• AFL Starts Tomorrow: I was just going over the Scottsdale Scorpions' roster for the list of Nats' prospects that would be playing out in the AFL this fall the other day for an AFL Preview, and didn't see his name mentioned then, but after catching a tweet from the Harrisburg Senators (@hbgsenators) this morning which read, "Arizona Fall League first pitch: TOMORROW! Carr, Burgess, Kimball, Lombardozzi, and Peacock are there and have all seen Sens action," I checked the roster, and Brad Peacock, the '06 41st Round pick, a right-hander out of Palm Beach Central High School in Wellington, Florida had indeed been added to the list of pitchers who will throw for the Scorpions. Peacock, 22, a 6'1'', 175lb right-hander, spent the 2010 season with Class-A Potomac and Double-A Harrisburg where he was a combined (6-11) in 26 G, 25 starts and 142.0 IP over which he struck out 148 (9.4 K/9).
Peacock joins pitchers Sammy Solis, Cole Kimball, and Adam Carr, catcher Derek Norris, infielder Stephen Lombardozzi and outfielder Michael Burgess as the Nats' prospects who'll be representing the curly-W out in Scottsdale. Still no official word on whether Bryce Harper's in or out. When Washington Post writer Adam Kilgore updated everyone on Harper's Florida Instructional League progress recently in an article entitled, "A Bryce Harper update from the Instructional League", Mr. Kilgore wrote that the Nats had, "...one AFL roster spot available and they can petition MLB for one more," though they'd need an exemption to add a third player who'd yet to play above Double-AA, but as he wrote, that's, "...a hurdle the Nationals would almost certainly be able to clear." So there's still hope even with Peacock's addition for those Nats fans who were expecting to see Harper in the AFL...
• MLB.com's Bill Ladson (@washingnats) is currently running a Twitter Poll asking Nats fans if the team should pursue Rays' frst baseman Carlos Pena, (and for the record, I have no problem with Carlos Pena, or anyone who thinks he'd be a good replacement should Dunn depart) but if the Nats' don't sign either Adam Dunn or Pena (who's two years older than Dunn and coming off a .196/.325/.407 season with Tampa Bay over which he had a slightly worse (-3.4 to -3.8) UZR/150 than Dunn), MLBTraderumors.com's Tim Dierkes has an article up today with a list of first baseman from around the league who could be available via trade. And for the record, MLBTR's reverse-engineered Elias Rankings still have Dunn as a Type B free agent, meaning the 2 draft picks Nats fans (and the D.C. GM Mike Rizzo) were counting on should Dunn walk, might just be 1 pick instead...if the reverse-engineering process proves accurate...
That's all for now...