Ole Miss Archives - Page 130 of 154 - All Mississippi Baseball

14 Nov

wait for it …

Oxford High’s Jason Barber, the Gatorade Player of the Year in Mississippi in 2015, has officially signed with Ole Miss, which announced a boatload of early signees this week. Mississippi State inked highly regarded Magnolia Heights products Riley Self and Dustin Skelton, among others, for its 2017 team. Southern Miss picked up juco stars Colt Smith and LeeMarcus Boyd from Northwest Mississippi Community College. Barber had a tremendous 2015 season: 10-0, 0.00 ERA as a pitcher, .337, eight homers as a hitter. Boyd’s numbers suggest an impact player: .330, 18 steals, 42 runs, 29 RBIs in 49 games at NWMCC. Of course, there is a catch. The “excitement,” if it can be called that, of the early signing period in college baseball is always tempered by the realization that the best of the signees may never put on the uniform of their chosen school. The MLB draft tends to snap them up. See Austin Riley, State signee from the fall of 2014, now a hot prospect in the Atlanta Braves’ system. It’s a quirky issue the other major sports don’t have to deal with. P.S. Conference USA might have scored a hit with its decision to hold its tournament at MGM Park, the new home of the Double-A Biloxi Shuckers, in 2017 and 2018. The Coast, with its casinos and beaches, might just draw some big crowds. Dates for the events haven’t been announced, but they’ll fall somewhere in mid-May.

13 Nov

this just in

If the reports are true, former Ole Miss standout Chris Ellis, a fast-rising pitching prospect, is changing organizations. Ellis is reported to be part of the package the Los Angeles Angels are sending to Atlanta in the eye-opening deal for Andrelton Simmons, the ex-Mississippi Braves shortstop. Erick Aybar, a veteran shortstop, and Sean Newcomb, another pitching prospect, are also said to be joining the Braves. Ellis, a third-round pick by the Angels in 2014, made it to Double-A last summer and handled that key level very well. He was 7-4 with a 3.92 ERA. The 6-foot-4 right-hander started 2015 at Class A Inland Empire, going 4-5, 3.88 before getting the bump to Arkansas. He was rated the No. 9 prospect in the California League by Baseball America.

12 Nov

there and here

Adam Frazier’s off-season work took him first to Arizona and then to Taiwan. Mississippi State product Frazier is on the U.S. team for the Premier 12 international tournament and has continued to swing a hot bat. Frazier had three hits in a 10-0 win over Mexico on Thursday after getting two hits and two RBIs in an 11-5 victory against the Dominican Republic on Tuesday. Frazier, a lefty-hitting middle infielder, batted .321 with four RBIs and six runs in seven Arizona Fall League games. He hit .324 with 30 RBIs and 59 runs in 103 games for Double-A Altoona in the Pittsburgh system this past season. The U.S. team, which also includes Ole Miss alum Cody Satterwhite, is 2-1 in the Premier 12, a big-time event on the world stage. P.S. Add Alex Presley to the list of Mississippi-connected players on the minor league free agent market. Outfielder Presley, 30, spent most of 2015 at Triple-A Fresno, where he hit .292; the ex-Ole Miss star got just 12 MLB at-bats with Houston. … Finally cleared to work – and play — in the U.S., Cuban outfielder Dian Toscano could be headed to the Mississippi Braves next spring. Toscano, 26, a lefty hitter with more speed than power, signed with Atlanta last January but did not play in 2015 as he awaited employment approval. He apparently has played very little the last two years, so some Double-A seasoning might be in order.

11 Nov

looking ahead

Can’t feel too bad for Lance Lynn, who had Tommy John surgery on Tuesday. He will make a reported $7.5 million in 2016 while not pitching for the St. Louis Cardinals. The crucial year for the former Ole Miss standout will be 2017, the final year of his current $22M contract. Lynn, who just finished his eighth pro season, has been a durable starter for the Cardinals the last four years, topping 200 innings twice and going at least 175 in the other two. And he has been a winner (61-39 career mark) on some very good teams. Many pitchers bounce back strong from Tommy John surgery. But some don’t. And Lynn will turn 30 in May of 2017. P.S. The Milwaukee Brewers’ new chart of top 10 prospects, as ranked by Baseball America, is flush with 2015 Biloxi Shuckers stars. Included: Shortstop Orlando Arcia (No. 1), right-hander Jorge Lopez (No. 2) and outfielders Brett Phillips and Tyrone Taylor.

04 Nov

odds and ends

JaCoby Jones, the former Mr. Baseball from Richton, heads a group of Mississippi-connected players named to the Arizona Fall League’s Fall Stars Game. Jones, a shortstop in Detroit’s system currently batting .304 with two homers for Scottsdale, is on the East roster. The West includes 2015 Mississippi Braves starter Lucas Sims and two Biloxi Shuckers alums, outfielder Michael Reed and closer Damien Magnifico. Magnifico had a magnificent run with Milwaukee’s Double-A team last summer, moving into the bullpen and going 4-1 with 20 saves and a 1.17 ERA in 42 appearances. The Fall Stars Game is set for Saturday at 7 p.m. CST and will be televised by MLB Network. … Connor Lien, expected to contend for an outfield spot with the M-Braves next spring, is scuffling in the AFL. He is hitting .171 with a homer, 18 strikeouts and two walks in 41 at-bats for Peoria. Still, Baseball America’s Bill Ballew calls Lien “one of my top sleepers in the organization.” … Jackson native and Ole Miss alumnus Cody Satterwhite, a veteran minor league pitcher, is on the U.S. roster for the first Premier 12 international tournament set for Nov. 8-21. Pool play is in Taiwan and Japan with the semifinals and finals in Tokyo. According to Baseball America, Premier 12 is the top senior event for the International Baseball Federation, now re-branded as the World Baseball Softball Confederation. Satterwhite, currently a New York Mets farmhand, is joined on the American squad by former M-Braves star Tyler Pastornicky and Biloxi Shuckers alum Brett Phillips. … Tampa Bay released former Jackson State catcher Jovany Felipe, who batted .182 in rookie ball this summer after signing as an undrafted free agent. … The Belhaven-William Carey rivalry apparently is no more. With the Blazers moving to NCAA Division III, their 2016 schedule does not include the NAIA Crusaders, their longtime rivals in the Gulf Coast Athletic Conference and Southern States Athletic Conference. BU will play Maloney Trophy rivals Millsaps and Mississippi College next season. Carey is playing NCAA D-II’s Delta State and MC in 2016, as well as NAIA Tougaloo.

23 Oct

campus notes

Circle the dates of March 6, April 22-24 and, most notably, May 13-15. Those are the dates when new Auburn coach Butch Thompson will send his Tigers out against Southern Miss, Ole Miss and Mississippi State in 2016. Aberdeen native and ex-Itawamba Community College star Thompson, a popular and well-respected assistant coach at State the previous seven seasons, has taken the reins on the Plains, where he was an assistant from 2006-08. Auburn will play USM in a tournament in Pensacola, Fla., in March, visit Oxford to play Ole Miss in April and host State in May in the next-to-last SEC weekend. … Ole Miss’ Will Golsan went on a tear in the Cal Ripken Baseball League playoffs back in the summer, batting .438 with six runs in five games en route to winning the championship. The sophomore out of New Hope High has had his moments during the Rebels’ fall ball scrimmages, as well, registering a four-hit game last weekend. UM has two more scrimmages slated for this weekend. … Southern Miss will begin its 5-game Fall World Series on Tuesday at Taylor Park. The last game is set for Nov. 3, which will conclude fall ball for the Golden Eagles. Senior pitchers Luke Lowery and Cody Livingston will manage the two squads in the World Series. … Jacob Barfield, a sophomore transfer from Wharton County (Texas) Junior College, put an exclamation point on Mississippi State’s Bulldog World Series with a three-run, last-inning home run for the Grays on Wednesday night. Cole Gordon homered for the Maroon team, which won the 5-game series. … Delta State concluded fall ball last weekend with the final two games of its Green and White Series. Compiling three-hit games were Luke Stanley, Erick Santiago and Josh Peden, while Westin Stringer, Itawamba CC transfer Brady Chambley and Dalton Moats, a former Coastal Carolina standout, delivered stout pitching performances.

23 Oct

here and there

Former Picayune High star T.J. House, whose 2015 season with Cleveland was derailed by arm problems, is doing a rehab assignment with Scottsdale of the Arizona Fall League. Left-hander House, 25, who last pitched on June 8, worked a spiffy 1-2-3 inning on Thursday, throwing eight pitches. House went 5-3 with a 3.35 ERA for the Indians in 2014 and made the rotation in spring training this year. After four starts, and with an 0-4 record and a 13.15 ERA, he went on the disabled list and then was sent to the minors. He was 0-2, 3.38 in five minor league appearances before being shut down. House’s teammates on the AFL Scorpions include Richton High product JaCoby Jones (Detroit) and Ole Miss alum Stuart Turner (Minnesota), who were in the lineup on Thursday – and went a combined 0-for-8 in a 7-6 loss to Surprise. … Mississippi State product Adam Frazier (Pittsburgh) is 4-for-6 with three walks in two games for Glendale in the AFL. … Ex-Ole Miss star Drew Pomeranz had shoulder surgery on Thursday. The Oakland A’s left-hander shifted from the rotation to the bullpen last season, putting up a 2.61 ERA in 44 relief appearances after posting a 4.63 ERA in nine starts. His 2016 role reportedly is still undecided.

22 Oct

a bright spot

Considering the Chicago Cubs’ star-crossed relationship with the World Series – no titles since 1908, no appearances since 1945 – it’s more than a little ironic that one of the greatest single-game pitching performances in World Series history was delivered by a Cubs hurler. In Game 3 of the ’45 Series, Waynesboro native Claude Passeau threw a one-hit shutout against Detroit. Baseball Digest, in its September/October issue, rated it among the top 10 Series pitching feats of all-time, in the company of legendary games thrown by Don Larsen, Sandy Koufax and Bob Gibson. Passeau, who played at Moss Point High and Millsaps, faced just 28 batters in the 3-0 win at Detroit’s Briggs Stadium that gave the Cubs a 2-1 lead in the series. The Tigers lineup Passeau shut down included Hank Greenberg, Rudy York (who had the lone hit, a second-inning single), Doc Cramer and Meridian native Skeeter Webb. Passeau, a 162-game winner in a big league career that ended in 1947, also pitched well in his other Series start that year, departing in the seventh inning of Game 6 with a 5-3 lead. The Cubs won 8-7 in 12 innings, then lost Game 7 9-3 at Wrigley, still the last World Series game played at the Friendly Confines. P.S. Ex-Ole Miss standout Chris Coghlan, who had a good year with the Cubs (.250, 16 homers, 41 RBIs), didn’t produce in the postseason, going 1-for-12 overall, 0-for-7 in the National League Championship Series. Coghlan got one start against the New York Mets, in Game 2 at Citi Field on Sunday, and was robbed of a home run by Curtis Granderson. … A Butera is going to the 2015 World Series. Sal Butera, who managed the Jackson Generals to a Texas League championship in 1993, is a scout for Toronto and is currently in uniform as a coach. Son Drew is Kansas City’s backup catcher. The Royals lead the Blue Jays 3-2 in the American League Championship Series. Sal won a ring as a backup catcher with Minnesota in 1987.

20 Oct

the other matchup

Forget Young-Dickey and Hendricks-deGrom for a moment. How about Clemens-Boyd? There is a fairly compelling pitching matchup tonight in Tempe, Ariz., when 354-game winner Roger Clemens goes against fellow former Boston Red Sox star Oil Can Boyd in Men’s Senior Baseball League action. Meridian native and ex-Jackson State star Boyd, 56, pitches for the Boston Wolf Pack, Clemens, 53, for the Houston Old Stars. Boyd went 78-77 in 10 big league seasons (1982-91) and pitched for many more years in independent ball. Clemens last pitched in the majors in 2007 but threw in indy ball just a couple years ago. Regardless of what kind of stuff either has left, it should be a good show. P.S. Cody Satterwhite, the former Hillcrest Christian and Ole Miss standout, is currently pitching in the Mexican Pacific League. Satterwhite, in his eighth pro season, posted a 4.38 ERA, two wins and two saves for Triple-A Las Vegas in the New York Mets’ system. The big right-hander is still chasing the big league dream.

19 Oct

in the zone in arizona

Former Richton High star JaCoby Jones has come out swinging in the Arizona Fall League and ranks among the league leaders in several categories. Jones, a shortstop in the Detroit system, is batting .538 (7-for-13) with a league-leading five runs plus two homers (tied for the lead) and four RBIs. Jones, 6 feet 2, 205 pounds, was drafted in the third round out of LSU by Pittsburgh in 2013 and was traded to the Tigers this summer. He batted .250 with six homers, 20 RBIs and 10 steals in 37 games for Erie in the Double-A Eastern League; he was rated the Tigers’ No. 10 prospect at season’s end. … Ole Miss product Stuart Turner, a Minnesota prospect, is on the Scottsdale team with Jones but hasn’t played yet. Turner, a catcher, played for Southern League champ Chattanooga this summer. … Ex-Mississippi State star Adam Frazier went 3-for-4 with a pair of triples and two RBIs in his one AFL game to date with Glendale. Frazier, a lefty-hitting shortstop in the Pirates’ organization, hit .324 in Double-A in 2015 and has a .291 career average over three pro seasons. … Johan Camargo and Connor Lien, who figure to be with the Mississippi Braves in 2016, are playing for Peoria. Shortstop Camargo is 3-for-8, outfielder Lien 1-for-8.