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The last place Solar Sox won just once last week, and that was only their 5th victory of the season in 22 tries. With just 10 games left Mesa is obviously no longer in the championship hunt, but they will continue to play for pride and to gain valuable experience.
I'll start with Mesa pitching and although top prospect Chris Reed threw just once this week, it was probably his most impressive outing of the season as he struck out a pair in a perfect innings. Andres Santiago also threw just once but he was a little shaky as he allowed 7 base runners and 2 runs over 4 frames. Relievers Eric Eadington and Red Patterson also struggled in their appearances.
The Dodger hitters on the Solar Sox were pretty quiet this week, especially since Joc Pederson only played once for Mesa. He did get to participate in the Rising Stars game, however, and drove in a run with a sac fly. Rafael Ynoa came into the week looking to start a new hitting streak, and he did just that by recording three multi-hit games in a row. While that streak ended on Friday with an 0 for 5, he still leads the team with a .338 average. Finally Griff Erickson was used sparingly, but reached base 6 times in 3 games thanks to 4 walks and a pair of singles.
The big news early in the week in other winter league action was the 3-homer game from Scott Van Slyke. While he went 0-for the rest of the week, overall he has 7 bombs in 18 games with a .957 OPS. Teammate Alex Castellanos' bat has slowed down after a hot start as he managed just 4 singles for the week, those he did collect 6 RBI's.
Moving to the Dominican Dee Gordon had a solid week as he had an 11 game hitting streak snapped on Sunday, but even in that contests he was impressive as he had 3 walks and recorded a pair of RBI's. For the week he had 3 triples and a pair of stolen bases. Tim Federowicz is playing along side Gordon and while he's hitting .143 over 10 games, he did record his multi-hit game and extra base hit of the season when he doubled and singled on Saturday.
As I say every week the pitchers playing outside the AFL just aren't very interesting, although I will mentioned that Javier Solano is struggling in Mexico. The right hander has allowed more than one run in 3 of his last 4 outings, and has a 6.75 ERA to show for it.