[新聞] Kelly, Lin, Exposito impress against …

看板RedSox作者mohicans (Last Of The Mohicans)時間16年前 (2010/03/04 09:12)推噓2(2推 0噓 0→)

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Casey Kelly, Che-Hsuan Lin, Luis Exposito impress against Northeastern By Nick Underhill March 03, 2010, 3:53PM FORT MYERS, Fla. –Five things I learned from the Red Sox 15-0 win over Northeastern. ‧David Ortiz still has his power. In the bottom of the fourth inning he took a ball deep over the City of Palms Park sign in right field off Northeastern pitcher Charly Bashara. The trouble is, in his previous two at-bats he was badly beaten. His first time up he hit a dribbler to the first baseman, and the second time around he hit a ball softy to second after being jammed. ‧Casey Kelly looked amazing. In his first appearance in a Red Sox uniform he promptly plowed his way through the first inning on 10 pitches. He struck out the first and third batter, and got the second one to ground out to second on the first pitch. ‧Adam Mills was equally impressive. Mills, an eighth-round draft pick in the 2007 draft, fell off the map for a little while after a few unimpressive campaigns at Double-A Portland. But a solid showing at Pawtucket late last year was enough to get him an invite to spring camp. He looked great Wednesday, striking out two batters in his one inning of work. It will be interesting to see how he works against Major League players. ‧Luis Exposito and Che-Hsuan Lin could be interesting prospects. Both swung big bats on Wednesday. Exposito went 2-for-3 with four RBIs, while Lin was 2-for-4 with two RBIs. ‧The college games might not be the most competitive in the world, but they are better than intersquad games. At least the players get on the field against real competition, and the kids from the schools love it. It was really interesting to see an assembly line of players line up around the batting cage to take photographs with David Ortiz before the game. Even though they got beat badly, the Northeastern players are going to remember this experience for the rest of their lives. That alone makes it worth it. http://is.gd/9DLSJ ----- box 3/3 Game 1 (VS Northeastern) http://boston.redsox.mlb.com/news/boxscore.jsp?gid=2010_03_03_neubbc_bosmlb_1 ----- Jose Iglesias, Casey Kelly shine By Gordon Edes ESPNBoston.com FORT MYERS, Fla. -- Mostly, the day belonged to Casey Kelly, the 20-year-old kid born into a baseball clan from nearby Sarasota, whose mom and brother and high school football coach and a bunch of buddies drove down to see him pitch for the first time in a Boston Red Sox uniform. Mostly, the night belonged to Jose Iglesias, the homesick 20-year-old kid born to a baseball dream in Havana, who could only wish that his family was there to see him, but trusted that somebody with a satellite dish back on the island was monitoring his every move in his first game with the Red Sox. But Wednesday wasn't all about Kelly and Iglesias. The day also belonged to an improbable pair of friends, Luis Exposito and Che-Hsuan Lin, the 23-year-old, Chinese-speaking, Cuban-American catcher from Miami and the 21-year-old Taiwanese outfielder who grew tight playing together last summer in small-town Salem, Virginia. Pitcher Kelly and shortstop Iglesias sparkled brightest in the mosaic that comprised the first day and night of baseball for the Red Sox in 2010, the annual doubleheader against autograph-seeking college kids from Northeastern and Boston College. Kelly threw 10 pitches in a two-strikeout, first-pitch groundout inning of work against Northeastern in a 15-0 Red Sox win, while Iglesias lashed the first pitch he saw from a mainlander for a three-run double in a 6-1 win against BC, and also was on the receiving end of a pickoff play called by catcher Jason Varitek. "I don't miss them -- I need them,'' said Iglesias, who is the youngest of five brothers and a sister, of his family back home. Spoiled? "Oh, yes,'' he said with a smile. "My mom always babied me.'' Iglesias signed a four-year, $8.2 million contract after defecting from Cuba, but these days his most valued possession is the phone card he bought to call his family two or three times a week. Yes, he said, his mother cries when he calls. "My father too. "By myself for a year and a half,'' he said, his face flushed momentarily with emotion, "it is hard, very hard.'' Iglesias entered the game as a pinch-runner for Marco Scutaro in the third, and lined a double into the left-field corner to clear the bases in the fourth. "He looked like he was ready to play,'' manager Terry Francona said when asked if the Iglesias bandwagon picked up any new passengers, with the game televised back to New England. "He wasn't messing around. He was obviously very excited to play. He came out in a hurry.'' Beyond the lightning-quick hands, the flashy embellishments and the obvious ease with which he glides through the Sox clubhouse as if he has been here forever, Iglesias has impressed the Red Sox most with his obsessive desire to succeed. He wants it all -- to speak flawless English, to embrace, and be embraced by, his new country, and to show that he can play at the highest level. "Mi sueno, '' he said to Alex Ochoa, the baseball operations special assistant whose primary assignment is to guide Iglesias through the assimilation process, which includes serving as interpreter. No translation was required. My dream. Kelly, the son of one big leaguer and brother to another, shares that ambition, and is on the same fast track to get there. Wednesday against Northeastern, the kid who would have been a college sophomore himself had he elected to play football at Tennessee threw a fastball that touched 93, and registered both of his strikeouts on changeups. Victor Martinez, who was behind the plate, raved about him afterward. "I don't think I've stopped smiling since I got off the mound,'' said Kelly, whose first exposure to big-league hitters will come Sunday in his hometown, when he faces the Baltimore Orioles. Francona has said that watching Kelly during workouts reminded him of a young Jon Lester before the Sox left-hander became the impressive physical specimen he is now. What you see now, Francona said, may bear scant resemblance to what you'll see in the future. "Amazing,'' Francona said. "He doesn't look like a kid who just turned 20 and hasn't pitched. "Where does he settle in? I don't think anyone knows. 93, 95? Where does he settle in? That's the fun part. You're going to see somebody different from what you see today.'' And then there was Exposito and Lin, who made their own memorable debuts Wednesday. "Me and Che [pronounced Shay] hang out all the time, so I just picked it up,'' said Exposito, explaining how it was that he happened to be chatting in Chinese with a reporter from Taiwan in the middle of the clubhouse. "He follows me around and I help him. "By the time, he got to Salem, he spoke pretty good English, but he speaks Chinese to me when he gets mad, so I had to learn the language.'' Exposito is in his first big league camp with the Sox but in his fifth year in the organization. He lost a year in 2007 when he was suspended by the Sox for disciplinary reasons. "That's in the past, and I learned a lot from it,'' Expositio said. "I'm grateful that the Red Sox stood by me, and now all I want to be is the best teammate I can be.'' Against Northeastern, Exposito had a double and single and drove in four runs. "He's so big and strong and throws so well, he's going to be fun to watch,'' Francona said. Lin, who hit a two-run home run in the 2007 All-Star Futures Game and was MVP, played left field and had two singles and two RBIs. Lin is another find for the Red Sox Asian scouting tandem of Craig Shipley and Jon Deeble. "We were on him for a year, year and a half before we signed him,'' said senior vice president Ben Cherington. "He became a bigger name before we signed him, but I remember Ship mentioned him to me, showing me video from one of the amateur tournaments, a center fielder who covered a lot of ground, bat speed he really liked. "We like him. He's got a chance to be a very good defensive center fielder. He's got really good barrel-to-ball skills as a hitter, he's still learning some of the nuances of plate discipline, how to drive the ball. He's been really young at every level he's played at, including last year in the Carolina League and got off to a really tough start, but to his credit made some adjustments and had a good second half. So he's got a chance to be a good player, a combination of good defensive ability and offensive upside.'' Chien-Ming Wang is the most famous big leaguer from Taiwan; Lin, who has played center field in the minors, was asked what it would mean to be the first position player to find his way to big league stardom. "I can't think that far ahead,'' he said through translator Mikki Jiang, "but once I make it to the major leagues, I would like to become a role model for kids back in Taiwan whose goal will be to make the big leagues like Che-Hsuan Lin.'' Are the dreams ever sweeter than on Day One? http://is.gd/9EoEC ----- Sox outfielder hopes to make impact in U.S. Taiwanese player has 2 hits in spring opener By GLENN MILLER Most American baseball fans don't know Che-Hsuan Lin. Maybe they will some day. The center fielder from Hwa-Lian, Taiwan, started and was 2-for-4 for the Boston Red Sox in their 15-0 victory over Northeastern University on Wednesday at City of Palms Park. Although he has yet to play above Class A in the American minor leagues, he's known in his island nation. "Very famous," said Jordan Huang, a photographer at the Taipei Times who was at Wednesday's game. Lin has played in the Olympics, the World Baseball Classic and the Futures Game. He homered in the 2008 Futures Game in Yankee Stadium and was named the game MVP. Cape Coral resident Chad Epperson, a coach in the Red Sox farm system, managed Lin last year with the Salem Red Sox of the Class A Carolina League. "He impacts the game, that's for sure," said Epperson, now a roving catching instructor for the Red Sox. "Very good instincts out there. Lin doesn't appear to be move quickly. "But it's very easy and effortless the way he goes about it," Epperson said. "He gets to some balls he has no business getting to. He's got the arm, to boot." Lin, who has played in the Red Sox organization since 2007, doesn't speak English. Mickey Jiang, a Red Sox interpreter from Taiwan, helps Lin with English interviews. "He's getting better and better," Jiang said. He added that Lin understands some English but doesn't yet feel comfortable speaking it, especially during interviews. Jiang helps Lin with questions about topics such as his home run in Yankee Stadium. "Looking for pitch I could drive," Lin said of the home run. And he did. He was 19 at the time and homered off Ryan Mattheus, a Colorado Rockies prospect. "I was happy," Lin said. "I didn't think it was going to be a bomb." He didn't homer Wednesday but felt comfortable playing for the big club, unlike last year when was summoned to one spring game and was nervous. He was notified the day before that game. Lin also continues adjusting to life in America. South Fort Myers High baseball coach Chip Duncan did the reverse of what Lin is doing. In the 1990s, Duncan played in Taiwan, pitching for a team called the Brother Elephants. "The Chinese culture, they do anything to make you feel at home," Duncan said. Although Duncan doesn't know Lin, he understands what it's like being far away from home and not speaking the language. He eventually learned enough Chinese to take a cab or order food. "You would hear the same things over and over and all of a sudden you start to get it," Duncan said. http://www.news-press.com/article/20100304/SPRINGTRAINING/3040408/1010 -- ※ 發信站: 批踢踢實業坊(ptt.cc)