Fall Ball Update

With almost no Pirate news coming in the past couple days, let's take a look at how the Bucs' young players that are playing right now are doing. For a complete list, you can check here.

Jamie Romak looks awful in the Arizona Fall League with his .182 slugging percentage in seven games. Shelby Ford, on the other hand, looks quite good with his .308/.426/.462 line, though the standard caveat about the AFL being an extreme hitter's league applies. Pitchers are harder to judge in these leagues because even the starters only throw a few innings, but Jeff Sues has had four nice outings in the AFL.

In Hawaii, Jim Negrych is continuing to do what he always does, which is get on base, with his .390 OBP. He may miss some time with an injury, but it doesn't seem to be all that serious. Kyle Bloom also has a nice line after four starts and 15 innings in what is also, if I remember correctly, a pretty extreme hitters league.

In the foreign leagues, Steve Pearce has 11 hits and 6 doubles in 33 at-bats in Mexico (.303/.425/.515), Jose Tabata still has big numbers in Venezuela, though there hasn't been much of an update since I mentioned him earlier in the week, and John Van Benschoten has made two good (but short) starts in Mexico.

Obviously you can't make a lot out of the numbers from these leagues, but sometimes they're a good indicator of a coming breakout for a young player (Matt Wieters destroyed Hawaii last fall in his professional debut). I don't think anything here is worth getting worked up over in either direction, but it's always good to keep tabs on things like this.