Imwalle is a guy who will scare opposing pitchers every time he steps to the plate. Last year in the American Association he was selected to the All-Star team and hit .263 with 25 doubles, 2 triples, and 15 home runs. His 15 home runs were 3rd best in the league and his 42 extra-base hits ranked him 5th.
In the past few years there has been a handful of players greatly increase their offensive production by going from the American Association to the Frontier League. Most notably, 2006 Frontier League MVP Ian Church. Church hit .269 with 21 doubles and 5 home runs in Sioux Falls in 2005 and after coming to Kalamazoo in 2006, he hit .317 with 38 doubles and 31 home runs. Last season Southern Illinois Miners All-Stars Ralph Santana and Chris Hall both came from Sioux Falls into the Frontier League and increased their offensive numbers by 20-30%.
I don't expect for Imwalle to have the dramatic increase in production that Ian Church had in 2006, but between Church, Santana, and Hall, Imwalle had the best numbers in the American Association by a good deal. He is also the only one of the four to be an All-Star in the American Association. There is no doubt that the spacious outfield of Wuerfel Park will hold down Imwalle's home run potential, but he can hits the gaps just was well as he can hit it out of the park, as his numbers prove. He will give our lineup a sense of power that Traverse City hasn't seen before.
In order to complete the trade, Traverse City will send newly acquired shortstop Tim Hutting to Sioux Falls. I completed the deal for Hutting in early December and we immediately notified him and sent him a contract. Hutting signed that contract and sent it back, however, early last week, well after he signed his contract, I received a phone call from Tim. During that phone call Hutting expressed a strong desire to not play in the Frontier League in 2007, and despite my best efforts, I was not able to resolve the situation. Rather than force a player to report to camp and play for a squad that he does not want to play for, I decided to make the best of the situation and trade him to Sioux Falls.
While I have to say that it deeply saddens me that we will not have Tim Hutting at shortstop in 2008, I am very pleased to acquire a player with the potential of Matt Imwalle. Traverse City will also receive a player to be named later in the deal, and I believe the second player we receive may end up being an impact player as well.
3 comments:
Wow thats got to be frustrating. I guess at least he let you know now and not in May. Also, not sure if you got this post yet, is it still 13 total rookies and R2s? Or do you only get a certain number of R2s and a certain number of Rookies?
Rookie-2 and Rookie-1 both count toward the 12 rookies you have to have (on a 24-man roster). If you carry 23 or 22, then you can have 11 or 10 rookies respectively. The rest of the roster has maximum amounts of 3 Veterans, 2 LS-2s, and 7 LS-1s. If you have less than the maximum amount of one classification, you can add to the classifications below. For instance, if you have 1 Veteran, you can have 4 LS-2s, etc.
Thanks For The Info Jason.
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