the game with a .82 ERA on the season.

The 51s will entertain Salt Lake for three more games at home before heading out for a four game series starting on Saturday against Colorado Springs. The trip is a short one and they’ll be back in Vegas next Wednesday.

The Brett Lawrie Watch

As was mentioned last week, each Vegas report will take some space to focus on Lawrie’s performance. He seems to be the player Jays fans are most interested in across their entire minor league system right now and this isn’t meant to downplay the exploits of others on the 51s or Fisher Cats, Lugnuts and so on but he’s a player many are excited about and we’ll keep you up to date on him a bit here every week.

So far this season Lawrie has played in all but one of the team’s thirteen games and is second on the team in park adjusted wOBA(which will be referred to simply as wOBA* from here on out just like it is over on StatCorner) with a .467 mark that trails only Eric Thames. He’s done so by hitting .392 with a .216 isolated power but only a 5.4 percent walk rate. He has one homer and six doubles on the season and has swiped two bases in two attempts as well. Lawrie’s struckout in 23.3 percent of his at-bats, just a little bit more than the league average of 22.1 percent in the PCL.

Lawrie’s only twenty-one and has absolutely gotten off to a great start for such a young hitter in the minor league’s top level. Some more patience would be nice to see as the season progresses, he’s only seeing 3.45 pitches per plate appearance right now and as was mentioned has just three walks in 56 plate appearances. Lawrie’s defense at third has been an issue too as he’s already committed six errors. Errors are not the end all be all of defensive statistics, far from it, but that many errors in that few a number of games is a blatant sign that he’s going to need time to learn the position.

The Best Five and Their Numbers

Starting this week, we’ll give you a table with several stats, most from StatCorner, of each of the 51s best five hitters and pitchers. For hitters the table will include their batting average, strikeout and walk rates, isolated power, batting average on balls in play, their park adjusted wOBA and wOBA+. For pitchers you’ll see their innings pitched, strikeout, walks and homers per nine innings, their groundball rates, tRA and FIP. Please, please, please, take sometime to get to know these stats. They’re all very useful.

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All advanced stats from StatCorner and all other stats are from Baseball-Reference. All game results and box score data is from the 51s official site.