AAA: @ Buffalo Bisons 3, Pawtucket Red Sox 0

Ken Takahashi returned from a week and a half off to start the game with four shutout innings.  He departed in favor of Adam Pettyjohn, who then fired three more scoreless frames in his Bisons debut.  Adam Bostick (pictured) tossed two perfect innings to end the game, fanning four and earning his first save.

Milt Northrop in the Buffalo News does a nice job detailing Adam Pettyjohn’s long trip back from ulcerative colitis in which he lost 65 pounds and his various stops in the minors on the way back to the majors with Cinncinnatti last year.

SSA: Staten Island Yankees 4, Brooklyn Cyclones 3

Game two was rained out, but the Baby Bombers scored in the eighth of game one to edge the Cyclones.  LF Luis Rivera was 3-3 with a walk.  Mark Cohoon gave up three runs on five hits in six innings while striking out four.  Matias Carrillo Jr. (1-1, 1.00) gave up the go-ahead run in the eighth.

The two teams will play a doubleheader on Thursday.

Rookie (GCL): GCL Marlins 5, @ GCL Mets 4

It seems kinda odd on a day filled with rainouts to be writing about a game played in FL, but here we go.  C Nelfi Zapata returned to the Cyclones lineup after a few days off and was 2-3 with a walk to raise his season line to .319/.400/.493.  19-year old Julio Concepcion was 3-4 with a double and is now up to .311/.360/.378 in 26 games.   Concepcion’s numbers are very similar to what he did last year in the DSL.

The B-Mets were rained out and will play two on thursday.

The K-Mets were rained out and will play two on Thursday.

AAA: Pawtucket Red Sox (BOS) (47-53) @ Buffalo Bisons (38-61) – 7:00
RHP Enrique Gonzalez (7-8, 5.52) vs. LHP Ken Takahashi (0-2, 1.91)

The Mets signed LHP Adam Pettyjohn to a minor league contract Tuesday.  He was 1-6 with a 4.68 ERA in 18 games for the Louisville Bats (CIN) last week.  In 2008, he led the IL with 15 wins.  According to the Buffalo News, Pettyjohn will relieve Takahashi, who has been sidelined for ten games with a “slight shoulder problem” and will join the rotation in short order. 

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AA: Binghamton Mets (39-62) @ Altoona Curve (PIT) (41-63)  – 7:05
LHP Eric Niesen (1-5, 7.36) vs. LHP Daniel Moskos (7-8, 3.90)
Niesen has given up at least four runs in each of his last three outings, none of which lasted longer than five innings. 

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SSA: Staten Island Yankees 3, Brooklyn Cyclones 1 (in progress box)
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Rookie (APP): Pulaski Mariners 2, @ Kingsport Mets 1 (delayed by rain, box)
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A+: @ Clearwater Threshers 4, St. Lucie Mets 3

CF Kirk Nieuwenhuis (pictured) was 2-4 with a HR, his tenth, to run his hitting streak to 10 straight games.  Over his streak, Nieuwenhuis is hitting .351 (13-for-37) with three doubles, a triple and a HR.  His two-run bomb in the eighth inning briefly tied the game at 3-3 before Clearwaters scored the go-ahead run off Stephen Clyne who walked three in the eighth inning.

RHP Chris Mason gave up three runs on six hits, a walk and two strikeouts.

A: @ Greensboro Grasshoppers (FLA) 13,  Savannah Sand Gnats 2

The Gnats committed four errors behind Eric Beaulac, who lost despite not allowing an earned run.   Beaulac’s own throwing error brought home the first Grasshoppers run in the first.  SS Wilmer Flores kicked a ball to begin a two-run bottom of the third and a 3B Jefry Marte led to a fourth unearned run in the fifth.  Marte did triple leading off the game to give the Gnats a brief 1-0 lead.

Sean Ratliff homered for the third straight game.

Beaulac’s (6-6, 3.63) final line: 5 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 3 K.

1.  The Mets have given a lot of newspapers the chance to show off their funny and snarky sides.

Wallace Matthews of Newsday might win the award however:

The Mets are the only organization in professional sports that can call a news conference to announce it has killed the Wicked Witch – and wind up running over Toto instead.

They are the only organization that, given a golden opportunity to rid itself of a clubhouse cancer, ends up blowing its own head off with a shotgun.

They are the only group currently known to harbor not one but two people who actually claim to have liked and respected Tony Bernazard.

Steve Politi of the Star-Ledger wants some career advice of his own:

Since the Mets are suddenly offering free career advice to sportswriters, I have a question for Jeff Wilpon: How do I become your new crisis management consultant?

Minaya made Steve Goldman at Baseball Prospectus angry, so Goldman compared the Rubin episode to the famous, (or is that disastrous?) Senator McCarthy-Army hearings.

2. The conversations that Rubin had with COO Jeff Wilpon clearly went beyond the abstract, “how does one get in the business” type chats that Rubin insisted was the extent  in the aftermath of Monday’s press conference.  To quote Rubin, “He told me to talk to SNY exec Curt Gowdy Jr., who told me basically that I was a bit “too flat.”"  Wilpon also recalled telling Rubin to get in touch with Mets AGM John Ricco about baseball ops positions.  This is more involved than Rubin originally admitted.  It’s not “lobbying” for a job, as Omar Minaya called it, but it is clear that Rubin was more interested than he initially let on in new positions with the Mets and SNY.

3. It seems to me that when people, like Adam Rubin, or the others who supposedly call Jeff Wilpon once a week to ask for advice, they really want a job or failing that, access to his contacts, like Curt Gowdy Jr. or John Ricco.

As far as I can tell, the best advice Wilpon can offer is: “be born to a really, really rich dad.”  Here are all of the non-Mets/Citi Field accomplishments listed for Wilpon in the Mets 2009 Media guide:

-Chief Operating Officer of the Brooklyn Cyclones (Fred Wilpon is the Chair of the Board of the Brooklyn Baseball Companies, the Cyclones parent company)

-Executive VP at Sterling Equities…. (founded by Fred Wilpon)

-Serves on the Boards of may non-profit organizations ….

-A former catcher, he was drafted by the Montreal Expos in 1983 and played part of that season with Jamestown (A) of the New York Penn League

4. This is likely to be my last post on this specific Rubin/Minaya/Wilpon topic.  It is no longer a baseball story, but a media relations, criticism and organizational politics story.  Those are all interesting topics to me, but I want this space to maintain its primary focus on the minors.

In yesterday’s Daily Dish at Baseball America, Matt Eddy wrote about Savannah SS Wilmer Flores.  Eddy talked to a scout for an AL team who had this to say about the 17-year old:

“Flores grew on me. He can hit,” the scout said. “I don’t know how much power he’s going to have—and he’s a legit 25 runner with well below-average athleticism—but he has a knack for putting the barrel on the ball. And he shows plate discipline and pitch recognition at a young age.

“His hands are really good and they allow him to manipulate the barrel and adjust to pitches in all parts of the zone. They help his defense, too. But he’s not a good athlete and he can’t run at all.

“But now, he just lays the barrel on the ball and throws it in the alley or in front of a outfielder for a single or double. I think as he gets more experience, he’ll learn to really attack it when he gets his pitch.

“He’s a big leaguer, I think, but not a shortstop for sure. And the approach has to improve, and he has to develop a lot more power if he’s going to be everyday on a corner.”

Eddy runs an excellent chart comparing the performance of 17 and 18 year olds in full season leagues over the last four seasons

SSA: Aberdeen Ironbirds (BAL) 2, @ Brooklyn Cyclones 1

Collin McHugh (5-2, 3.64) gave up two runs, one earned in seven innings, but took his second loss Tuesday night.  McHugh struck out five, walked three and allowed four hits.

3B Tyler Vaughn was the only ‘Clone with more than one hit, but committed Brooklyn’s only error of the game.

I’m listening to Edit – Straight Heat at the moment.  Beautiful beats and strings; it’s absolutely sick.

Rookie (APP): Pulaski Mariners @ Kingsport Mets – ppd by rain

Rookie (GCL): GCL Mets 10, @ GCL Astros 4

25 (!) year old RF Scott Grimes led the way for the GCL offense in this one going 3-4 with a double, a walk and 3 RBI.  CF Javier Rodriguez was 2-5 with a double.  2B Roy Van Gurp was 0-3 with two walks and three stolen bases, accounting for half of the Mets six thefts.