Sports stats



ApL Princeton WhistlePigs

Princeton Rays News

April 12, 2005 - Appalachian League (ApL)
Princeton WhistlePigs News Release


Finally, it's all about baseball now! Our televisions are flooded with major league coverage, the full-season minor league clubs are underway while our local college and high school baseball teams have set up a springtime residence on our local diamonds. These are the telltale signs we look for annually which tell us that another exciting season of Appalachian League baseball is now on our radar screen and fast approaching. Let's get caught up together by enjoying this April, 2005 edition of "Raywatch," the official monthly e-mail newsletter of the Princeton Devil Rays.

WHO'S WHERE? : The four full-season farm clubs of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays all now have a few regular season games under their collective belts and all four rosters are dotted with the names of former Princeton players. The Class AAA Durham Bulls can count catchers Paul Hoover and Pete Laforest, infielder Luis Ordaz, outfielder Jonny Gomes, and pitcher Doug Waechter among their troops. Donning the uniforms of manager Charlie Montoyo's Montgomery Biscuits will be pitchers Jason Cromer, Carlos Hines, Josh Parker, and Chris Seddon, along with catcher Shaggy Isenia, catcher Shawn Riggans, and infielder Gabby Martinez. Tampa Bay's new high-A entry at Visalia, CA will have a definite Princeton "look" with pitchers Brian Allen, Tony Peguero, Juan Salas, Brian Stokes, Scott Vander Meer, catchers Josh Arhart and Coltyn Simmons, infielders John-Paul Davis, Kris Dufner and Elliot Johnson while rounding out the Oaks' Princeton alumni ranks will be two good hitting outfielders from our P-Ray past: Jason Pridie and Carlos Ramos. The Devil Rays have a new full season low-A entry at Battle Creek, MI: the Southwest Michigan Devil Rays, who will now be filling the role for Tampa Bay that was formerly occupied by the Charleston (SC) Riverdogs. The Southwest Michigan opening day roster featured six former Princeton pitchers: Calvin Carpenter, Eduardo Delacruz, Jose Delacruz, James Houser, Jarrad Lavergne, and Brandon Mann. The catching corps for SW will include Christian Lopez, and Craig Markel while the balance of their roster includes four more former P-Rays: infielders Reid Brignac, Tommy Nichols, and Travis Schlichting along with outfielder Shaun Cumberland. We hope you will join us all season long in following the progress of these players.

GOING THE OTHER DIRECTION: Of course, on the other side of baseball, there are players who are released every year and several players who formerly wore the Princeton colors were released by Tampa Bay this spring and they were Chad Cooper, Chad Coward, Nate Dion, Jon Dobyns, Nick Gor, Tim King, and Bud Woodruff among others.

MAJOR LEAGUE BUS TRIP UPDATE: If you have been debating whether to go on the P-Rays' June 11 bus trip to Pittsburgh to see Tampa Bay play the Pittsburgh Pirates, do not delay much longer as just a scant few seats remain! Cost of the trip is $75.00 per person, which includes all your transportation fees on the 55-seat air-conditioned Abbott Trailways Bus and your game ticket. This is a one-day "up and back" trip. If you are interested, please contact the P-Rays' front office immediately by e-mail at raysball@sunlitsurf.com or by telephone at (304) 487-2000. Don't miss this very economical opportunity to see major league baseball at Pittsburgh's PNC Park, one of America's most beautiful new ballparks!

WEB SITE WEDNESDAYS REMINDER: We thank all of you that participated in our recent P-Rays' "Web site Wednesdays" contest. We do remind you that all prizes that you may have received for Blarney Stone Restaurant and Mountain Fresh Cleaners must be redeemed by April 30, 2005. The contest featured our team's "new look" website at www.princetondevilrays.com and we invite you to visit the P-Rays' site if you have not been there in a couple of months to check it's refurbishing through the efforts of Red Head Pro Design Services of Princeton.

MARCH TRIVIA: Another month gone by, another chance for our trivia gurus to test their resolve in coming up once again with the correct answer in our monthly e-mail "Raywatch" trivia contest. Top review, our trivia question for our March issue was "What active major league pitcher has (at the beginning of the 2005 season) the most career "saves" without having as many as 300 career "saves?" The correct answer was Jose Mesa and we had five local winners nail the right answer: Christie Cook, David Lawson, Frank Lewis, Marshall Lytton, and Mark Morehead. Each local winner received a $5.00 gift certificate from both the Eccentric Fish Restaurant and Breadman Bakery. As usual, our out-of-area readers had their thinking caps on also and we had nine more with the correct answer and they were Cecil Blauser (Karns City, PA), Cy Campbell (Denton, TX), Kevin Clark (Radford, VA), Scott Gibson (St. Albans, WV), Ron Martin (Clemmons, NC), Grant McKay (Cincinnati, OH), Rob McNamara (Rockville, MD), Jeffery Smith (Cleveland, OH), and Mark Wilson (Arden, NC). The trivia question will follow later in this newsletter.

WVIAC BASEBALL TOURNEY: Our office has already received several calls inquiring about the 2005 West Virginia Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WVIAC) Baseball Tournament. The three-day double elimination tourney, which features the "Final Four" among West Virginia's NCAA Division II collegiate schools, will be at Princeton's Hunnicutt Field on May 6-8 with two games on Friday, May 6 beginning at 3:00 p.m., three games on Saturday the 7th beginning at 12:30 p.m. with either one or two games to follow in the championship round on Sunday, May 8 beginning at 1:00 p.m. This is a great brand of baseball to get you primed for the Appalachian League season and don't forget that the tourney's sponsors, the Rotary Club of Princeton, will donate all the proceeds toward scholarships for deserving area students. Here's a special late bulletin for our e-mail subscribers: Keep alert for an e-mail from us sometime in the ten days prior to the tournament to learn how you can attend one of the sessions as the guest of the Princeton Devil Rays!!

MUSIC PLEASE: As you may remember from past years, we have had several different musicians and/or bands of several different music genres play music at our front gate entrance area both before and after games. We are also always on the lookout for national anthem singers and you may ask yourself if your church choir has ever performed the anthem before one of our games. If you know of any musicians/singers that fit this description, please contact the P-Rays front office either by e-mail at raysball@sunlitsurf.com or by telephone at (304) 487-2000.

APRIL TRIVIA: Since spring has sprung, our trivia will revisit last year's "Fall Classic," the 2004 World Series. We want to have a lot of winners, so we're hitting you a sacrifice fly with this question. The first 15 local winners will receive a $5.00 gift certificate from both the Eccentric Fish Restaurant and Breadman Bakery. Please remember to e-mail your guesses to us at raysball@sunlitsurf.com and also be sure to include your U.S. postal mailing address so we will know where to send your prize cards. As always, we invite our out-of-area readers to play along so you too can be listed with the winners in the May edition of "Raywatch," the official monthly e-mail newsletter of the Princeton Devil Rays. Here is your question: "Who had the highest batting average for the Boston Red Sox for the four games that made up the 2004 World Series?" Okay, we will be waiting on your responses.

FROM RAYS TO RICHES: Outfielder Carl Crawford, who started his career here as a 1999 P-Ray, made April Fools Day a very happy one for him when he agreed on a six-year contract with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays that has a potential total value of more than $31 million. The agreement includes two one-year club (TB) options covering the 2009 and 2010 seasons, Crawford's first two years of free agency. As part of the contract, he will donate back up to $400,000 to the team's "Rays of Hope Foundation," which is an arm of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays that develops charitable programs in the Tampa Bay community. The contract to date is the longest ever awarded in team history, and Crawford's charitable donation is the largest by a player in team history.

At the time of the announcement, the following quote was given by Tampa Bay Devil Rays' General Manager Chuck LaMar: "Today's (April 1) announcement reinforces our goal to sign, develop and retain our most talented, young players. We are very pleased that Carl recognizes the promise of our organization and has chosen to remain a Devil Ray for many years to come. We expect that he will be a cornerstone of our future successes."

"TOP TEN" TALENT: The current issue of "Baseball America" magazine, which is on sale in stores and newsstands across the country until April 24, 2005, ranks the overall Tampa Bay Devil Rays farm system ninth among the 30 teams in major league baseball. The issue is devoted to the 2005 minor league preview and featuring the talent rankings of the 30 major league organizations. In the section devoted to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, the following references can be found:

On outfielder Rocco Baldelli (Princeton-2000): A "franchise" player that the farm system has produced lately.

On pitchers Seth McClung and Doug Waechter (both 1999): Both are pitchers who have surfaced in Tampa Bay over the past couple of seasons.

On outfielders Carl Crawford (1999) and Rocco Baldelli (2000): Both are already established in the majors as 23-year olds.

On outfielders Jonny Gomes (2001) and Jason Pridie (2002): Both are among the outfielders listed at Tampa Bay's most well stocked position in the organization.

On infielder Travis Schlichting (2003): This third baseman is beginning to make adjustments at the plate and is the player named by the magazine to make possibly the most rapid progression through the system (category is listed as "Prepare for Takeoff"). While he just has two homers in his previous two pro seasons, he has enough bat speed and power potential to become a home run threat once his lanky 6-foot-4 frame fills out.

And so there you have it. Yes, we here at Princeton are making a difference in the progress which is mounting at Tampa Bay and will result in a very special major league baseball team on the Gulf Coast of Florida just a few years from now. We are indeed proud of our fans who attend games at Hunnicutt Field to both enjoy the atmosphere of minor league baseball while at the same time realizing they are helping to build a major league baseball team in Tampa Bay through players they are now helping by their encouragement from the bleachers. We thank our fans for their patience and for realizing that P-Ray victories are not always measured in the win/loss column but sometimes by the ability of our organization to help advance players to "the show" as fast as any organization in the Appalachian League. By the way, we hope to share with you what some of our new souvenirs will be for 2005 in our May edition of "Raywatch" to help get you fired up for summer and we invite you to stop by the stadium soon to pick up your box seats or to pick up your season tickets for our 18th season in the Appalachian League.

More so than ever, make this the year you help your P-Rays team by bringing a friend or neighbor who is not coming to our games. After all, you are already helping to build our heritage now, so just add another building block by bringing a friend. See you next month!

Check out the Princeton WhistlePigs Statistics

• Discuss this story on the Appalachian League message board...

Appalachian League Stories from April 12, 2005


The opinions expressed in this release are those of the organization issuing it, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.

OurSports Central