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Falmouth can pitch a little

As I was poring over stats to come up with those extra leaderboards, I realized something: Falmouth has some ridiculous starting pitching. The five starters at the moment are Aaron Crow (Missouri), Christian Friedrich (Eastern Kentucky), Kyle Gibson (Missouri), Shooter Hunt (Tulane) and Aaron Shafer (Wichita). Through Saturday, that quintet had started 20 of Falmouth’s 26 games. These are the numbers they’ve put up:

• 10-3 record
• 1.83 ERA
• 1.07 WHIP
• 138 strikeouts (10.51 K/9), 45 walks (3.07 K/BB)

That is one heck of a rotation, and it’s no wonder that Falmouth is on a hot streak. The Commodores have won five in a row, and not surprisingly, the five winning pitchers were the five starters.

The bullpen hasn’t been quite as strong. Five relievers have ERA’s over 4.00, but there have been enough bright spots to think Famouth’s pen will be fine. Erik Bird (Nebraska) has a 2.13 ERA in nine appearances with nine strikeouts and no walks, while Brent Graffy (Notre Dame) has a .77 ERA in 10 appearances.

In all, with starting pitching like they’re getting, it’s going to be tough to send the Commodores to a losing streak. And it’s more likely they’ll stay hot.

Tools

The five tools: ability to hit for average, ability to hit for power, speed and baserunning skills, throwing ability, fielding ability

One player with all those tools is a complete player. I haven’t seen enough of anybody (nor am I very good at scouting) to know if there are any of these five-tool guys on the Cape. But I know from what I’ve seen and what I’ve read that Falmouth’s Aja Barto (Tulane) has a lot of these tools. He’s 6-foot-5 and 225 pounds. He can play anywhere in the outfield. He can hit. He can run.

And though he isn’t up on the leaderboard in many categories, he’s showing off his tools in this his second summer on the Cape. As of Saturday, Barto — who’ll be a junior at Tulane — was hitting .273 with two home runs. Most impressively, he’s leading the league with 12 stolen bases, and his .375 on-base percentage isn’t too bad, either. For Tulane this spring, Barto only had seven steals and hit .269. Last summer on the Cape, he hit only .216 with four steals.

I’d say he’s having a good summer this time.

Quickly

According to Perfect Game Cross-Checker’s best Cape prospects from ’06 (which you can find here), the top player who’s back this summer is Cotuit shortstop Reese Havens (South Carolina). After hitting .266 last summer, he’s at .298 so far this year with seven extra base hits and a .352 on-base percentage . . . The second-best prospect who’s back is Y-D catcher Buster Posey (Florida St.). Interestingly, he played shortstop and pitched last year on the Cape before moving to catcher this spring for the Seminoles. In the process, I think he made himself quite a bit of money. Catchers who can hit are infinitely more valuable than shortstops, and if Posey can show enough defensively to stay at catcher, look out. Because he can hit. For FSU this spring, Posey hit .382 with a team-leading 65 RBI and a .973 OPS. So far for Y-D, Posey is hitting at a .265 clip. This article compares him to Josh Donaldson, who played on the Cape last year then was a compensation round pick in the ’07 draft . . . You have to feel bad for Wareham pitcher Wade Miley (SE Lousiana). With 40.1 innings pitched in six starts, he’s a workhorse, but he has little to show for the work, at least in the win column. He was 1-4 at week’s end despite a 2.01 ERA. But poor record or not, Miley is having a heck of a summer. He’s third in the league in strikeouts, and even if he doesn’t end up with a winning record, he’s still made quite an impression . . . Y-D has more home runs (25) than Hyannis, Harwich and Falmouth combined . . . Orleans shortstop Brandon Crawford (UCLA) is one of the most highly-touted prospects on the Cape this summer, a guy who’s trying to secure his draft status. So far, not so good. Crawford was hitting .169 heading into Sunday’s game, though he did have three home runs. The stats don’t always mean much to scouts, as far as the top prospects are concerned, but you can bet Crawford is hoping to break out . . . Bourne’s Kevin Hoef (Iowa) has been leading the league in average for awhile now, and he’s not cooling down. He went 2-for-3 Saturday to raise his average to .385. Hoef hasn’t shown much power at all, with no home runs, one double and one triple. But you can’t ignore all the hits . . . No official leaderboard here, but I’ve gone quickly through the stats and circled the guys who aren’t striking out much. Y-D’s Mike Tamsin (Northeastern) leads the way with three strikeouts in 54 at-bats (once every 18 at-bats). Also up high on the list are Harwich’s Cole Figueroa (Florida) with eight strikeouts in 79 at-bats (one per 9.88 AB), Chatham’s Addison Johnson (Clemson) with 12 in 98 at-bats (one per 8.16), and Blake Dean (LSU) with 10 strikeouts in 80 AB (one per 8). The guy with the most strikeouts is the aforementioned Aja Barto (Tulane), who has fanned 34 times in 88 at-bats (once per 2.6 at-bats).

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