Greinke lands BDBL accolade, Outlaws to go 5-man

Not only was the effort that Zack Greinke put together in Chapter 2 noticed within the Outlaw front office, his work also garnered awards from the BDBL press.

I normally don’t pay much attention to the wins stat, but when a guy goes a perfect 6-0 in a chapter, it’s tough to ignore,

The article went on to highlight that Grienke led the league in batting average against as well as on base percentage against (.166/.201).

It’s the second POM award since Greinke joined the staff in 2017. He landed the award in Chapter 1 last season when he went 4-0 with a 2.33 ERA and similar numbers against hitters (.186/.244/.322).

But not only did the article praise Greinke, but the entire staff was lauded for the second straight month.

Flagstaff’s starting pitching, in particular, has been unreal. A quick look at the leaders board shows all four pitchers in Flagstaff’s starting rotation among the league leaders in ERA. They own four of the top six spots, capped by Alex Wood, who has remarkably allowed only five runs in 61 innings.

“It’s hard to ignore what the pitching has done,” Outlaws GM Greg Newgard said. “The fact is it was even stronger until that series against Las Vegas inflated the stats a bit. But it’s good for this entire staff to be highlighted for the work they’ve been putting in.

During the first two months of the season, Flagstaff featured a four-man rotation (Chris Sale, Greinke, Wood, Michael Wacha) with spot starters filling in for Wood and Wacha on occasion. But the Outlaws are taking a different jack as the calendar turns to June.

“With interleague play coming and a somewhat shortened schedule of 24 games, we thought this might be a good time to lengthen the rotation to a 5-man setup, putting J.C. Ramirez at the back end, and letting Collin McHugh continue to get spot starts for rest.

“This gives our workhorses one less start this chapter, but allows us to manage their usage a bit. It’s a bit early to think about next month to see if we’ll continue it, but we want to go back to a four-man down the stretch, so we are going to help ensure we do that but resting players here in the middle.”

Flagstaff will start Chapter 3 Thursday when they face the Great Lakes Sphinx in interleague play.