X's feel good about winning championship
By Terry Hersom Journal sports editor | Posted: Thursday, May 10, 2007
Optimism. Around the American Association, it will never run any stronger than it does today.
With a full slate of five season openers on tap tonight, all 10 teams in the independent professional baseball league are thinking they might bring home a championship.
That includes the Sioux City Explorers and their I-29 rivals, the Sioux Falls Canaries, who kick off the 2007 campaign at the "Bird Cage'' in Sioux Falls. Game time is 7:05.
"You have 12 days (pre-season camp), you run around and it rains like hell, but you try to tell yourself everything looks good,'' said Steve Shirley, the new Sioux Falls skipper whose second opportunity as a manager just happens to come against the team that gave him his first shot two years ago.
"I think everybody feels they have some talent, but let's strap it on and see what happens. I think this is a good league. I think everybody's going to be good.''
X's Manager Ed Nottle, certainly, has lots of good feelings about the team he has put together for Sioux City's (and Sioux Falls') 15th season.
"I feel so good, I wish we could start the season right now,'' chirped Nottle on Tuesday.
Two days later, he'll send out Brad Guy, a veteran righthander who pitched for him two seasons ago with the Can-Am League's Brockton (Mass.) Rox, hoping to start things off on the right foot. The 31-year-old Guy went 9-5 with a 2.93 at Brockton last season, after Nottle left the Rox and returned to Sioux City for his second tour of duty.
Tonight's game launches a four-game series between teams that will play one another more than anyone else -- no fewer than 25 times, including 14 encounters at Sioux Falls Stadium.
That will the most meetings ever in a series the X's have dominated in recent years. Sioux City claimed a 14-8 advantage over the Canaries last year and has gone 50-26 since the Birds last won the season series in 2001.
Friday night, 32-year-old Rafael Gross, who went 36-8 in a three-year stretch for Winnipeg from 2001 through 2003, launches his comeback from shoulder surgery 18 months ago. Ironically, he'll be trying to beat a Sioux Falls franchise that was the last team to employ him two years ago -- the club that also paid for his surgery.
Nottle has talented rookies Alexander Francisco and Ty Marotz slated to work on Saturday and Sunday, respectively, then will give holdover Aaron Marsden another shot at the No. 5 starter's role when the team opens a three-game series at St. Paul on Monday.
"I would put our front four starters up against any front four in the league right now,'' said Nottle. "Our fifth starter, we'll see what develops.''
Sioux Falls, which lost a 13-7 exhibition slugfest with Sioux City in Yankton last week, hooks up with the X's again next Thursday for the home opener at Lewis and Clark Park.
The Canaries had to juggle their rotation earlier this week after veteran Josue Matos jumped ship to sign with a team in Taiwan. Matos, who pitched for Puerto Rico in last year's World Baseball Classic, had been the logical No. 1 starter. Jeff Landing, a righthander who went 6-11 with a 4.70 ERA for the New York Mets' Class A team in Hagerstown (Pa.) last year, was Shirley's pick to start, instead.
The departure of Matos was a blow, to be sure, but Shirley has put together a quality lineup, much like he did here two years ago. That 2005 club got out of the gates with an 8-1 record. Soon after, though, the club's top two pitchers, Mitch Wylie and Tony Evans, were picked up by major league organizations, creating a void Shirley was never able to plug.
The team was still over .500 at 33-32 when Shirley took the leave of absence from which he didn't return, eventually finishing 44-52.
"I've still got a lot of friends in Sioux City,'' said Shirley. "I think that makes it a little bit more exciting, especially since we'll be playing each other so many times.''
The middle of the Canaries' batting order will likely feature first baseman Abner Arroyo along with outfielders Wil Quintana and Will Smith. Arroyo, second in the league in slugging percentage, is in his third season in Sioux Falls, but Quintana (league-high 21 homers for St. Joseph) and Smith are both new. So is outfielder James Shanks, a career .295 hitter who was leading off for the Florida Marlins' Class AAA farm club last season.
Nottle also likes his lineup, which features veteran holdovers Alex Llanos at second base, Jake Daubert at third and Jorge Moreno in left field. Llanos hit .341 with a career-high 10 homers last year, Moreno batted .302 with 19 homers (second in the league) and a team-high 65 runs batted in, and Daubert hit .294 after joining the team midway through the season.
First baseman Julian Benavidez, coming out of the Giants' farm system, has drawn rave reviews for his offensive exploits in training camp. Meanwhile, centerfielder Jason Tuttle, a Can-Am League all-star for the New Jersey Jackals last year, should be a quality table-setter at the top of the order.
The Explorers are 9-5 in season openers and have won eight of their last night, including the last four in a row. However, this is only the second time in 10 years they have opened on the road. Before that, the club's first five openers were all road games, including a 2-1 loss in Sioux Falls in 1995 and an 18-4 romp at the Bird Cage in 1994.
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Explorers' profiles
With a full slate of five season openers on tap tonight, all 10 teams in the independent professional baseball league are thinking they might bring home a championship.
That includes the Sioux City Explorers and their I-29 rivals, the Sioux Falls Canaries, who kick off the 2007 campaign at the "Bird Cage'' in Sioux Falls. Game time is 7:05.
"You have 12 days (pre-season camp), you run around and it rains like hell, but you try to tell yourself everything looks good,'' said Steve Shirley, the new Sioux Falls skipper whose second opportunity as a manager just happens to come against the team that gave him his first shot two years ago.
"I think everybody feels they have some talent, but let's strap it on and see what happens. I think this is a good league. I think everybody's going to be good.''
X's Manager Ed Nottle, certainly, has lots of good feelings about the team he has put together for Sioux City's (and Sioux Falls') 15th season.
"I feel so good, I wish we could start the season right now,'' chirped Nottle on Tuesday.
Two days later, he'll send out Brad Guy, a veteran righthander who pitched for him two seasons ago with the Can-Am League's Brockton (Mass.) Rox, hoping to start things off on the right foot. The 31-year-old Guy went 9-5 with a 2.93 at Brockton last season, after Nottle left the Rox and returned to Sioux City for his second tour of duty.
Tonight's game launches a four-game series between teams that will play one another more than anyone else -- no fewer than 25 times, including 14 encounters at Sioux Falls Stadium.
That will the most meetings ever in a series the X's have dominated in recent years. Sioux City claimed a 14-8 advantage over the Canaries last year and has gone 50-26 since the Birds last won the season series in 2001.
Friday night, 32-year-old Rafael Gross, who went 36-8 in a three-year stretch for Winnipeg from 2001 through 2003, launches his comeback from shoulder surgery 18 months ago. Ironically, he'll be trying to beat a Sioux Falls franchise that was the last team to employ him two years ago -- the club that also paid for his surgery.
Nottle has talented rookies Alexander Francisco and Ty Marotz slated to work on Saturday and Sunday, respectively, then will give holdover Aaron Marsden another shot at the No. 5 starter's role when the team opens a three-game series at St. Paul on Monday.
"I would put our front four starters up against any front four in the league right now,'' said Nottle. "Our fifth starter, we'll see what develops.''
Sioux Falls, which lost a 13-7 exhibition slugfest with Sioux City in Yankton last week, hooks up with the X's again next Thursday for the home opener at Lewis and Clark Park.
The Canaries had to juggle their rotation earlier this week after veteran Josue Matos jumped ship to sign with a team in Taiwan. Matos, who pitched for Puerto Rico in last year's World Baseball Classic, had been the logical No. 1 starter. Jeff Landing, a righthander who went 6-11 with a 4.70 ERA for the New York Mets' Class A team in Hagerstown (Pa.) last year, was Shirley's pick to start, instead.
The departure of Matos was a blow, to be sure, but Shirley has put together a quality lineup, much like he did here two years ago. That 2005 club got out of the gates with an 8-1 record. Soon after, though, the club's top two pitchers, Mitch Wylie and Tony Evans, were picked up by major league organizations, creating a void Shirley was never able to plug.
The team was still over .500 at 33-32 when Shirley took the leave of absence from which he didn't return, eventually finishing 44-52.
"I've still got a lot of friends in Sioux City,'' said Shirley. "I think that makes it a little bit more exciting, especially since we'll be playing each other so many times.''
The middle of the Canaries' batting order will likely feature first baseman Abner Arroyo along with outfielders Wil Quintana and Will Smith. Arroyo, second in the league in slugging percentage, is in his third season in Sioux Falls, but Quintana (league-high 21 homers for St. Joseph) and Smith are both new. So is outfielder James Shanks, a career .295 hitter who was leading off for the Florida Marlins' Class AAA farm club last season.
Nottle also likes his lineup, which features veteran holdovers Alex Llanos at second base, Jake Daubert at third and Jorge Moreno in left field. Llanos hit .341 with a career-high 10 homers last year, Moreno batted .302 with 19 homers (second in the league) and a team-high 65 runs batted in, and Daubert hit .294 after joining the team midway through the season.
First baseman Julian Benavidez, coming out of the Giants' farm system, has drawn rave reviews for his offensive exploits in training camp. Meanwhile, centerfielder Jason Tuttle, a Can-Am League all-star for the New Jersey Jackals last year, should be a quality table-setter at the top of the order.
The Explorers are 9-5 in season openers and have won eight of their last night, including the last four in a row. However, this is only the second time in 10 years they have opened on the road. Before that, the club's first five openers were all road games, including a 2-1 loss in Sioux Falls in 1995 and an 18-4 romp at the Bird Cage in 1994.
html>Related stories
Explorers' profiles