Mike Miller, a former Cal Poly shortstop and current professional in the Boston Red Sox system, joined the podcast this week. 

Miller told lots of stories and gave lots of background I didn’t know. Did you know he went unrecruited out of high school and attended Cal Poly on his own for a year without playing baseball?

Miller discussed life in the minors, PB&J, and an organization called More than a Game. 

As always, feedback is welcomed. 

On Tuesday night, Cal Poly alum and former Big West Conference Player of the Year Mitch Haniger made his major-league debut. The 25 year-old outfielder started in left field, batting 7th. Facing Noah Syndergaard, Haniger struck out in his first at-bat and grounded out to second base in his second.

Here’s a second picture of Mitch Haniger that hasn’t been used by everyone and their brother. By Owen Main

In his third at-bat, Haniger tripled toward the pool in Chase Field’s right-centerfield gap. The hit drove in two D-Backs as they tried to come back against New York’s Thor. Here’s a link to a video, though you’ll likely have to watch one of those infernal “Toomgis” AMPM commercials before you’re treated to the sweet Haniger swing.

Later in the game, Haniger roped a hanging breaking ball down the left field line for his second hit — a double. Haniger became the first Diamondbacks player to notch a triple for his first big league hit and also the first to have three RBI’s in his debut.

Two springs ago, Haniger was in his first spring training with the Diamondbacks when I caught up with him for a conversation. After starting that season poorly in AA ball, Haniger was demoted to High A in the California League. This year, he worked his way all the way to Arizona’s Reno affiliate, where he was tearing it up.

Arizona brought him up tonight and it paid dividends.

Congrats, Mitch. You’ve got a whole lot of Cal Poly fans rooting for you.

PVG’s glove has always been solid, but he used the bat to end the game last night. By Owen Main

The bases were loaded with one out in the bottom of the tenth inning, and Peter Van Gansen came through. On the first pitch of the at-bat, Van Gansen drove the ball down the right field line for a game winning hit.

For video of Van Gansen’s walk-off, click here. 

So far this season, Van Gansen’s slash line is .313/.389/.413 in 39 games. He has two homers and 18 RBIs. He’s even stolen five bases.

Also on his Northwest League All-Star team was former Mustang Brian Mundell. Playing for low-A Boise, Mundell is has a .267/.354/.389 slash line to go with two home runs and 19 RBIs.

Mundell started the game at first base and went 0-2. Van Gansen came into the game as a pinch hitter and went 1-2 with a pair of walks.

Click here for photos of Van Gansen and Mundell signing autographs prior to the game.

He wasn’t Cole Hamels, David Price, or Sonny Gray, The Dodgers got pitching at the trade deadline. Mat Latos was a fine low risk, high possible reward pick-up, but I’m really pumped about Alex Wood.

Zachary Bird was a promising young starting pitcher for the Dodgers, but they got proven commodities in return. By Owen Main

First, who did they give up for Wood? As MLB Trade Rumors reports, they gave up just three players — Hector Olivera, Paco Rodriguez, and Zachary Bird. I saw Bird pitch this summer in San Jose for Rancho Cucamonga against the Giants. Bird only pitched two innings that day, walking four batters and tallying 50 pitches in those innings.

In return, they got a Braves’ top prospect, Mat Latos, and the aforementioned Wood.

Alex Wood will make his first start for the Dodgers tomorrow. By Kaotate, via Wikimedia Commons

I’ve followed Wood kind of closely this season because, to be honest, he was on my fantasy team for much of the year. Wood’s funky delivery makes his small step back this season a little more worrisome, but if he can be a fourth or fifth starter for the next four seasons, turn in ERA’s under 4, and decent peripherals, the Dodgers feel like they can win with other big-name, top-of-the-rotation guys.

If he can be a poor man’s Chris Sale — a lefty with a funky delivery who stays healthy — then this move will look amazing in two years or so. That’s when the Dodgers will be rolling out Clayton Kershaw, Zack Greinke (or David Price) and Julio Urias as their top three pitchers. At that point, having Wood as a low-cost alternative to eat up innings and offset the high salaries of Kershaw and the number-two will be a fantastic value.

Think about it. Two years from now, Wood will be that young lefty starter who is fun to watch, super effective, and cost-controlled. Did I meantion that Corey Seager will be playing third base, Joc Pederson will still be roaming the outfield, and Wood might be competing for a starting role with guys like Jose DeLeon.

Many of the above would be but a memory if the Dodgers had traded for Hamels or Price or even Cueto.

The Dodgers will also be coming off a recent championship. I’m talking best-case scenarios here for the Dodgers, so why not?

Earlier this week, Padres prospect and Cal Poly alum Nick Torres was gracious enough to spend some time after a game in Lake Elsinore to talk some about how the past year-plus of professional baseball has been for him.

Here are some things I wrote about the experience over two days in Lake Elsinore. It includes a lot of words and photos.

Nick Torres has spent a little more than a year in professional baseball and has found success this season. By Owen Main

Drafted in the fourth round in 2015 by the Padres, Nick Torres had a great first half of the summer in Fort Wayne, San Diego’s class Low A affiliate. He hit .326 in 77 games for the Tin Caps and was promoted to Lake Elsinore three weeks ago. Since his promotion, Torres has continued his hot hitting, maintaining a .844 combined OPS and a .326 combined batting average.

I happened to be in the region for work for a weeks and decided to take in a few of the Storm’s home games against the Inland Empire 66ers (Angels).

The first thing to note is that Lake Elsinore hasn’t been very successful in winning games so far this season. At 7-22 in the second half coming into Monday night’s game, they have the worst record in the California League during that time, and the second-lowest record overall (38-61). Torres, who hits in the three-hole, seems to be one of the most competent hitters in the lineup.

ON MONDAY, Torres was busy right away dealing with the blistering late-July sun. With two outs in the first inning, Inland Empire’s Andrew Daniel hits a bleeding line drive right at Torres, and directly into the sun. The ball dropped in front of him in right field, and a few batters later the Storm were down 2-0.

Despite the ball lost in the sun, Torres does look more agile in right field — a little quicker to break and also seems like maybe he’s gotten a little faster. In the second inning, he sprints toward the line and slides to keep a ball from rolling into the corner, holding the opposing hitter to a long single.

Torres singles and is stranded in the first, but manages a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the third. His RBI gets Lake Elsinore a little closer. In the bottom of the sixth inning, Torres singles, steals second base (WHAT?) and scores on a single. After getting pictures of all of it, I figure I can get back to my hotel (an hour away) and prepare for my next day of work, having safely secured a number of photos.

I was wrong.

In the bottom of the 10th inning, Torres’ sacrifice fly is a walk-off. Considering I’ve left two games early this season that have ended in 9th-inning, game-winning grand slams, this early departure wasn’t my worst, but I suppose it does take the bronze medal.

TUESDAY night is hotter than Monday, but it’s also Taco Tuesday at Lake Elsinore Diamond. The promotion is a standard amazing series of deals: $2 tacos, $3 tallboy beers, and it’s working. At first pitch, there are probably twice as many fans as Monday night in attendance — the total at the end of the game is 1,500.

The pitching also seems a little more exciting on Tuesday. Sean Newbomb, Inland Empire’s left-handed starter, begins the game by striking out the first two Storm hitters he faces, sitting at 92-94 miles per hour with his fastball and a curve that made guys look silly all night. Newcomb, a 2014 first-round draft pick of the Angels, clearly has stuff that warrants his first-rounder status. The Storm do everything they can to foul off pitches and stay in counts, but are generally held to soft contact, including Torres’ first-inning soft roller to second base.

Torres measures Newcomb up the second time around, doubling to left field with one out, but he is later stranded at third base. Did I mention the Storm have a .390 winning percentage this season?

One thing that caught my eye were the two coaches in the dugout with major league uniforms on. There was a guy with a Padres uniform in the Storm dugout and a guy with Angels duds in the 66ers’. They are roving instructors, and it makes sense they’d wear the uniform of the Big Club so they don’t have to manage five or six different ones. Against the uniforms of each of the teams playing, the big league uniform is a contrast aesthetically, but it probably also serves as a reminder of where all these players, and umpires for that matter, are trying to get.

Which reminds me, the umpires in this series are the same two guys I saw in San Jose for the Chase Johnson start I saw earlier this season. The two-man crew may seem undermanned — after all, the Blues have three-man crews for all California Collegiate League games — but I bet they do as good a job, if not better than other three-man crews. Also, they get significantly more time calling balls and strikes vs. a three-man crew, which I’m sure is also an advantage as they try to advance to higher levels.

The right field wall is really high in Lake Elsinore. By Owen Main

THE right-field wall in Lake Elsinore is 36 feet high. It’s the last thing the evening shadows overtake and is the backdrop for Torres. The wall dwarfs the young power hitter, but in the third inning of Tuesday’s game, Torres plays the wall like a pro. After an Inland Empire hitter laces one straight over his head, Torres plays the ball on one hop and fires it into second base to hold the hitter to a single. When the next batter singles, Torres’ play could have been run-saving.

A few innings later, Torres gets a bad jump on a ball over his head and the 66ers hitter ends up on second base.

Really, the 66ers’ pitching is the story of the night, holding the Storm in check in a 5-0 win. It turns out that Monday’s win for the Storm is the only one they’ll get in a seven-game stretch.

It seems like Torres is generally in the middle of a lot of action for his new squad, despite the fact he’s only been there for a month or so. I only been two games — part of a schedule that will last for around 140 games and seven months.

AFTER the game, Torres comes out of the dugout and sits next to me for an interview in the top row of the stands. Most of the lights in the stadium are off, save for a few sets that are illuminate the infield. His uniform, is still on, except for his tennis shoes, which have replaced his cleats. Looking out over an empty field Torres reflects on the past 13 months, a hopeful beginning to a professional baseball career.  The grounds crew works on the field under the lights, which seem to be slowly fading, even though I know they aren’t changing a bit. When we are done, Torres heads back into the locker room. There are always preparations to be made in this beautiful grind of professional baseball.

Photos by Owen Main

The person who is your media contact at a game isn’t often dressed as a Taco and armed with a bullhorn throughout that game. But Tyler Zickel, Lake Elsinore Storm Assistant Director of Marketing/Digital Media Coordinator is something of an exception.

Enthusiasm is something that is appealing to me. When it’s done right and genuinely, enthusiasm is contagious. People who have real, unbridled enthusiasm are people who always have my respect.

Taco, mask, and bullhorn. How can you not get pumped? By Owen Main

On Tuesday, I was supposed to find Zickel at the game to set-up a post-game interview. I ducked my head into the operations room near the press box and asked where I could find him.

“Have you been watching the game?” asked a Storm employee.

“Yes,” I replied.

“Have you seen the guy dressed as a taco?”

“Wait, THAT’S Tyler?”

Zickel has enthusiasm. He’s the kind of person whose college probably begged to give tours of their campus. On Tuesday night, he had a microphone, was dressed as a taco, and probably directly engaged each of the 1500 fans at Lake Elsinore Stadium at least once or twice. He managed the honorary first pitch. He made sure the kids there had the giveaways. He made sure the veterans at the stadium were honored, and he led a 9th-inning rally chant with a bullhorn.

Tyler Zickel is all high-5’s and smiles for Lake Elsinore.

He even found time to take a selfie with me and make sure I got my interview after 3 1/2 hours of being “on stage.”

As I walked with him to the locker room ten minutes later, Zickel waves at the last remaining fans making their way to the exit. His smile is as big as it was in the first inning, despite the taco costume surely not being quite as fresh — game time temperature was around 90 degrees.

“Thanks for coming out! See you tomorrow!” he chirps cheerfully to the fans, who seem to know him by name.

Yes he will see them tomorrow, and everyone will be happier for it.

Much respect.

Tornadoes around Manchester never materialized, but the weather did give us a beauty of a sunset on Tuesday night. By Owen Main

I’ll be honest. I’m impressed with the venue here. For a city of just over 100,000, Manchester New Hampshire, and their AA level Fisher Cats have a really nice place to play baseball.

Northeast Delta Dental Stadium is ideally situated in New Hampshire’s largest city. Adjacent to the Merrimack River, the stadium is home to the Toronto Blue Jays AA affiliate. On Tuesday, I got to experience some of the city and the stadium.

Setting

The riverside setting of the stadium is pretty ideal. While it’s set-up traditionally (right field is the “sun field”), part of me wishes that the field could be set-up to have the river past an outfield wall. At least two home runs I saw went onto or over a road past the right field fence. Because I start to perseverate on these things sometimes, I wish there was a way for homers to go into the river… .

Down the left-field line, there is a well-placed eatery with great beer. When they built the stadium, ten years ago, the restaurant wasn’t there. It’s there now and seems heavily used during games Moving toward left-center field, the main outfield sight-line is on a relatively large Hilton Garden Inn. A good poke out to left-center puts a ball into the courtyard of the hotel. Presumably one could watch a game from their room if they had one with a “ballpark view.”

The seating is also cozy and gives a nice minor league feel. There aren’t more than 20-30 rows of seats, though they do wrap around most of the way down each line, giving it a capacity of almost 8,000. A top level holding luxury boxes and the press box combined with very little foul territory put everyone right in the action and give the stadium a cozy feeling.

The stadium is the second I’ve been to in the Eastern League, and is by nearly every measure more accommodating to fans than the Sea Dogs’ Hadlock Field in Portland. It has to be said though that the fan experience at any minor league stadium is pretty much a dream if you’re into baseball.

Food

Food is pretty standard – hot dogs, etc… . On this night, probably due to a tornado watch, the stadium wasn’t super well-attended and lines for food were virtually non-existent. There is decent beer and a pretty good variety of menu options given the size of the venue.

Though I didn’t have as much time in Manchester as I’d have liked, the off-site eatery known as Republic, located on Elm St. It was recommended by Fangraphs’ Audio host and native New Englander Carson Cistulli. As such I’m sure has words like “farm to table” and “vegetarian.”

Update – I just looked at their website. The word plethora appears. So much of me wishes I’d gone there, but I digress.

Friendliness

One of the things I’ve fond most likable in my somewhat limited minor league experience is the friendliness of staff at minor league games. Ushers, food people, media relations, and everyone backstage seem to hustle a little bit more at a minor league game.

Instead of telling you where you can’t go, as many ushers at major league stadiums tend to do, the staff at places like Northeast Delta Dental seemed really nice, apparently at least nice enough to comment on here.

Accessibility

One of the great things about the stadium is the availability of parking and easy accessibility right into the stadium. I could imagine that some semi-urban locations like this one might struggle with things like ease of parking, but they definitely do not in Manchester.

For any “event” that a person attends, there is a cost in time. To attend a Cal Poly or SLO Blues game in San Luis Obispo even, one must account for driving there, parking, and the walk to the stadium. In Manchester, there are close and convenient parking lots and I didn’t park farther than a hundred yards from the stadium.

_______

On my way out, I strolled on the concourse — the storm-enduced sunset lighting up the sky behind the third-base dugout. That sunset being somewhere in the outfield would be neat if I didn’t know what re-orienting a stadium could do to the integrity of the game. Alas, I don’t think the idea of putting the river beyond the outfield was very good after all — at least not on its current site.

As I turned my back and started to walk out of the stadium, a cool evening breeze was blowing out to right field, providing some nice night-time relief from the sticky eastern summer day. Things seemed just as they should be.

Chase Johnson is pitching really well in his second full season of professional baseball. The pitcher out of Cal Poly talked to Owen for a few minutes after last Sunday’s game about transitioning to a starting role and his mental approach to the game.

Also, Owen drivels on to start the episode about some nonsensically related sports topics. A short episode, this one is.

Chase Johnson is finding a groove this season for the San Jose Giants. By Owen Main

It was just two years ago.

Cal Poly baseball was in the midst of a 40-win season. The UCLA regional featured a potent UCLA team, a San Diego team with a guy named Kris Bryant, and the upstart Mustangs.

Cal Poly would lose their last two games in heartbreaking fashion, but dig deeper into the box score and you’ll see one thing all the games had in common.

Chase Johnson relieved in all three games. Chase Johnson didn’t give up any runs in his 4 1/3 innings at Jackie Robinson Stadium. Chase Johnson was really good.

The Giants thought highly enough of the right-handed junior out of Fallbrook to select him in the third round (101st overall) in the 2013 draft just days after his regional performance. Since then, they’ve moved him to a starting role — a position he didn’t ever find himself in during his time in San Luis Obispo.

What’s been his biggest adjustment over the past few years?

“I was a reliever in college so last year, just getting into the routine of a starter and trying to get in good rhythm,” said Johnson. “There’s a big learning curve going from reliever to starter… . A lot of it’s mental for me. I kind of get pumped up as a reliever because you’ve only got one or two innings, but as a starter it’s more about being calm and collected and just try to be even-keeled throughout the whole game.”

After appearing in 13 games in 2013, Johnson spent the entirety of last season in the Giants’ class A team in Augusta, Georgia. In Augusta, Johnson started 22 games in 2014, striking out more than twice as many hitters as he walked en route to a 4-7 record and a 4.57 ERA.

This year, Johnson earned a promotion to High-A San Jose, where he has improved markedly. Batters are hitting just .245 against him so far this year, and he has struck out 39 batters in 40 1/3 innings en route to a 2.68 ERA.

On Sunday, Johnson started against Rancho Cucamonga on a hot San Jose afternoon. While he didn’t earn a decision, he certainly pitched well enough. Using his 93 mile per hour fastball effectively, Johnson mowed down nine Quakes hitters in just 5 2/3 innings, before leaving the game after 95 pitches. The Giants’ bullpen promptly gave up the lead, but his team came back to win the game and eventually sweep the four-game series against the Quakes.

What was working for him on Sunday afternoon?

“Fastball location was working really well today and changeup slider mix,” said Johnson. “I kept going in a lot and just try and keep them off balance.”

Johnson is currently ranked 22nd in the Giants’ organization on MLB Pipeline’s prospect watch. He was also listed 19th by Fangraphs and 20th by Baseball America, according to this McCovey Chronicles post.

Photos by Owen Main