51s have no excuses for making winning such a novelty

Can we agree this developmental premise is getting old with the 51s?

The central purpose of Triple-A baseball remains as constant as those weekend giveaways at Cashman Field. The kids in the stands get T-shirts or a bobblehead, and the older kids on the field supposedly get the best instruction for how to eventually graduate to the major league level.

Many believe that progression remains the most important objective, even more than winning.

It's believed mostly by teams like the 51s, who haven't done much of it for years.

The winning part, that is.

Las Vegas, which last finished with an above-.500 record in 2003, dropped to eight games under with Wednesday night's 7-4 loss to Colorado Springs at Cashman. The last-place 51s are stumbling through another season hoping to trip over an answer or two as to why other Pacific Coast League teams seem to graduate players to the majors and still compete for titles at this level.

Sacramento is the affiliate for the A's and certainly has lost players to Oakland in recent seasons. The River Cats also have managed to play 77 games above .500 and win three Southern Division titles since 2002. Tucson is the affiliate for Arizona. Over that same period, the Sidewinders are 47 games over .500 and have won one championship and finished second three times.

The 51s since 2002: 22 games under .500, one title, one second, two thirds and a last-place finish.

Can we agree it's time the team again should be as good -- or at least close to it -- as those giveaways?

"Everyone gets decimated at one time or another by call-ups," 51s president Don Logan said. "Everyone goes through it in Triple A. It's a lame excuse (for losing).

"Some years it's worse than others. But that excuse doesn't hold water with me. We just have to get better. Stats don't lie."

It's true last season --

67-77 record, 24 games back of division champion Tucson -- was an aberration for Las Vegas, which lost more players to the Dodgers than Grand Prix tires were obliterated in that downtown fire Wednesday.

To which, as black smoke rose hundreds of feet into the air, one Cashman press box voice cracked, "There's the 51s bullpen."

It's like football. People get hurt. You replace them and move on. Triple-A players get called up. You replace them with guys who might not be prepared to make the jump from Double A and teach them and hope they adjust.

Others just have done it far better than the 51s for some time now, one reason being Las Vegas hasn't discovered much of a solution for getting people out.

It has a PCL-worst 5.30 team ERA this season, which pretty much cancels out the fact the 51s lead the league in runs scored. Last season, the ERA was 4.69. In 2005, it was a T-ball-like 6.21, the highest in franchise history and yet for some inexplicable reason still not bad enough to stop the Atlanta Braves from hiring Roger McDowell away to be their pitching coach.

Talk about the Peter Principle at work.

"Guys have to learn how to execute pitches, especially late in games," said Ken Howell, 51s pitching coach the last two seasons. "Young kids get hit in this league and become afraid of the strike zone.

"They start pitching away and get deep in the count and begin walking people. They get behind 3-0 and 3-1 and then want to induce contact and come to the middle of the plate and get crushed. They get away from their off-speed stuff because they don't have the ability yet to pitch backwards."

What he just said: They can't get ahead of hitters, can't throw strikes when they need to and, when they pitch to contact, get lit up like those Grand Prix tires.

The PCL always will be a hitters' league where balls fly out of some ballparks at altitude like $1 hot dogs do off the shelves each Wednesday night at Cashman. But others have made it work. All of it. Sacramento has. Tucson has.

The call-ups. The young arms. Playing baseball on the moon. The fact that chemistry is difficult to develop at a level where individual advancement is so paramount.

"We talk about (winning) every day," 51s reliever Eric Hull said. "The manager, the shortstop, the center fielder, someone is always saying, 'Let's start by winning this one.' "

Can we agree they either aren't talking loud enough or the teaching part needs to dramatically improve?

Ed Graney's column is published Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday. He can be reached at 383-4618 or egraney@reviewjournal.com.