NINE LEAGUE ALUMNI NOW IN MAJOR LEAGUES

Independent Baseball Chatter – by Bob Wirz

In the ups and downs of the major leagues, pitcher John Brebbia (pictured, Sioux Falls ’14, Laredo ’15) is back with the St. Louis Cardinals after spending a few days at Triple-A Memphis and Junior Guerra (Wichita ’11, ’13) rejoined Milwaukee from Colorado Springs to start Wednesday (1 run in 5 plus innings) while fellow righty James Hoyt (Wichita ’12), who started the season on World Champion Houston’s disabled list, was optioned back to Fresno then quickly recalled.

This gives the league an impressive count of nine major leaguers; eight are pitchers.

The toughest break belongs to still another right-hander, Aaron Wilkerson (Grand Prairie ’13-’14), who not only did not stick with Milwaukee out of spring training, but now misses out on his starting assignments for several weeks with the Brewers’ top farm club in Colorado Springs because of a left (opposite) shoulder injury.

The end of spring training always means a number of players have to be released as teams get to their roster limit. American Association players cut include outfielders Blake Gailen (Wichita ’08, Lincoln ’11) and Dalton Wheat (Kansas City ’16),  pitchers Matt Solter (Gary ’15), Scott Shuman (Wichita ’15) and Nestor Molina (Joplin ’15) and catchers  Christian Correa (Kansas City) and Shawn Zarraga (Cleburne ’17).  Zarraga had been a non-roster invitee in the Los Angeles Dodgers spring training camp.

Previously the chief spokesman for Baseball Commissioners Bowie Kuhn and Peter Ueberroth, Bob Wirz has been writing extensively about Independent Baseball since 2003.  He is a frequent contributor to this site, has a blog, www.IndyBaseballChatter.com, and a book about his life, “The Passion of Baseball”, is available at Amazon.com or WirzandAssociates.com.