Stop me if you heard this before, Syracuse had a disappointing month.  The Chiefs ended April at 10-13, which is below expectations.  Syracuse did have the best pitching in the IL, plus they outscored their opponents in April by 5 runs, but they were 2-7 in one run games and that led to a losing month. 

The Chiefs came into the season with a young pitching staff and hitters who were a blend of veterans and suspects. The pitchers performed better than expected while the hitters were worse.

Pitching

Four of the projected opening day Chiefs pitching lineup have been called-up to Toronto, McGowan, Marcum (twice), Janssen, and Tallet.  That's a lot of movement for April. 

Casey Janssen made four starts and got better each time out.  In his first two starts Casey allowed more hits than innings pitched but in his third start Janssen pitched seven shutout innings with three hits allowed.  That pattern mirrors his first three major league starts.

Josh Banks made five starts and was his usual battling self, 28 innings, 25 hits, two walks, and 23 K’s.  Banks rarely gets blown out and keeps his team in the game.  Banks pitches are not as good as Janssen so his control needs to be better than Janssen.  Even though banks WHIP is less than 1, his ERA is 3.54 reflecting the 5 home runs he allowed in April.

Ty Taubenheim has been a nice surprise for the Jays.  Taubenheim is a very large man but is more of a sinker, slider pitcher on the mound than a fire-baller.  Taubenheim was arguably Syracuse’s best pitcher in April with a 1.48 ERA.

David Purcey has allowed almost a half a hit per inning, 12 hits in 22.2 innings.  But Purcey has allowed 17 walks in the same 22.2 innings.  Because of his ability to allow few hits, and because he has allowed 8 unearned runs, Purcey’s ERA is 1.99  and once he gains a little more control he could be special.

Francisco Rosario made four April starts and, unfortunately for me, the one I saw was his worst.  Rosario pitched 16.1 innings in April and allowed only 11 hits and 8 walks with 21 K’s.  Rosario has now made his way to Toronto and is pitching out of the pen.

In the bullpen Dustin McGowan sports a 5.11 ERA.  McGowan needs to hit his spots and when he doesn’t he is being hit.  McGowan allowed runs in 4 of his 7 April appearances.

Pop Quiz: Which pitcher has the highest K/9 among Syracuse pitchers?  The answer might surprise you, Shaun Marcum has 16 K’s in 11.1 innings for a K/9 of 12.7.  Marcum’s ERA is 2.48 and he has made a couple of stops in Toronto.

Brandon League pitched well in April, a 1.53 ERA, with 15 hits and 4 walks in 17.2 innings.  League’s control of his fastball is much improved, now he needs to refine his control of the slider and split finger to raise his K/9 above the April level of 6.1.

The rest of the bullpen has generally pitched well, both Adrian Burnside and Ryan Houston sport 0.00 ERA’s while Lee Gronkiewicz has a 1.80 ERA.

Hitting

Eight hitters had at least 66 at-bats in April, only two of them were hitting over .250.  John Hattig leads at .271 while Rob Cosby is close behind at .270.  However neither of them like to walk too much, 2 and 4 walks respectively, so their on-base percentages are not impressive.  Kevin Barker with 10 walks and Wayne Lydon with 12, lead the team in walks and in OBP, each at .326, again not a very good number.  Lydon also has 3 home runs, tied for the team lead with Chad Mottola. 

Twenty three games is just over 15% of the season so it is hard to make sweeping comments on a small sample size so I will be general.   Rob Cosby and John Hattig are doing OK, not great but not disappointing either.  The trio of John-Ford Griffin, Ryan Roberts and Sergio Santos each hit in the 210’s in April, too low for their abilities.  Jason Phillips average is also low, hitting in the .240’s is poor for a reported good hit catcher.  Mike Mahoney was the best hitter in April, a .306 average and a team leading .798 OPS in 36 at-bats. 

None of the hitters had a great month in April.  Several hitters such as Jason Phillips, Chad Mottola, Kevin Barker and John-Ford Griffin have a much better track record in previous AAA seasons, look for them to get better as the weather warms up.

Summary

April was disappointing and does bring back some memories of 2005.   The pitchers have generally done their job, probably pitching better than we can expect for the rest of the season.  The hitters need to do their part.  Veterans like John-Ford Griffin, Chad Mottola, and Jason Phillips need to pick it up.  John Hattig, Rob Cosby, Ryan Roberts need to show they deserve a call up to Toronto.