Clay Harris - FSL POTW

The Florida State League announced Threshers infielder Clay Harris as its Player of the Week for the period June 23-29, 2008.

During the period, the Slidel, La. native produced 12 hits in 22 at-bats for a .545 average. Four of Harris’ hits were home runs, including three in consecutive at-bats on June 29 against St. Lucie. Harris drove in 12 RBI during the week.
A Louisiana State University product, Harris was taken in the 9th round of the 2005 draft by the Philadelphia Phillies. For the season he his hitting .350 with a team-leading seven home runs, and his 31 RBI place him fourth on the team.

2008 Futures Game - Update

Antonio Bastardo was also named to the World team, but due to injury he will not actually play.

Other players previously announced as taking part in the game are catcher Lou Marson, infielder Jason Donald, and outfielder Greg Golson who will play for the U.S. team and right-handed pitcher Carlos Carrasco who will play on the World team.

All are former Threshers.

Tempers Flare at St. Lucie

Clay Harris homered in his first three at-bats Saturday night, and the St. Lucie Mets apparently didn't like it. After driving in five runs on three long balls, Harris was plunked by Casey Hoorelbeke in the seventh inning. Threshers starter Edgar Garcia responded by hitting the first batter he faced in the bottom half of the inning, earning him an ejection to go along with his eighth win of the season. Hoorelbeke seemingly didn't care that the bases were loaded when Harris batted in the eighth inning, hitting him with another pitch to allow Harris to pick up his sixth RBI of the evening. Hoorelbeke was ejected. The bean balls didn't stop there, however, as St. Lucie's German Marte was tossed in the 9th for hitting Tuffy Gosewisch.

Certainly an eventful night on the other coast as the Threshers improved to 3-6 for the second half.

2008 Futures Game

The Phillies organization will be well-represented at the 2008 Futures Game, placing four players on the roster. All are former Threshers.

Catcher Lou Marson, infielder Jason Donald, and outfielder Greg Golson will play for the U.S. team, while right-handed pitcher Carlos Carrasco will play on the World team.

The 2008 Futures Game will be played as part of the All-Star festivities at Yankee Stadium in New York next month.

Let's Play Two

It's that time of the year, huh?

Tonight's game at St. Lucie was postponed due to rain. The two teams will attempt to play a doubleheader tomorrow with the first game starting at 5:00 PM.

And who says it's too early to scoreboard watch? Dunedin lost tonight 8-4 to Jupiter, so the Threshers didn't fall back any further tonight. In fact, all of the West Divisions that were able to play tonight lost (Sarasota 6-1 to Vero, Fort Myers 3-1 to Brevard). Hopefully the good guys can put together a nice stretch here pretty soon and quickly get back into the thick of things.

Phillies Minor League Players of the Week

From Larry Shenk:

**Pitcher: RHP Justin De Fratus, Williamsport. 0-0 for 1st start in short-season ball, 6 innings, 4 hits, 2 walks, 6 strikeouts, tagged for an unearned run in the 5th inning. Threw 61 fast balls, 17 sliders and 17 changes. The 20-year-old was an 11th-round selection a year ago out of Ventura (CA) College. Broke in pro ball last summer at Gulf Coast League, 2-3, for 8 starts.

**Player: SS Jason Donald, Reading. In 8 games, batted .400 with 12 hits (2 doubles, 2 homers), 6 RBI and 8 runs scored. Hitting .378 in June, 4 homers, 13 RBI. For the season, .304-8-36. The 23-year-old was selected in the 3rd round in 2006 out of the University of Arizona.

6/26 Roster Moves

A whole slew of moves to tell you about today. Firstly, Kris Benson concluded his rehab stint with the Threshers and was moved to Lehigh Valley (AAA).

Brett Harker, with his sparkling 1.43 ERA, was promoted to Reading (AA).

Alex Concepcion was promoted from Williamsport to Clearwater.

Carlos Monasterios was activated from the DL.

Finally, Orlando Guevara was added from Reading.

Game Day - Threshers vs Vero Beach (Noon)

3:00 Update - Threshers 2, Vero Beach 5 (FINAL)

Story on the main site by clicking here.

Original Post

Special noon o'clock (yes, that's right, noon o'clock) start here at Bright House Field today.

It's a toasty 92 under partly cloudy skies with a wind from right to left at 5 MPH.

Lineups:


Vero Beach

Jennings
Baldelli
Suarez
Fields
Royster
Groce
Callender
De La Rosa
Lopez

Tiffany


Threshers

Berry
Leon
Cardenas
Milner
Taylor
Harris
Spencer
Gosewisch
Hernandez

Savery

Game Day: Threshers vs Vero Beach (7:00 PM)

It's Phinley's birthday tonight, so I'll be around the park documenting that with still photos. There might be some updates tonight when I get free moments.

Game Day - Threshers vs Vero Beach Devil Rays (7:00 PM)

9:30 Update - Vero Beach 3, Threshers 7 (FINAL)

Full story now on the main site.


Original Post - 1:10 PM EDT

Greetings Thresher fans! Hopefully this new work week is getting off to a great start for all of you.

Speaking of great starts, I was just checking up on Reading (AA affiliate of the Phillies) and saw that Tyson Brummett had a great start for them last Thursday, his first with the club since being called up earlier this month. He threw 8.2 innings, giving up just six hits and three runs while striking out five. Sam Walls, another former Thresher, picked up the save in the game, throwing the last out of the contest. Walls has picked up three saves in four opportuties.

Just a little word of protocol from here on out. While I will always strive to keep this blog as up-to-date as possible, sometimes other duties around the park will limit my ability to do that (i.e. pulling tarp). However, in the event of a postponement, it should be posted almost immediately after that decision is made. The official site will have that information, as well.

Game Day - Threshers vs Vero Beach Devil Rays (4:00 PM)

8:03 Update

Clearwater 0 Vero Beach 2 (Final)

4:30 PM Update

The tarp is currently on the field, and we are in a rain delay.

Original Post

It's a bright and sunny, beautiful day at Bright House Field... or is it? We just got done taking the tarp off for the second time today (the staff came in at 10:00 AM this morning to take it off from yesterday, only to have to put it back on about 50 minutes later when a somewhat unexpected downpour hit the area. Hopefully we're done for the day, and we start at 4:00 PM.

The Vero Beach Devil Rays are in town, but they are without David Price and JT Hall who were promoted to Montgomery (AA) last night.

No changes for the Threshers today.

If anything changes with the weather, we'll let you know.

Game Day - Threshers vs Dunedin Blue Jays (6:30 PM)

6:05 PM Update

TONIGHT'S GAME HAS BEEN POSTPONED TO A LATER DATE.

4:40 PM Update

We're getting tons of phone calls into the ticket office here... as of right now, we are still scheduled for first pitch to happen at 6:30 PM. Check here and threshersbaseball.com for the latest updates.

3:15 PM Update

We just put the tarp out on the field which to me is actually a good sign. The field could have been played on at this point, so we're just taking the precaution in the event of additional rain.

There is more rain out in the Gulf, so again, we'll just have to see.


Orginal Post

It's a wet one here at Bright House Field today, but we're still anticipating the game being played at 6:30 PM.

In roster news, Jay Miller was sent to Lakewood today and Herman Demmink was placed on the DL.

Benson Feels Good After Rehab Start with Threshers

From Philly.com...

Benson armed with optimism after Clearwater start

Phinley's 2nd Birthday

Tuesday, June 24 is Phinley's birthday, and it's sure to be a night full of fun at Bright House Field! Phinley has invited a lot of his closest friends to come celebrate with him, and many of them have already called to tell the friendly shark that they're coming!

The RSVP List

Thunderbug (Lightning)
D-Jay (Jays)
RalliGator and Mr, Red (Reds)
Blue (Yankees)
Sluggernaught (Rays)
SideKick (Tiger Schulmmans Karate)
Buddy the Recycling Dolphin (City of Clearwater)
Inflatable Raymond (Rays)
Roi The Koi (Nice Green and Beautiful)


P.S. If anyone has any idea what "Sluggernaught" is, please let me know!

Game Day - Threshers vs Dunedin Blue Jays (7:05 PM)

Big night here at Bright House Field as the second half of the season gets underway. Tons of roster moves were made today, as seen in the post below this one.

Probably won't have updates as frequent and in-depth of the other night as I have to excersise my photography skills some during the game, and Catch 47 is here broadcasting the game tonight, as well.

Roster Additions - 6/19

Kris Benson, Ben Pfinsgraff, Drew Naylor, Herman Demmink, and Michael Taylor were all added to the Clearwater roster today.


RHP Pfinsgraff, RHP Naylor, INF Demmink, and OF Taylor were promoted to the Threshers today from Lakewood (A).

Pfinsgraf, a reliever, had a 3.41 ERA and picked up two saves in five opportunities for the BlueClaws and picked up 37 strikeouts in 37 innings. A Clemson product, Demmink was batting .231 at Lakewood.

Taylor’s impressive .361 batting average and 90 hits were leading the South Atlantic League, and he ranked fifth in RBI with 50. For the season he had drawn 31 walks to also lead the SAL in on-base percentage at .441. Taylor, a fifth-round pick of the Phillies in 2007, was recently named the SAL Player of the Month for May by the Topps Company and Minor League Baseball.

Naylor, a native of Australia, leads the SAL in strikeouts with 97 and also has two complete games while compiling a 5-3 record and a 2.99 ERA. He joined Taylor at the SAL All-Star Game and was named the Most Outstanding Pitcher.

Brummett Named Phillies Pitcher of the Week

Tyson Brummett, just recently promoted to Reading (AA), was named the Phillies Minor League Pitcher of the Week for the week ending June 15. The UCLA product, drafted in the 7th round of the June 2007 draft, won his only start of the week. He struck out seven batters in eight innings while allowing just one run. He won his last two starts with the Threshers before being promoted to Reading earlier this week.

Brummett to Reading

Tyson Brummett was promoted to Reading (AA) today. Brummett started the season at Lakewood (A), going 3-0 there with a 1.95 ERA in six starts. He made his Clearwater debut in early May and went 2-3, posting a 3.59 ERA in eight starts. The right-handed UCLA product had come on strong of late, winning his last two starts including giving up just two hits in his next to last start against St. Lucie.

Game Day - Threshers vs Tampa Yankees (7:00 PM)

Tuesday Update

Instead of leaving the massiveness that are the game night updates up, each day after a home game we're just going to put up links to the previous night's play-by-play from milb.com and the game recap on the main site.

mIlb.com play-by-play

ThreshersBaseball.com Recap


Orginal Post

A couple of roster moves to tell you about on this, the first day after the FSL All-Star Break. Andrew Carpenter has been activated from the DL, and Carlos Leon has been added to the roster.

A look at the radar shows some rain out in the Gulf, so we'll be keeping an eye on that.

Juan Samuel Inducted to Phillies Wall of Fame

Just received word out of Philadelphia this morning that Juan Samuel is going to be the 2008 inductee into the Phillies Wall of Fame. From the team's press release:

"Samuel was the Phillies’ regular second baseman from 1984 through 1988. As a rookie in 1984, he set modern club records for most at-bats in a season (701), most triples (19) and most stolen bases (72). He became the first player in major league history to reach double digits in doubles, triples, home runs and stolen bases in each of his first four seasons.

The 47-year-old Samuel, current third base coach for Baltimore, will be inducted prior to the Friday night, August 8 game against the Pittsburgh Pirates."

Darren Daulton, Lenny Dykstra, John Kruk and Greg Gross were the other former Phillies who were finalists to be this year's inductee.

All-Star Game Weekend - Saturday Night Update

Pictures from the 2008 All-Star Game...
(click for larger image - all pictures by Taylor Flatt)

Edgar Garcia was named the Most Outstanding Pitcher for the 2008 FSL All-Star Game earlier tonight, a perfect topping to a fantastic night for the Threshers representatives on the West Division's team. I'm going to get a story up for the official site and then update this entry with pictures and the like after that.

Updated at 1:00 AM

Well, I actually never got around to the story for the main site. It wouldn't be good without the final score which I actually just didn't write down, and the final hasn't been updated on milb.com. The West did win though, and the Threshers were good. Gus Milner played the entire game in right and went 1-4 with a walk and two runs scored. He also made a great defensive play hustling to a ball that was hit towards the line in right, getting off a nice throw to force the runner to stay at first after he hinted towards making an attempt to stretch it out into a double.

Garcia threw a 1-2-3 second inning, including picking up a strike out for the second out. Brett Harker pitched in the sixth and gave up two quick singles before retiring the next three batters, including two via the punch-out. Matt German entered the game with two outs in the seventh and like Harker was greeted by a hit, but he managed to retire the next batter to end the inning. He remained in the game for one batter in the eighth, making him strike out looking.

All-Star Game Weekend - Saturday Afternoon Update

Good afternoon from a sunny Viera, Florida! Hope all is well back in Clearwater or from wherever you may be reading.




Threshers coaches and players before the All-Star Gala


The gala last night at the hotel was a great time. For dinner the players were all assigned seats scattered throughout the room, and us interns who made the trip had the pleasure of having the company of Ft. Myers right-handed pitcher Jeff Manship and some of his family.



Following dinner, Frank Viola (pitched for the Twins, Mets, Red Sox, Reds and Blue Jays) delivered a nice address to the crowd. After that the party shifted outside to the pool late into the evening. Everyone enjoyed themselves.


This morning a handful of the staff that made its way over for the festivities headed out to Cocoa Beach for a few hours. I personally found it odd that we were going to the beach until someone reminded me it's something we don't really ever get the chance to do in the summer with our busy schedule at Bright House Field.


While we were relaxing on the beach, the players were participating in an autograph session, and I believe they're all over at Space Coast Stadium now having team pictures and the like taken.


We'll be heading over to the stadium ourselves in a couple hours. Check back here because hopefully we'll have a lot more pictures and the like from tonight's festivities.

All-Star Game Weekend - Friday Afternoon Update

Welcome to Viera, Florida! The Threshers players and quite a few of the front office staff departed from Bright House Field this morning at just after 11:00 AM and arrived here in Viera this afternoon at around 2:30 PM here at the Holiday Inn.

Just to give you a little bit of a behind the scenes look, when we arrived in our rooms, we were greeted by a bag with the passes that we'll need for all the various events this weekend along with our ticket for tomorrow night's game.

There is an event here at the hotel in about an hour, a social hour of sorts for everyone. It should be a fun time. If there is anything of much substance to add tonight, we'll update later on.

Welcome back!

After a couple months off, we're pleased to bring back the Inside the Clearwater Threshers blog!

We're just going to jump right back into things with exciting updates from this weekend's Florida State League All-Star Game in Brevard County, so look forward to that! The Threshers will be represented by Edgar Garcia, Matt German, Brett Harker, and Gus Milner along with the coaching staff who will lead the West Division's team.

On most home game nights, we'll be updating the blog live throughout the game with instant updates. It's the next best thing to radio, so check frequently starting Monday night as the Threshers host the Tampa Yankees at 7:00 PM EST. If there is ever a game during which we have to cover other responsibilties in the park, we'll try and post ahead of time to let everyone know there won't be updates that night.

Tell all of your friends that we're back! We know we have some mighty big shoes to fill (thanks, Kevin!), but we're going to try our best.

Thanks for stopping by, and we'll talk to you soon!