It Was a Dark, Lonely Night

Season: 20-12; Trip: 0-1
Wrap, Box, Herald-Sun, Syracuse.com

It’s been a long winter up in the Nawth and it doesn’t look like folks are coming out to watch baseball yet. Only 1,359 were reported to have shown up at the park last night, and that was paid attendance. Syracuse has the lowest average attendance (2,225) in the IL so far this year. Wonder why.

The weather might have something to do with it. Several Bulls were wearing hoodies underneath their jerseys last night.

Overall, new catcher Curt Casali came into a confusing situation and was called on to handle a young pitcher who isn’t doing all that well this year. Matt Andriese struggled from the very start and finally blew up in the 4th.

So let's look for some brightness. Kevin Kiermaier is doing very well in his leadoff job, Mikie Mahtook was back playing baseball in right field and Montoyo had his “regular” outfield of Christian, Kiermaier, and Mahtook for the first time in what seems like a very long while. New guy Curt Casali in his AAA debut went 2 for 3 with a double and a walk, although he did get charged with three stolen bases.

Outside the game —

• Reliever Steve Geltz has been handed a 50-game suspension for using a “drug of abuse”. This hurts him and hurts the team. He had appeared in 11 games, 16⅓ innings, with 4 holds and a 2-2 won-loss record to his credit. He had a superb 2013 with the Bulls and seemed, to me at least, to have a shot at getting on the 40-man this year. That didn’t happen. These suspensions are handed out after a warning, so it’s hard to sympathize. 
• This is going to mess up the Bulls rotation for quite a while since the Rays are expected to call up a reliever today to fill a hole in their bullpen.
• More on Curt Casali: Over at Rays Colored Glasses they’ve been cheering on Mr. Casali for a while. And the Bulls own blog has some more background.