The second year in existence, the Greeneville Reds season came to an end in the final week of August. They finished the season at 26-41 on the year and in last place in the Appalachian League West Division.
Impressive team stats
The Reds finished dead last in runs scored. They were also last in average (.226), on-base percentage (.295), and OPS (.655). They had 25 fewer walks than the next worst team in the league. They had the second most strikeouts. Frankly, the offense was really, really bad as a whole. They did finished second in triples with 23 on the season. They were 6th in the league in home runs with 51 (10 teams). On the pitching side of things they finished with the third most strikeouts. They also had the fewest walks in the league.
Top Hitting Performance
Two hitters topped the .800 OPS mark for the Reds this season, Allan Cerda and A.J. Bumpass. This one came down to those two, but I’m going to give the edge to Bumpass here, who checks in with a .250/.333/.471 line in 161 plate appearances. He added in 10 doubles, 3 triples, 5 home runs, and he went 4-for-4 in stolen base attempts.
Top Pitching Performance
There are two performances that stand out here and they both come from relievers. Randy Wynne, despite only starting 3 games and pitching out of the bullpen in his other 9 appearances, nearly led the team in innings – falling 1 out short of matching Graham Ashcraft for the team lead. In his 53.1 innings pitched, Wynne posted a 3.04 ERA, walked just 2 batters, and he racked up 54 strikeouts.
Tanner Cooper made all 15 of his appearances out of the Reds bullpen. The 19-year-old posted a 2.21 ERA in 36.2 innings. He gave up just 23 hits – including 1 homer, and he walked 12 batters to go with 42 strikeouts. He also picked up a team best 2 saves.
Team MVP
It’s not usual that a guy who spent a large majority of the year in the bullpen is going to be the MVP of the team, but I think that’s what we’ve got here. Randy Wynne’s 3.04 ERA and 53.1 innings stand out on this team. His 0.88 WHIP really stands out, as does his 54-to-2 strikeout-to-walk ratio. He also put up the game of the year within the Appalachian League, and the best game in the short history of the Greeneville Reds when he struck out 17 batters with only 1 hit allowed over 8 innings on August 20th.
If you would like to see the entire stats for the team you can click here and head on over the team page at Baseball-Reference.