wsuprise24

Haniger has a cannon of an arm. That's probably what inspired the comparison

I find it shocking that Jungmann had previously been using his index finger as his spin finger on his breaking ball. It's only been a few years since I pitched and I dealt with plenty of different pitching instructors (mostly Chris Bosio) and I've never heard of anyone ever using a grip like that. I looked for some older shots of Jungmann and sure enough: http://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/host.madison.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/5/6c/56c5125e-c882-11e0-8c26-001cc4c002e0/4e4b37a6cb69f.image.jpg His middle finger is down past the seam, and his index finger is on the seam, providing the spin. Just by holding a baseball, you can tell that this is a pretty awkward grip. The middle finger is longer and thus leaves the ball last, so having that on the seam and the index finger more on top of the ball, providing stability, works much better. He'd already been having a solid season, but in the long run I think this should really help his curve become more of a downward, strikeout pitch.

Murphy hit 97 in the first when Gomez spun himself into the ground on strike three, but that was easily his fastest of the game. I guess facing a big leaguer plus it being the first batter of the game will do that.

Hawkers are the vendors that walk up and down the aisles selling food.

Sad news today in the Timber Rattler family. Brock, everyone's favorite hawker, passed away monday night. If you've ever been to a game at Fox Cities Stadium, I'm sure you remember him. He truly loved his job. I've had season tickets for over a decade and am now in my second year of working for the team and in the hundreds of games I've been to, I never saw him let up for even a moment. His enthusiasm was unmatched. There will be a moment of silence in honor of Brock before the game tonight. Edit: Post crescent now has an article http://www.postcrescent.com/article/20120516/APC01/305160153?fb_ref=artsharebottom&fb_source=home_multiline

bookmarked

I'm probably missing something, but where is Nick Ramirez?

This is correct. I'm actually the guy that types the codes into the Gameday program while I watch the games from the press box at Fox Cities Stadium. Every pitch is recorded, so the pitch counts for Rattler games are accurate (home games at least). Brevard County doesn't seem to have anyone doing the Gameday for their games, so I wouldn't be surprised if some of the other Midwest League teams don't either. Cool! Any word if velocities will be available? Let me know if you take another job so I can apply for yours. We don't have the PitchFX technology at the stadium. The pitch locations are manually entered by me, so I honestly wouldn't pay too much attention to those. They'll be pretty accurate horizontally (inside/outside), but I'm looking down from straight behind the batter so I have a bad angle for judging the height of pitches. There is a gun at the stadium, so I can see the speed of every pitch, but Gameday is programmed to get its velocities from the PitchFX cameras, which we don't have. I'll be able to let you guys know after the game what sort of velocities certain pitchers were sitting at. Today was my first game so I couldn't pay attention to that as much, but I remember that Hawley was consistently hitting 93 and the other team's 6'11" reliever was hitting 90. I'll just be working a few games when I can until I'm done with finals, but starting in mid-May I'll be watching every pitch of every home game, so I should be able to answer just about any question that you guys might have about the T-Rats

This is correct. I'm actually the guy that types the codes into the Gameday program while I watch the games from the press box at Fox Cities Stadium. Every pitch is recorded, so the pitch counts for Rattler games are accurate (home games at least). Brevard County doesn't seem to have anyone doing the Gameday for their games, so I wouldn't be surprised if some of the other Midwest League teams don't either.