SummerBall ranks top 25 Summer teams.  While this seems like a dubious task that amounts to nothing, it’s interesting none the less.  You can see their list HERE.  Michigan players show up on the following teams:  #10 Wareham Gateman (LaMarre), #12 Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox (Burgoon), #25 Lima Locos (Toth, Wood, Brosnahan).

From the Cape.  The Cape Cod League has been plagued by rain this season, postponing a total of 33 games so far.  Pitching is still dominating the league with the few games played so far.  Ryan LaMarre is batting .167, good for 6th best of the Wareham regular starters.  Their top batter is only batting .265 while the team average is around .191.   LaMarre has moved from the lead off hitter to around the 6 hole.

Burgoon on the other hand is still dominating.  He’s only pitched 9.1 innings this season, but he’s struck out 17.  He does have an 0-1 record, but hey, he still hasn’t given up an earned run.  His 5 saves still leads the league.

Lima Locos.  Toth has been half of the offense.  And that’s not necessarily a good thing.  The Locos are only batting around .215 as a team, near the bottom of the Great Lakes League.  Pitching has been fairly solid.  Wood and Brosnahan have both done well as relief pitchers the last 2 weeks, each having a couple of shut out appearances.

Alexandria Beetles.  Things haven’t been so good for Michigan in Alexandria. Vangheluwe continues to struggle. His ERA has come down from 9.31 to 7.71 over the last 2 weeks. I guess that’s good news. Matt Miller has struggle a bit too, but he has taken over the teams closer role with 3 saves. His .288 OBA and 4.50 ERA aren’t particularly flattering. Tyler Mills made his debut with the team since the last update.  So far he’s 2 for 9 with a pair of doubles and 4 RBI in limited action.

Valley League.  Brandon Sinnery is having some bad luck with the Winchester Royals.  In 3 starts, he’s 0-1 with a 2.00 ERA.  He’s struck out 18 in 18 innings of work, but just can’t get the run support.  Matt Gerbe has cut his ERA down from 36.00 to only 9.69 thanks to a move back to the bullpen full time.  His OBA is still .368 and 9.69 still isn’t good by any stretch of the imagination.

Meanwhile, at Fort Royal, the impostor posing as Jeff DeCarlo continues to pitch beautifully.  His ERA is just 2.00 in 6 relief appearances stretching 13.1 innings.  I can’t remember DeCarlo ever having a stretch in Ann Arbor where his ERA was less than 6.00.  Also with Forth Royal is Kevin Krantz.  Krantz is splitting time at third but may be winning more time.  He’s batting .292, good for 5th on the team.  His defense has also been

Leesburg Lightning.  Good things continue with the Leesburg crew on the mound.  Alan Oaks is 1-0 in 4 starts with a 3.98 ERA.  His 11 walks to 15 strikeouts ratio is something to work on.  Dufek has 4 saves in 7 appearances stretching 6.1 innings.  In that time he’s struck out 11 and not given up a run.  Eric Katzman finished up his summer classes and got a late start to the Florida Collegiate League season.  So far he’s made 1 start and 1 relief appearance.  The start went pretty poorly, but it might have been part of brushing the rust from his arm.  He’s gave up 2 runs on 5 walks in 3.2 innings pitched in the start.  Sounds like a normal “Evil Katzman” start.  Once he gets back into the groove, he should do better.  Chris Berset hasn’t seen much playing time so far.  He’s made it into 4 games but has yet to get a hit.

Travis Smith in Texas.  Travis leads the Brazos Bombers in starts this season, but they haven’t been overpowering.  He’s 0-3 in 6 appearances (6 starts) including today’s game.  Via bvbombers.com:

The Bombers were able to keep McKinney off the board the rest of the game with great pitching and defense, but were unable to muster any run support for Smith, who dropped to 0-3 with the loss.

Smith gave up one run in the top of the first. The Bombers lost 0-1. Tough luck there.

Prospect League.  Garrett Stephens is currently hitting .244 for the Richmond RiverRats, good for third on the team.  His 14 RBIs are 6th in the League.  John Lorenz doesn’t qualify for stats in the league, but he has been getting more starts at third lately.  His average is up to .250.  This week he went 3/12 with 3 Rs and an RBI.

Coley Crank in Alaska.  Coley continues to do most of the catching for the Anchorage Bucs and is batting .203 so far on the season.  He does have 13 RBIs on the season, good for 3rd on the team.

Matt Broder’s team site is horrible.  I know he’s got 1 W and a 3.00 ERA as of today’s leader board.  Take it as you may.

Players still MIA:  Bryce Aspinwall, Mike Kittle, Nick Urban, Jake McLouth, Vinnie Sarafa, Vinny Losorelli (we have 2 Vinnie/Vinnys on the team? Are we in New Jersey?), and Adam Arbour.  I can’t find anything on them yet.

Eric Katzman and Chris Berset were both listed with Leesburg, Katzman so much that he was mentioned in the season preview.

Vangeluwe and Broder show up on Grand Lake’s roster as stated by the Great Lakes League (both as #0), but aren’t on the Grand Lake Mariners team’s site.  I assume that just means they’ve gone to other teams.

Jake McLouth was originally signed with the Winchester Royals with Sinnery and Gerbe, but that’s no longer the case.  He was released on June 4th.

I’ll check up with these guys in a little while to look at how they did.  Most games started this last week so not much to report on now.

Ex-Player / Now Coaches

Jason Wuefel (‘03 ) is also coaching the Butler BlueSox of the Prospect League.  Good for him.