The mean ducks in Akron won last night but Brantley went 0-4. Frazier went 3-4, Zimmer hitless, Papi 1-3.

Clip show won even though Plutko got smacked around. House was brought in to face a lefty and he walked him. Yandy continues to be a dandy, single and a double.

Mejia nor Allen either one got a hit last night, but that is just because the mighty Hillcats of Lynchburg, VA got rained out. ... Little side note, Lynchburg was the only major Virginia city not taken by the north in the Civil War. But let's be honest, it was just because Sherman and Grant never made it there. Those buckeyes would have kicked that ass if they got the urge. .... This is the kind of analysis you get nowhere else.

Sigh, the Captains lost their 9th straight game. Chin up Lake County fans, there is some talent on the way next couple years. But for now, you suck. The good news, Lukes and Marabell continue to hit. 2-4 with a triple and 3-4 with a double, respectively. Gotta start watching these two a little more closely.

Mahoning Valley won, due to me wearing my Scrappers hat all evening, I'm sure. Calico 2-4 and Tinsley 2-5, both with a double. Logan Ice is still cold, 0-3, but with 2 more walks.
Juan Hillman 4 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 3 BB, 2 K
0.89 ERA on the year now.

Oscar Gonzalez homered again, and 1st round pick Will Benson homered too.

Friday:

CLE AA Frazier, Clint RF 4 0 3 0 .292
CLE AA Papi, Mike DH 3 0 1 0 .210 BB (24)
CLE AAA Diaz, Yandy RF 5 1 2 0 .314 2B (11), CS (1)
CLE AAA Armstrong, Shawn 1.1 1 0 0 1 2 2.60 [walk came with the bases loaded]
CLE AAA Plutko, Adam 6.1 4 4 4 4 2 4.42
CLE SS Hillman, Juan 4 3 1 0 3 2 0.89 [kind of similar to McKenzie's start the day before ]

Also:
Andrew Calica SS 4 2 2 1 .346 2B[1]
Logan Ice SS 3 1 0 0 .179 2BB [17]
Will Benson R 3 1 2 1 .188 HR [2] BB [5]
Oscar Gonzalez R 4 1 1 1 .306 HR [6]
Nolan Jones R 3 1 0 0 .200 BB [5] SB [1]
Francisco Perez R 6 4 1 1 3 W[3-0] 1.82 18 year old 6-2 lefty
Ronny Rodrigz AAA 5 2 2 1 .260 HR [6] 2B [19]

Clips won. Yandy 2-4 w/ 2 dbls. Morimando 6.2 IP 6 H 2 ER 7 K

Ducks lost 1-0, so not a shock that Zimmer and Frazier both go 0-3. Kaminskey with a solid start though. 7IP, 7H, 1ER, 7K

Lynchburg wins big. Allen 2-5. Bradley 3-5 with a walk and a double. F.Mejia extends his hit streak to 35 games by going 3-6 including a homer. Krieger 3-5 with a double.

Captains lose their 10th straight. 2-0. Lukes and Marabell both 0-3.

Scrappers lose big. G.Mejia singles, which of course means he actually doubles, cause that always ends in a SB. Logan Ice 1-4 to actually raise his average. A double.

I just noticed that Lake County played a DH'er yesterday. My info was from game 2. They actually won game 1, 2-1, on two solo homers by Lukes to snap their losing skid.

BA highlights are similar to HB's:

CLE AAA Diaz, Yandy LF 4 0 2 1 .317 2 2B (13)
CLE HiA Allen, Greg CF 5 2 2 0 .298
CLE HiA Bradley, Bobby 1B 5 1 3 0 .260 2B (19), BB (53)
CLE HiA Chang, Yu-Cheng SS 4 2 3 2 .282 HR (11), 2 BB (35)
CLE HiA Krieger, Tyler 2B 5 1 3 1 .365 2B (6)
CLE HiA Mathias, Mark 3B 5 3 3 3 .268 2B (25), HR (4), BB (32)
CLE HiA Mejia, Francisco C 6 2 3 1 .327 HR (1)
CLE LoA Castro, Willi SS 4 0 1 0 .252 CS (6)
CLE MAJ Naquin, Tyler CF 3 2 2 0 .315 2B (8)
CLE AA Kaminsky, Rob 7.2 7 1 1 0 6 3.86 L (4-6)
CLE AAA Morimando, Shawn 6.2 6 2 2 0 7 4.15 W (1-1)
CLE HiA Brown, Mitch 1 0 0 0 0 1 5.49 [career night for Mitch]

and both sources omit one of faves who seems to be back on track:

Anthony Santander 6 2 2 6 .282 2HR [13] now tied with Bradley for league lead in RBI. Been around awhile but he won't be 22 until the off season. Younger, for example, than Nathan Lukes who hit his 3rd and 4th homers for lower level Lake County. Santander's OPS for July is 1.116. BA is not allowed to list anyone on their daily update who was not on the preseason Top 30; perhaps they'd answer a question about him when he doesn't make the Hot Prospect List next Friday, but probably not.

I liked the depth of the Lynchburg lineup when the season opened, but now with Krieger and Mejia promoted to the Hillcats and no one [e.g. Allen] moved up to Akron, they have solid prospects all over the field:

Mejia C
Bradley 1b
Krieger 2b
Mathias also 2b but now playing a lot of 3b
Chang ss
Santander lf
Allen cf
ok, so probably no one in RF: Luigi Rodriguez is barely still a prospect; and Dorsyss Paulino has been hurt for a couple months

Lots of these guys are impressive, but also could make logical trade assets to get that Lefty in the Bullpen and/or 3rd baseman

in Arizona Will Benson singled in 4 trips. Jones was off.

Matt Esparza with 55 K in 49 2/3 innings is starting for the Captains today. Fans 3 in his 2 first 2 scoreless, 3 hit innings.

Cody Anderson working for the Clippers. Is he trade bait, too?
Aaron Civale with his 0 ERA in his first 10 pro innings for the Scrappers.

MV Scrappers ‏@mvscrappers 1 hour ago
Civale: 3 IP, 1 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 2 K

How do you give up 1 hit and no walks but still allow 2 ER in 3 IP?

A hit batsman then a homer I guess?

Zimmer doubled [#20] and singled. NRod singled for 2 rbi and fanned 3 times. Frazier hitless. Akron loses.

Lake County ends their 10 game skid. Nathan Lukes with his 3rd homer in 2 nights and 5th of the season and a single. Willi Castro singles, homers [#6] for 6 rbi. Lu-Jin Chu finally back in full season ball after injury and rehab in Arizona, 3 singles as the DH, he's .667 in his first 9 AB [a 22 year old catcher who's hit well in first seasons in rookie and short season ball].
Solid start by Matt Esparza 6 4 0 0 0 7 ERA 3.09 WHIP 1.02. I gave the wrong K/IP tallies for him earlier [just posted his last 10 starts]. For the year: 107 K; 18 BB; in 96 IP. 21 year old RH, 14th round from UC Irvine in 2015.

You're close Hillbilly:

Auburn Bottom of the 1st

Blake Perkins hit by pitch.
With Jack Sundberg batting, Blake Perkins steals (8) 2nd base.
Jack Sundberg triples (1) on a line drive to center fielder Gabriel Mejia. Blake Perkins scores.
With Daniel Johnson Jr. batting, wild pitch by Aaron Civale, Jack Sundberg scores.
Daniel Johnson Jr. grounds out, second baseman Erlin Cerda to first baseman Emmanuel Tapia.
Ryan Ripken strikes out swinging.
Oliver Ortiz called out on strikes.

Ahhh.

Holy hell ... Frankie Mejia 2-3 with a double today to extend his hit streak to 36 games!

And Santander 3-4 with a homer.

And game is only 6th or 7th inning.

The Lynchburg express continues to roll.

Santander finished with 4 hits; he's now at 14 homers [3rd in the league], 290, and league-leading 68 RBI. and he's in top four of lots of other Carolina League categories.
I was wrong to say no talent in the final OF spot: LRod's two hits puts him at 310 and Taylor Murphy with a single and walk is hitting 284. Finally Mark Mathias with his 27th double. [He's hitting .358 with OPS of 1.004 in July] Which sounds good until compared with Santander: his slash line for the month 373/441/763 [OPS 1204]

SUMMARY
Anthony Santander drove a ball over the left-field fence in the sixth inning for his fourth home run in his last four games to help Lynchburg claim a 7-2 win at Frawley Stadium Sunday evening. The Hillcats logged 12 hits to reach double digits in that column for the sixth straight game.

OFFENSE CONTINUES TO ROLL
Anthony Santander tied his career high with four hits in the game, including a two-run homer on a 4-5 day that featured two RBIs and two runs scored. He has hit safely in 22 of his last 24 games and has 28 RBIs during that stretch to pass Bobby Bradley for the league lead with 68 for the season. Santander and Mathias each scored in the first inning, while Yu-Cheng Chang and Francisco Mejia picked up the RBIs to stake Lynchburg to an early 2-0 lead.

Mejia's RBI came on a base hit up the middle to extend his hitting streak to 36 in a row. Lynchburg tallied another run in the second inning when Luigi Rodriguez singled and scored on a Mathias double to build a 3-0 edge.

The Hillcats plated two more in the fifth on a two-run double by Mejia that brought home Bradley and Chang. Santander's homer capped off the Lynchburg scoring in the sixth. The 'Cats increased their league leading batting average to .270 and now have a league-best 84 home runs through 92 games.

POLANCO RETURNS TO THE WIN COLUMN
Anderson Polanco (4-2) earned his first win since June 15 by holding Wilmington to one run on three hits in five innings. The lefty struck out four, although he surrendered a season-high five walks. Justin Garcia tossed two scoreless innings in relief, and Trevor Frank pitched a perfect ninth inning to highlight the bullpen's efforts.

SHORT HOPS
Lynchburg has hit 55 of its 84 home runs on the road despite playing the same number of home and away games this season (46)…Santander had two home runs batting right-handed all season before this series and now has two in the past two days…The Hillcats have at least 12 hits in eight of their last 11 games...Mejia went 2-5 with three RBIs and has 16 multi-hit games during his 36-game streak.

ON DECK
Lynchburg plays Wilmington Monday at 6:35 p.m. Luis Lugo (5-3, 4.3) will start for the 'Cats against fellow southpaw Foster Griffin (2-5, 6.20). Fans can listen to the action on 93.3 FM and 1320 AM as well as www.lynchburg-hillcats.com, beginning with the Hillcats On-Deck Show at 6:15 p.m.