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Saturday, July 26, 2008

Team Undergoing Big Roster Shuffle

By Randy Harrison
Journal Staff Writer
      If the 13,390 fans at Isotopes Park on Friday night absolutely needed to know the players, you bet there'd have been 13,390 souvenir programs sold.
    The Albuquerque roster has had a dramatic shift over the past few days, which is not at all an excuse for a 7-4 loss to Sacramento. River Cats lefty Dan Meyer (10-5) gets much of the credit. He was tough on the Isotopes for eight innings, and a five-run River Cats fourth, complicated by Tagg Bozied's throwing error on a play at home, was all they needed.
    Yet in the past five days, the Isotopes have had 14 transactions, six on Thursday alone, and for almost as many reasons. And so the dynamic of the clubhouse is changing as Albuquerque tries to make lemonade of what has been a lemon of a season.
    "I expected roster changes," said Isotopes manager Dean Treanor. "To have such dramatic changes, I didn't expect that. Now we're gonna have to take on a little different identity. And we've got to get after it with who we've got."
    To summarize the comings and goings: Marc Gwyn, a closer of late, left to play in Japan. John Gall left for Team USA and the Olympics. Catchers John Baker and Paul Hoover went to the parent Florida Marlins, and five players are on the disabled list. Chris Barnwell, an All-Star at shortstop, has been gone for a week to attend to family issues in California, and there's no indication when he will return. Middle infielder Andrew Beattie hasn't gone anywhere for the last week, his sprained ankle allowing no movement, but his day-to-day status allowing no roster movement either.
    Left fielder Michael Ryan made his Isotopes debut Friday night, having been signed from Somerset of the independent Atlantic League. The former Minnesota Twin grounded out in all four plate appearances. Shortstop Manny Mayorson, up from Double-A Carolina, was in his sixth game.
    "We've still got a lot of core guys who are kind of our leaders," said Chase Lambin, who as one of the guys who broke camp with the Isotopes is suddenly an old-timer in his first Triple-A season. "We've also lost some guys who were contributors. Hopefully we'll get Beattie and Barnwell back soon. It hurts not having those other guys here, but we just won three out of four with the new group. We've got a good group of guys here, and everybody can play at this level."
    Meyer allowed five hits and struck out only two, both times Istopes slugger Dallas McPherson in the lefty-lefty matchup.
    "He pounded the ball in, had good cutters and sliders in on the hands, and he didn't really leave much on the hands," said Lambin. But down 7-2 in the ninth, the Isotopes made a run at it.
    Lambin was in the middle, blasting his 10th homer of the season off reliever Chris Farley and raising his average to .325. That drew Albuquerque within 7-4. The Isotopes got the tying run at the plate, but Mayorson flew out to end the game. Bozied doubled and tripled, but he was left stranded each time. He has five hits over two nights.
    Albuquerque (46-60) was trying for its first series sweep at home this season. Sacramento (61-45), which got 15 hits off Bobby Keppel, has been on the brink of being swept four times now, but each time pulled out game four.
   

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