Daily Notes: Concerning Tonight’s Caribbean Series Title Game

Table of Contents
Today’s edition of the Daily Notes has no table of contents, it appears.

Caribbean Series Title Game
The Caribbean Series — featuring the champion from each of the Dominican Winter, Mexican Pacific, Puerto Rican, and Venezuelan Winter Leagues — began last Friday in Hermosillo, Mexico. The first six days of the Series were played in a double round-robin format, with each team playing every other one twice.

Championship Game: Escogido vs. Obregon, 9pm ET
Dominican club Leones de Escogido and Mexican club Yaquis de Obregon finished first and second during the round-robin portion and meet in the first-ever actual title game of a Caribbean Series, the champion of which has historically been whichever club recorded the most wins from the round-robin tournament.

With regard to tonight’s game, here are points of interest for the reader:

• Right-handers Angel Castro and Rodrigo Lopez pitch for Escogido and Obregon, respectively. Castro was impressive in the club’s opening game against Venezuela, striking out seven while walking none in seven innings. Lopez was less so, posting a 2:1 K:BB in six innings — also against Venezuela — but allowing just a single run anyway, somehow.

• Escogido’s Miguel Tejada has been probably the best hitter of the tournament, with a slash-line of .318/.429/.636, two home runs, and a 4:4 walk-to-strikeout ratio in ca. 26 plate appearances.

• Escogido infielder Jose Ramirez is an actual prospect. Just 20 years old as of September, he played at Cleveland Single-A affiliate Lake County for most of 2012 and posted a 145 wRC+ (.378 BABIP) while recording a 24:26 walk-to-strikeout ratio in 313 plate appearances.

• Obregon’s Barbaro Canizares has been that team’s best hitter, posting a 5:3 walk-to-strikeout ratio. His home run during Wednesday night’s game against Puerto Rico was only his team’s third in the six-game tournament.

• So far as the author can tell, the game will be available both streaming via Watch ESPN and also on ESPN Deportes.

Scores
Here are the results from Wednesday’s games, the final of the round-robin portion of the Series, with links to the relevant box scores:

Game 1: Dominican Republic 4, Venezuela 2
Game 2: Mexico 10, Puerto Rico 0

Standings
Here’s a table of the final standings, copy-and-pasted illicitly from ESPN Deportes, but then formatted to suggest nothing of the sort:

Tean	G	P	PCT	JD	CA	CP	DIF
República Dominicana	5	1	.833	–	38	23	15
México	3	3	.500	2	29	21	8
Puerto Rico	2	4	.333	3	13	27	-14
Venezuela	2	4	.333	3	12	21	-9

And here’s a glossary, with English translations, for the above:

G: Ganados (Wins)
P: Perdidos (Losses)
PCT: Porcentaje de victorias (Winning Percentage)
JD: Juegos detrás (Games Back)
CA: Carreras anotadas (Runs Scored)
CP: Carreras permitidas (Runs Allowed)
DIF: Diferencial de carreras (Run Differential)

Stats
Here is a slightly absurd, but not entirely usesless, leaderboard of the top-10 hitting performances through the round-robin stage of the Caribbean Series. SCOUT+ an offensive measure calculated with regressed home-run, walk, and strikeout rates, where 100 is average and above 100 is above average. (Click here for more on what is SCOUT.)

Player	Team	Pos	PA	xHR%	xBB%	xK%	SCOUT+
Miguel Tejada	DR	SS	26	2.9%	9.5%	22.2%	111
Barbaro Canizares	MEX	1B	21	2.6%	10.2%	22.3%	109
Rey Navarro	PUR	2B	21	2.6%	8.7%	20.9%	108
Donell Linares	DR	3B	20	2.6%	8.8%	21.1%	107
Francisco Pena	DR	C	15	2.9%	8.0%	23.2%	105
Alfredo Amezaga	MEX	2B	26	2.5%	8.0%	20.8%	105
Joe Thurston	VEN	OF	21	2.2%	9.2%	20.9%	105
Jose Ramirez	DR	2B	30	2.5%	10.4%	24.2%	105
Jesus Feliciano	PUR	OF	26	2.2%	9.0%	20.8%	104
Jose Castillo	VEN	2B	24	2.5%	8.6%	22.5%	104

And here are the top-10 pitching performances thus far — in this case by SCOUT-, a metric calculated with regressed strikeout and walk rates where 100 is average and below 100 is above average.

Player	Team	G	GS	IP	TBF	xK%	xBB%	SCOUT-
Jailen Peguero	DR	4	0	4.1	16	26.2%	8.4%	90
Yeiper Castillo	VEN	2	1	6.1	24	26.3%	8.6%	91
Victor Moreno	VEN	2	0	2.1	7	26.3%	8.7%	91
Ricardo Gomez	PUR	2	0	3.0	9	26.0%	8.5%	91
Ken Ray	VEN	1	1	6.0	24	25.7%	8.2%	91
David Reyes	MEX	2	0	5.2	18	25.5%	8.3%	92
Saul Rivera	PUR	3	0	3.0	11	25.1%	8.4%	94
Hector Navarro	MEX	2	0	1.0	5	24.7%	8.5%	96
Angel Castro	DR	1	1	7.0	24	24.4%	8.2%	96
Jose Cobos	MEX	5	0	4.1	13	24.7%	8.6%	96

Notable Performance: Jailen Peguero
With the exception of a home run allowed to Puerto Rico, Escogido closer Jailen Peguero was excellent, striking out eight batters over 4.1 innings.

Here he is striking out Gustavo Molina with a slider to end Wednesday’s win over Venezuela:

And here is, seconds later, shrugging — in what is probably equal parts a petulant and charming gesture: