Kasuls started and played 2nd last night, O'neal was still on 3rd. But I do agree with you Coach is giving O'Neal every chance he can at 3rd, unfortunately he has not been able to turn it around.
The crappy thing is that O'Neal started the season 7-27 .260, since then is 0-32 in his last 32 AB's.
Meanwhile Camp is 3-15 on the season, but 0-6 in his last 6 AB's. It shows you how much we miss Windham at 3rd.
He was only hitting .250, but was a rock there, 0 errors on the season. The advantage Camp gives you if he becomes the 3B is that he has an OBA of .400 while O'Neal is .188 and even the before mentioned Windham was only .283.
Guys, I know we look at BA%, but we really need to look at OB%.
Cantrelle .479
McKinnon .434
Lott .433
Breaux .418
Camp .400 limited duty
Dupuy .375 limited duty
Kasuls .371
Hannie .364 limited duty
Toro .333 limited duty
Veillon .327
Frank .320 limited duty
Monica .319
Wiley .318 limited duty
Spears .308 limited duty
Mitchell .300 limited duty
Lahare .296 injured right now
Lochridge .188
If Camp or Dupuy are capable of playing 3B one of them needs to be there. We can't afford a guy getting on base less than twice out of plate appearances, when we have two infielders who are close to 4 out of 10 plate appearances.
O'Neal has really struggled with pitch recognition and has squared up very few balls this year. The hit last night that was snagged by the leaping second baseman may be the best ball I've seen him hit. The down side is he lets numerous belt high fastballs go without swinging and then swings at balls that are a foot off the plate or shoulder high. He really seems to be having trouble identifying the strike zone right now.
To a lesser extent, the same could be said for Monica as well. Last night he was down in the count, worked it to a full count, and wound up swinging at a pitch at his shoulders. You could read the frustration in his face when he stopped to drop the gloves and bat. In Handy's case I know you're there to drive in runs, but it's OK to take a walk.
As it's been pointed out, Lochridge is 0-31 since his last hit. During that stretch, Cantrelle has gone 32 for 82 (.390). He also leads the team in slugging (.606) and OB% (.479). Cantrelle was recruited to be the starting SS from day 1 and he damn well should get a longer leash than everyone else.
McKinnon is my favorite player on this entire team, that kid is a grinder
Quit with it. He has no leash.
The point all along was twofold:
Because of the opportunities given to Cantrelle, no other player should be judged against him. Its his position, he has broken the slump two years in a row and we need to enjoy his great play at this juncture.
Second, others don't get half a chance at whatever position we are trying to fill - we basically had four revolving doors last year. Third was closed defensively with .177 offensive production. Left was eventually closed with .226 offensive production and suspect defense. DH was never closed with Lott on the bench and first base stayed with revolving players none of which gave much offense.
This year we gave Lott a good chance to get in a rhythm and DH now has .337 and 433 numbers. Ding Ding Ding
Again this year, we have managed to keep the revolving door going in left field and third base with no production in those positions and have used LaHare and Monica at first base and that has had little effective offensive production.
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