Tag Archives: Meridian Community College

08 Jul

number crunching

1 — Major league starts by Phil Irwin, the Ole Miss alumnus who’ll make his second tonight for Texas against Houston. It’ll be his Rangers debut.
4 — Hits by Ole Miss product Chris Coghlan (now batting .252) and RBIs by Taylorsville’s Billy Hamilton (34 for the season) in Monday’s Chicago Cubs-Cincinnati game, won by the Reds 9-3.
4 — Runs allowed (in three games) by former UM standout Aaron Barrett since a controversial balk call against him on June 30. Barrett, pitching for Washington, had yielded just five runs in 30 previous appearances.
5 — Number of Mississippi Braves alums slated to play in All-Star games next week: Current M-Brave Jose Peraza (Futures); Atlanta’s Freddie Freeman, Craig Kimbrel and Julio Teheran (MLB); and Gwinnett’s Phil Gosselin (Triple-A).
5 — Home runs in 2014 for ex-Rebels star Alex Presley, who hit his latest Monday to help Houston stop a seven-game losing streak with a 12-7 victory over Texas.
9 — Consecutive seasons of at least 20 saves for former Mississippi State star Jonathan Papelbon, who reached that number Monday in Philadelphia’s 3-2 win against Milwaukee.
10 — Starts by Meridian Community College product Cliff Lee (4-4, 3.18), who won’t make another for the Phillies until after the All-Star break. He has been on the disabled list since May 19.

02 Jul

jolting the memory

A familiar name popped up on the TV screen during a Cape Cod Baseball League game this afternoon: Wade Wass. As if on cue, Wass belted a grand slam to give Brewster a lead against Wareham. Oh yeah … Wass is the former Meridian Community College star who had a monster season for the Eagles in 2012, batting .427 with 23 home runs. He was drafted in the 13th round by Baltimore but chose to go to Alabama, where he redshirted with an injury in 2013. The 6-foot, 215-pound catcher/first baseman batted .302 with five homers for the Crimson Tide this season, helping the team make the NCAA Tournament. He wasn’t drafted last month. He can only help his 2015 stock by playing in the Cape, which is generally considered the best of the college summer circuits and draws flocks of scouts. … Incidentally, Wareham is coached by Cooper Farris, the former Mississippi Gulf Coast CC skipper who has spent many a summer in the CCBL. Wareham’s shortstop today was Ole Miss’ Errol Robinson.

30 Jun

hard knocks

Big day at the plate for B.A. Vollmuth on Sunday. The former Southern Miss star, playing for the Beloit Snappers in the Class A Midwest League, went 3-for-4 with three doubles, three runs and an RBI. Trouble is, the big days have been few and far between for Vollmuth this season. Dealing with failure is a big part of a player’s development in pro ball, and that’s what Vollmuth is confronted with in 2014. The 6-foot-3, 215-pound third baseman is batting just .189. He has six home runs but hasn’t hit one in the entire month of June. Vollmuth, from Biloxi, was arguably the state’s best player as a junior at USM in 2011. He was drafted in the third round by Oakland and showed enough that first season that he was rated the A’s No. 9 prospect heading into 2012. He batted .261 with 14 homers at two levels of A-ball in 2012 and was rated the No. 17 prospect following that season. Vollmuth spent 2013 at Stockton in the high Class A California League and enjoyed some success, hitting 21 homers and knocking in 70 runs. But he hit only .212 and struck out way too much (161 times). He was sent back this season to the low-A Midwest League, where apparently he is still trying to figure things out in what may be a pivotal season. P.S. Corey Dickerson, the former Meridian Community College standout, went 2-for-4 for Colorado on Sunday and has 10 multi-hit games in June. He is batting .343 with 10 homers, 33 RBIs and 34 runs in 60 games. Too bad his name isn’t on the All-Star ballot. … Tony Sipp, the Mississippi Gulf Coast CC product, registered his first save of the year in Houston’s 6-4 win over Detroit. Sipp threw 1 1/3 scoreless innings to lower his ERA to 1.61. Primarily a set-up or situational left-hander, Sipp has only four career saves. … Picayune’s T.J. House was back in The Show and pitched well for Cleveland, allowing just two runs in six innings against Seattle. Unfortunately, the rookie lefty was matched against Felix Hernandez, who allowed just one hit over eight innings as the Mariners won 3-0. House is 0-2 with a 4.54 ERA in seven games, six starts.

24 Jun

ghostbuster

Lance Lynn seems to have the counter curse for the demons that haunt pitchers at Coors Field. The ex-Ole Miss star threw eight shutout innings on Monday night, yielding just three hits with seven strikeouts in St. Louis’ 8-0 win over Colorado. The skidding Rockies were shut out at home for the first time in almost a year. Lynn, now 8-5 with a 2.90 ERA, has faced 77 batters at Coors in his career and never yielded a home run. The big right-hander reportedly has made some changes in his delivery to avoid tipping pitches, and he has allowed just two runs in his last 22 innings. He retired 17 of the first 18 batters he faced on Monday. Meridian Community College product Corey Dickerson, who always seems to be in the middle of something (witness his pratfall between third base and home on Sunday), had two of the Rockies’ three hits. P.S. Jarrod Dyson, the former Southwest Mississippi CC standout, went 3-for-3 with two RBIs, a run and a pair of stolen bases in helping Kansas City beat the Los Angeles Dodgers 5-3. Dyson is batting .305 with 12 stolen bases in 51 games (105 at-bats). … UM product Aaron Barrett (1.75 ERA) pitched a scoreless inning as Washington beat Milwaukee 3-0 in a matchup of National League division leaders.

21 Jun

eye on …

Chris Coghlan has been playing more regularly for the Chicago Cubs of late, and his bat is waking from its slumber. Coghlan, the former Ole Miss standout, tripled and homered for the Cubs on Friday in a 6-3 win over Pittsburgh. The left-handed hitting outfielder boosted his average to .219, which might not sound so hot until you consider that he was at .125 on May 21. Brought up from Triple-A Iowa in early May, Coghlan has been in 35 games (73 at-bats) and produced two homers, four RBIs and seven runs all told. He is batting .282 in June. Coghlan, who just turned 29, is a career .267 hitter and hit .321 back in 2009 when he won National League rookie of the year honors with the Florida (now Miami) Marlins. P.S. Southern Miss product Brian Dozier delivered his second career walk-off hit for Minnesota, which beat the Chicago White Sox 5-4 on Friday. … Ex-Ole Miss star Seth Smith belted two monster homers — and just missed a third — for San Diego, ending a 20-game long ball drought. He has eight on the year. The Padres beat the Los Angeles Dodgers 6-5. … Meridian Community College alumnus Corey Dickerson went 4-for-5 with his ninth homer but Colorado fell to Milwaukee 13-10 in a Coors Field slugfest. … Ryan Buchter and Juan Jaime joined the list of former Mississippi Braves to play in the big leagues when they pitched for Atlanta against Washington. That brings the number to 87. Buchter, who was up at the start of the season but didn’t play, got the win as the Braves won 6-4 in 13 innings.

19 Jun

a few small things

Just for the record, Meridian Community College product Corey Dickerson was the only Colorado batter to reach base (via an error) during Clayton Kershaw’s no-hitter for the Los Angeles Dodgers on Wednesday night. And Dickerson also made the final out, fanning at a breaking ball to become Kershaw’s 15th strikeout victim in the 8-0 gem. … Resurgent Cincinnati, which beat Pittsburgh 11-4 to reach .500 (35-35) for the first time since April 2, has gotten contributions of late not only from Taylorsville’s Billy Hamilton (now batting .278) but also from the other Mississippi connection on the team, Ole Miss alum Zack Cozart. Cozart had two hits on Wednesday and is batting .306 during the Reds’ current 7-3 run. … Former Southwest Mississippi CC star Jarrod Dyson went 1-for-3 as Kansas City won its 10th straight game, 2-1 over Detroit. Dyson is batting .300 with seven RBIs, 14 runs and 10 steals in 46 games for the first-place Royals. … UM product Aaron Barrett got one out and the win — he’s 3-0 — in first-place Washington’s 6-5 victory over Houston. The Nationals and slumping Atlanta start a big National League East series tonight. … Ex-Rebels standout Seth Smith went 1-for-4 as San Diego beat Seattle 2-1 on Tony Gwynn tribute night at Petco Park. … Lance Lynn, another UM product, took a loss for St. Louis against the New York Mets despite allowing just two runs in six innings of a 3-2 defeat. Lynn is 1-3 in his last four starts, 7-5 with a 3.15 ERA overall.

13 Jun

makes no sense

If Corey Dickerson of the Colorado Rockies has a bruise on his right thigh today, he could consider it a badge of achievement. The former Meridian Community College standout from McComb wore out Atlanta in their four-game series, going 7-for-13 with a homer, five RBIs, four runs, four walks and an HBP. Dickerson was hit in the thigh by the Braves’ David Carpenter in the eighth inning of Thursday’s game, a 10-3 Rockies win. The plunking came immediately after Dickerson’s inadvertent whacking of Braves catcher Gerald Laird on a backswing. That makes no sense. Dickerson said he couldn’t be sure if he was hit intentionally; Carpenter, who was ejected, denied doing so. But it was pretty obvious. Rockies manager Walt Weiss, also ejected after charging onto the field, certainly thought so. Maybe Carpenter was just frustrated by his soaring ERA. Maybe the fact the Rockies — and Dickerson, in particular — were pounding the Braves for a second straight day had something to do with it. Whatever it was, Dickerson didn’t deserve to be hit. It was a classless act. P.S. Tyler Moore, another former MCC standout, is 8-for-20 at Triple-A Syracuse since Washington sent him down on June 5. The Mississippi State product has two homers and seven RBIs over that stretch.

12 Jun

3 stars — plus a couple

Desmond Jennings, the ex-Itawamba Community College star, had a two-run single in a four-run fourth inning as Tampa Bay snapped a 31-inning scoreless blight and went on to beat St. Louis 6-3 on Wednesday night. All told, Jennings was 2-for-4 with a run for the reeling Rays, who have won just twice in their last 16 games. … Meridian CC product Corey Dickerson, enjoying more playing time in Colorado, went 2-for-4 with three RBIs as the Rockies beat Atlanta 8-2 and knocked the Braves out of first place in the National League East. … Former Taylorsville High standout Billy Hamilton went 1-for-3 with a walk, an RBI, a run and a stolen base (No. 24) as Cincinnati beat the Los Angeles Dodgers 5-0. … Ole Miss alum Alex Presley, a veteran among Houston’s cast of kids, went 2-for-4 with an RBI and a steal to help the Astros beat Arizona 5-1. … And Jarrod Dyson, the former Southwest Mississippi CC star, was 1-for-3 with an RBI for Kansas City, which beat Cleveland 4-1. Ned Yost’s Royals have climbed into second place in the American League Central. P.S. The Biloxi Shrimpers? That’s one of the choices — perhaps the best — on the new Southern League club’s name-the-team ballot. The others: Beacon, Schooners, Mullets, Shuckers and Black Jacks. Voting ends this week. The team, moving from Huntsville, is scheduled to begin play in a new ballpark on the Coast next April.

05 Jun

caught in a draft

Joe DiFabio is the answer to a good – no, make that a great – trivia question. Who was the first Mississippian (native or college alum) to be picked in the first round of the MLB draft? DiFabio, a right-hander out of Delta State, went 20th overall to St. Louis in the very first draft in 1965. Despite a good pro career (45-34 record, 3.28 ERA), DiFabio never made the big leagues. That’s the fickle nature of baseball — and the baseball draft. Being picked high is no guarantee of an MLB job, nor does going in a later round mean you’ve got no chance. Several Mississippians currently in the majors are evidence of that. Brian Dozier, having an All-Star worthy season (.251, 12 homers, 30 RBIs, 13 steals, 48 runs) for Minnesota, was an eighth-round pick out of Southern Miss in 2009. Corey Dickerson, batting .348 with seven homers in his second MLB season with Colorado, was picked in the eighth round in 2010 out of Meridian Community College. Aaron Barrett, having a marvelous rookie season with Washington (0.87 ERA in 22 games), was a ninth rounder from Ole Miss that year. Mitch Moreland, batting .256 with two homers and 17 RBIs in his fifth year as a regular in Texas, was a 17th rounder out of Mississippi State in 2007. And then there’s Jarrod Dyson. He is batting .275 with 10 stolen bases and playing solid defense in center field as a part-timer for Kansas City. Dyson was a 50th-round pick in 2006 out of Southwest Mississippi Community College and made The Show four years later. There might not be a Mississippian selected in today’s first round, but plenty will be called in the next 39. As Dyson and others have shown, all you need is an opportunity. P.S. Belhaven University is ranked 18th in final NAIA poll. The Blazers went 42-21 and made the regionals. Two BU players, Tyler Akins and Paul Pickerrell, were named All-Americans. … Three Mississippi high schools, all state champions, made the top 27 in Baseball America’s final poll. West Lauderdale was No. 10, New Hope No. 24 and Oak Grove No. 27.

21 May

could be worse

The Philadelphia Phillies put Cliff Lee, the ex-Meridian Community College ace, on the 15-day disabled list today with what was described as a mild elbow strain. Not good for a 35-year-old pitcher, but not the worst case scenario. There were some concerns that he might be headed for Tommy John surgery. Left-hander Lee, who last pitched on Sunday, is 4-4 with a 3.18 ERA. P.S. Ole Miss product Drew Pomeranz won his third straight start for Oakland on Tuesday as the A’s beat Tampa Bay 3-0. How’s this for consistency? Since moving to the rotation, lefty Pomeranz has worked five scoreless innings in each of his three starts. He is 4-1 with a 0.94 ERA for the season. … Mitch Moreland is heating up in Texas. The former Mississippi State standout is 4-for-11 with a homer in his three starts at first base (his former position) in place of the injured Prince Fielder and is batting .345 over his last 10 games. For the year, the Amory native is batting .294 with two homers and 15 RBIs.