Originally Posted by
RaginDave
Just took time for the process to work. We had a lot of new pieces early in the season and the bats were catching up, remember of our position players guys like Pastore, Torres and Alexander were brand new, Amadee, Stelly, Yuhasz, Lafleur and others were not regular contributors last season (Lafleur was due to injury). Now they have been playing for 1/2 a season plus and they have caught up.
Pitching was similar, we did not know what the weekend staff would look like, we were Martinez, Morgan and TBD, now we are Hermann, Morgan and Flune, LP has moved to the pen where he belongs, new guys are getting comfortable in their roles. New and veteran guys are coming off injuries and/or figuring out little tweaks that make them better vs certain hitters.
I can't exactly figure out the fielding change, but some of that has to do with guys playing new positions or just getting better at eliminating the mistakes. Amadee has been solid at 3rd base, his range is probably not the best over there, but he does not make big mistakes, the Higgs, Mandino, Alexander, Stelly combination has worked in the outfield to lessen some of the mistakes out there, Pastore/Amadee/Lafleur combination at the corners is working better now as well. We have one of the best middle infield combinations in the country with JT and Debo, Torres is a man behind the plate and Wargo aint to shabby, Mandino and Alexander are both really good and fast CF's. In baseball if you are good up the middle (Catcher, 2nd, SS and CF) you will be good defensively, we are really good up the middle. That and our pitchers are making it much easier to play defense when people can't hit your pitching, I think that has been the main reason our defense has improved so much.