There is no other way to explain the Giants trade with the Texas Rangers, where reliever Cory Gearrin and outfielder Austin Jackson were headed along with minor league pitcher Jason Bahr for either a minor leaguer to be named or cash.
Neither Gearrin or Jackson was having an especially big year (Gearrin's ERA was over four in 35 games and Jackson was hitting just .242 without a homer) and the team saved over four million with Jackson (signed thru 2019) and another million and a half from Gearrin by sending them away.
Teams don't help others for free and Texas added an interesting prospect in Jason Bahr.who led the SAL in strikeouts at Augusta (88) before being called up to San Jose where he allowed only three runs in three starts.
The fifth-round pick from Central Florida in 2017 was assigned to the Rangers high A affiliate in Kinston NC-the Down East Wood Ducks...
San Francisco called up two players to fill the vacated two roster spots as outfielder Steven Duggar and reliever Ray Black arrived from AAA Sacramento.
Duggar is a plus defender and was hitting .272 in Sacramento, while the 28-year-old Black struck out 38 batters in 21 AAA innings.
Both played in Sunday's game against St.Louis with Duggar's double giving him his initial big league hit, while Black allowed three runs in a third of an inning to welcome him to the majors.
And there is where we write a story about Ray Black.
Let's say a fascinating story with full credit to the Folksmen.
Ray Black throws hard.
HARD- as in clocked at 104 MPH hard.
Look at Black's strikeout numbers and one can see that, but until he began to harness his control and cut back his walks as he did in 2017, Black was going to be looked at as more novelty act than bullpen asset.
We move back to our first trip to Charleston WV in 2016 when we saw the Augusta Greenjackets in town against the West Virginia Power.
As we needed to this season, to see the Greenjackets we needed to hit the road because Augusta doesn't visit Hagerstown.
I wrote back then about the famous West Virginia "Toastman" Rod Blackstone and his heckling.
The Toastman's routine has become somewhat famous through the minors and he has even been placed in a few of Topps minor league sets.
Fred and Michael Landucci were at our hotel, checking out the next day and our hotel was next to the hotel that Augusta was staying.
Their bus driver was waiting outside and we struck up a conversation about the previous night's game (a game so good that Fred and I still talk about it) with him.
The lack of hitting came up and the bus driver started talking about Rod Blackstone and his ability to distract players or as the driver put it " That F'ing Toastman knows how to get inside these kids head".
The driver told us about Blackstone getting to the players because he doesn't curse or do anything nasty, he simply drives them nuts by telling the truth about their stats, signing bonus, draft status or background- "Its hard to ignore someone that's telling the truth".
But then came the really interesting part- "but one guy pushed back on the Toastman".
Of course, we then needed to know the story and it features the power-armed Ray Black- as in the previously mentioned 104 MPH fastball Ray Black.
The driver said that Black had claimed that he wouldn't tolerate the Toastman experience and he didn't as he was brought into the game as a reliever and watched as Blackstone began his reciting of various facts for Black.
This is where the story gets interesting- The driver claimed that in his warmups that Black rocked back and gunned his best fastball "and you know that Black throws very hard" at Blackstone at the netting.
"The net bulged back, Toastman's eyes grew WIDE OPEN and he almost got nailed!"
I found this story very interesting and remembered for our trip to Charleston in 2017 and asked Rod if this indeed happened- his response was that he didn't remember it occurring.
I thought that perhaps the driver had been either telling a story or exaggerating one as sometimes a fable is far more fun to listen to than the actual truth.
Maybe Black did throw a wild pitch and then commented as we all do as "almost getting him" etc?
Fast forward a few weeks after this, I'm in Harrisburg for the Richmond Flying Squirrels and who comes walking by to their bullpen but Ray Black.
I have to ask him about this and I do so with Black answering with a sheepish grin and a "so where did you hear about this?".
I told him that the Augusta bus driver told us this story and Black replied so "bus drivers name ( I cannot say that I remember his name) still remembers that".
We talked for a few minutes about Augusta, the Greenjackets then-home, Charleston and of course, the Toastman before Black had to go back to work.
It didn't seem like a story that Black was bragging or embellishing and he was very matter of fact about it, which lent some credence to me that at least a portion of the story was factual.
The entire thing made me a Ray Black fan and he seemed like a cool guy when we talked about the story, so I was very happy to see him get a shot at the big time at the age of 28.
No matter if the story was as described or not, it was still a good tale and it is fabled such as those that make minor league baseball what it is- Fun...
