Well, one and three-fourths series later, the Chiefs are on a seven game losing streak. There's a lot to be said here so I will just cut to it.
The Pawtucket series was marred by more bad umpiring. Kevin Causey and Brian Kennedy made enough mistakes in the series to cause Doug Davis to even get tossed twice. Causey's rotating strike zone and Kennedy's disappearing eye act at first were just laughable by the end of the series. They held those positions in the first and last game of the series, easily the two most horrific (though Causey looked just as bad at first base in the third game). Now, I am not saying they are the sole reason for the sweep, but I think with better umpiring, the Chiefs would have won at least one game.
That being said, what an amazing time the infield had against Pawtucket. Nine errors in four games, which included one game where Chief had an error. We had Russ Adams with two errors, John Hattig with one, along with Sergio Santos and Kevin Barker both having three. At that point Santos had six errors in ONLY nine games for the Chiefs. It can also be argued that Barker's scooping abilities (lack there of) helped a few more errors occur, but due to the throws being bounced, they were ultimately awarded to the thrower.
Moving on to the Scranton series, the Chiefs have held early leads in two of the three games played so far. A problem, however, is that the Chiefs have been hung out to dry regarding pitching. At the current time, they only have ten active pitchers on the roster (more on that later). A spot start by Justin James went well until the fourth inning where he earned the loss by giving up four there and five overall. My question is, can you expect a guy who has been in the bullpen all year to be able to perform great when asked to start and go more than the innings he has been used to? Granted, he has pitched three innings a number of times, but he was doing well until that fourth one. Aside from that, the Chiefs have given up seven homers in three games, and Josh Banks didn't pitch any game. That's just not acceptable. The plus for the team is Chad Mottola picking up two homers in Thursday's game.
An interesting not about the Scranton series so far is that Kevin Barker has not played in either of the last two games. That marks what I believe to be the first time this year he has missed consecutive games.
As I alluded to in the title, with call ups and releases, the Syracuse Chiefs now only have 23 active players on their roster. Among the transactions is the release of Mark Redman. Along with that, Hector Luna has been sent down to the Chiefs, while Russ Adams was called up by the Blue Jays. Now, looking at New Hampshire, things get confusing for me. They also only have 23 players, but they also have 13 pitchers active. With Chip Cannon on the DL, I would think about possibly sending Kevin Barker down, while possibly bringing Ty Taubenheim back up. Possibly sending down Sergio Santos also would be in my realm of thinking. I would consider this even if Brandon League gets sent down when he is off the DL.
With August comes the normal Chiefs' fan's discouraged feeling. Another season down the tubes, great looking on paper but just not panning out. We will probably see another Auburn Doubleday sent to Syracuse to "fill a spot" once September 1st hits. Let's just hope the Chiefs can take a couple from Ottawa the rest of the year, or else they could have an outside shot at being the worst team in the league.
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