Karachi Dissa and Data

[Karachi_GM]

A Roster Adjustment, the Draft, and Spring Training Injuries

by Hasan Khan, Sports Editor (Karachi Dawn)
16 March 2105

In another pleasant surprise for fans of the Karachi Falcons, the World Baseball Association has reversed the waiver claim from late last season that saw pitcher Dermott Baldwin pass from the Falcons to Rio de Janeiro in the Americas League.  Baldwin has returned to Karachi and will see action in the final Spring Training games.  He was a very effective reliever for the Falcons last year.  He will probably join Rick Etheridge as Karachi set-up men, but could possibly be given a spot in the Falcon rotation as a starter.  The overall consensus is that he lacks the stamina to be a regular starter. 
[FYI: the Karachi Pitching Review has been updated to include the presence of Baldwin on the roster.]

Dermott Baldwin

The WBA amateur draft is complete.  It should be no surprise at all to anyone that Karachi placed the emphasis of its draft selection on pitching help.  The team’s top three selections were all pitchers:

• El-Fatih Mwendapole is a 22-year-old Ugandan who projects to someday be Karachi’s number one starter.  Known as ‘The Mailman’, Mwendapole was the number two overall pick in the draft.  He throws a fastball, a slider, and a wicked changeup, and he can bring it in at 95-97 mph.  No relation to Fasilidas Mwendapole, another pitcher in the Karachi organization, El-Fatih will start his professional career at Multan in Class A.
• Bhuvanesh Chandak, Karachi’s second rounder and 12th overall pick, is a year older than Mwendapole and hails from India.  His pitch selection and speed mirror that of Mwendapole, and he too could someday be a number one.  He will start his career at Sargodha in the Rookie League.
• Tai Lu, the third round pick, is of a different sort.  He projects to be a closer with his excellent fastball and curve.  About to turn 22 and hailing from Vietnam, he too will begin his career at Sargodha.

Spring Training is winding toward its conclusion.  Splitting nine of eighteen games to date seems reasonable enough.  Karachi management feels strongly that the major goal in Spring Training is injury avoidance.  So far the injury list includes new reliever Jorge Cruz suffering a strained forearm that will sideline him until June and Lukyan Enohin rupturing a finger tendon that keeps him off the roster until mid-July at earliest.  Frankly, Enohin was a long shot to make the roster anyway.

[Huckleberry]

Love your writeups, man.  Keep 'em coming.