The Storm breaks out with a four game sweep of Inland Empire, after losing 2 of 3 to the Lancaster Jet Hawks, to put a punctuation mark on their sixth week of play. The bats really came alive against the 66ers with 3B/DH Jedd Gyorko catching fire to burn up the scoreboard for a collective 15/30 with 11 runs scored, 3 2B, a 3B, 4 HR, 11 RBI with 3 BB and 4 SO for the week!

This barrage paced the Storm to a 5-2 record and a collective 17-25 for the season, holding them in 4^th place and nine games back of Rancho Cucamonga. Gyorko did get some help with strong hitting from teammates Eddie Rincon and Nate Freiman but most of the heavy lifting was done by Gyorko.

OF Danny Payne came off the DL and upped his average from .238 to .273 with at least one hit in each game he played. OF Wande Olabisi has also helped his cause with an increase from .231 to .296 over the week.

The consistent output of CF Rey Fuentes should not go unnoticed.  Holding his average at .312- .307 during this time, Fuentes collected at least one hit in every game he played. He upped his stolen base total from 10 to 16, stealing at least one base per game over the first 5 games of the week and was caught stealing in his attempt at a 6^th game in a row.  That makes 16 steals in 21 attempts. Of his 48 hits only 9 are for extra bases but it should be remembered he is still only 20 yrs old and should develop more gap power as he matures.

It is not reasonable to expect Gyorko to continue at this pace but he has put on quite a show for so early in the season and has increased his RBI total to 43 for the year. Besides being the team leader in RBI he also leads in HR with 11 and doubles with 20. With AAA 1B Anthony Rizzo attracting most of the organizational excitement at the moment, Gyorko is making a name for himself at a slightly lower volume but it won’t stay that way for long if he keeps this up.

Other newsworthy notes for the Storm include the injury to starter Jose DePaula that placed him on the DL this week ( left pectoral strain) and the signing of starter Jason Ray as a free agent to replace him. Ray is a career minor leaguer from the Oakland A’s organization who was drafted in 2005 and has not played above AA in his career.

Pitcher Chase Marona was sent to Lake Elsinore from extended spring training to shore up the relief corp. He started the season with Fort Wayne but had a rough go of it and was sent to Peoria for some work. I expect this will be a short-lived stint for him. He was a 27^th round pick from last year’s draft.

One other standout that should be mentioned is reliever Miles Mikolas who has been serving closer duties for the Storm for the majority of the early season. He has quietly impressed with a 0-0 record and 1.65 ERA over 14 games and 16.1 IP with 13 hits, 3 earned runs, 1 HR, 21 strikeouts and no walks with a .203 average against. He is the only pitcher on the staff to go without a walk so far this season. It continues to be impressive how this organization is able to draft and develop dominant relievers at every level. As mentioned at the end of week three, the Storm bullpen has many talented arms and this 22 yr old bears close watching.