Getting a Grant
The Wild Things added a big piece to their roster when they announced Wednesday the signing of third baseman Grant Psomas, a Keystone Oaks High School graduate and West Virginia University product.
Psomas is one of the three players classified as Veterans by Frontier League roster standards. The others are Chris Sidick and Brett Grandstrand.
Psomas comes to the Wild Things after spending five seasons in the minor leagues - two in the New York Mets' system and three with Florida. He made it as high as Class AAA, playing in seven early-season games last year for Albuquerque in the Pacific Coast League. Psomas went 9-for-18 with three home runs for Albuquerque, but he struggled the rest of the season in Class AA and high-Class A.
I believe outfielder Doug Garcia (2003) was the only other Wild Things player to have played in Triple-A.
Psomas had two productive seasons (66 extra-base hits) for the Mets after being drafted in the 15th round in 2004. Psomas was one of three minor-leaguers New York traded in 2005 to Florida for all-star first baseman Carlos Delgado and $7 million. Psomas, who was the "player to be named later" in the trade, went to Florida along with first baseman Mike Jacobs (now in the majors with Kansas City) and pitcher Yusmeiro Petit, who is currently playing for Arizona and has replaced injured Brandon Webb in the Diamondbacks' rotation.
In his first two years in the Marlins' system, Psomas hit 26 home runs, including a 50 extra-base hit season in 2007 for the Carolina Mudcats in Double-A. But his batting average dipped to .238 - he was a .283 hitter in Class A.
In five minor-league seasons, Psomas hit 55 home runs including 23 above the Class A level.
"Grant will provide us veteran leadership and an impact bat in the middle of the order," said new Wild Things manager Mark Mason. "We have received very strong reports on him, and his numbers speak for themselves."
Labels: Grant Psomas
posted by Chris Dugan at
10:31 PM
29 Comments:
From Frontier League website:
April 23, 2009
LAKE ERIE CRUSHERS: Signed RHP Brian Chambers; released OF Greg Plecki, RHP Andrew McCormick, and [b]C Brandon Ketron[/b]
I thought the Wild Things would have first rights on Brandon Ketron in the Frontier League. Did they make a trade to relenquish his rights?
Im from WVU and i watched Psomas play in Morgantown, i am very excited about this signing and looking forward to watching him play for the Wildthings this season. He's a great talent both offensively and defensively, not to mention has great sportsmanship,.... glad to see the WT are starting to consider character when they sign a player
WVU Alum
According to what I was told several years ago, when a player gets picked up by an affiliated team during the season, his FL team retains his rights for the remainder of that year and the following year. Thus, the Wild Things' rights to Ketron expired after the 2007 season. This is how Washington was able to sign Chris Carter in 2005 without compensation to Kalamazoo.
Rockford signed Mike Goetz. Shouldn't Traverse City have first crack at retaining him...or is there more given up by Rockford sent to Traverse City in order to sign Goetz? Seems like a good sign by Rockford though.
Also, to keep the baseball talk rolling, Windy City dropped ultra utility man/pitcher Amos Ramon and then Kalamazoo quickly picked him up. Chris, your thoughts on his signing by K-zoo?
Randy Gore
I would think Rockford has to give up something, if what I was told about retaining rights was correct. But, if you look at Traverse City's roster on the FL site, the Beach Bums don't have an opening for another L2 like Goetz. ... Rockford also signed first baseman/outfielder Todd Martin, who was on Wild Things' radar for quite some time. They thought they had Martin in the fold but he signed with Rockford for more money. That's at least two players this year that Rockford has lured away from Washington by offering more money. The other is a rookie pitcher.
Radio Randy,
Will you be the Wild Things radio broadcaster this year? How many years is it now?
I enjoy listening to you and I feel you improve each year.
Will Arnold be driving the bus again?
If so, with Franni Williams taking over, Arnold, Ross, and Chris Blayne will be the only ones associated with the Wild Things since day 1.
PS-I forgot two others PA Bill and Don the usher. I did not include Bob Gregg because he is only a partimer.
It would be sooooooo good NOT, repeat NOT to hear DiFabio on the PA at CEP ever again.
This freakin’ ego driven nut job is a drag on what is otherwise a nice evening at the ball
park. Would also be good if they did not bring back that red headed usher nazi again.
Looking for the WT to improve by about 6 games this year. I don’t think there will be a lot of
sellouts this season though. A poor start will probably be disastrous for attendance.
The apple doesn’t shine the way it did in the first few seasons. If Jamal follows through on his threat to bring bus loads of his friends, well………….. I’m outa’ there!!!
Dale M
llib,
Thank you very much for the compliment. Yes, I will be back again this season and this will be my 5th year. I'm very much looking forward to this summer. Should be a fun team to watch.
Randy Gore
Randy better be planning to be back.
I'm WAAAAYYYY too old to ride the bus like that....
He does a great job for us.
By the way, our entire crew is back--Randy on all the games, home & away; Mark & I will work the home games with Randy (except for the opening weekend of the PONY League World Series).
Bob Gregg could never be considered "part time". Mr. Gregg is "prime time" in my book. Few can top his talent.
What I meant about Bob Gregg being part time was he is not the announcer for all 96 games plus he does not do all the home games.
I would consider "Radio" Randy as the voice of the Wild Things, and Bob Gregg and Mark Uria as the commentators for home games only.
Only one person can top the talent of Bob Gregg and in his own mind is the best of all time. Can you guess who I am talking about?
PS-He sits pretty close the the radio announcer's both at Consol Park.
I think Randy does a pretty good job for a young chap. But listening to him and listening to BobGreggg is night and day. Bob knows what is happening before it happens.
I don't have a preference to any of the radio guys.Just tell me the score every now and then.Don't be like the Succo's play by play guys and ramble on about nothing pertaining to the game.
I'm with Mr. C, I have no preference. Both of those guys are excellent yokels.
Jack
Miners Nab Ketron
http://www.frontierleague.com/cgi-bin/dist/news.cgi?id=1241101582
This comment has been removed by the author.
How about those older ladies?!?! I know Claude's friend likes them.
Bubba Higgins
This blog is dead
The blog would not be dead if the deleted comment was left on.
I read it before it was deleted and probably before Jamal read it because there has been no response from him.
Perhaps they could make Jamal the public address announcer.
That would be very classy.
Ps-Have you ever head the expression "If pigs fly".
Well you have now, swine flu.
Ron Wilson,
Have you disappeared?
I miss hearing from you.
Why did the administrator remove the remarks about how the Mexican Pig flu might hurt the Frontier
League?
I guess he didn’t like to hear the truth about it. I thought it made a lot of good sense.
Well, I can just hear it now; “It’s MY blog..whaa….whaa….whaa…!!!!
BTW: I wasn’t the one that posted it.
Mark J
The post was removed because the liberal reporter that is the administrator will only allow comments that may be controversial to be made by Jamal and his ilk!
Just more sucking up to Obama stuff. This is how censorship begins, with small and unimportant things being removed under some sort of phony pretext. That post did indeed contain something about baseball.
Also, it included some things that may have touched a nerve with some folks----so what?
The previous bloggers are correct. This blog is about a boring baseball team that tries to pass itself as an AA, or better team – no way! Sandlot perhaps, maybe even American Legion but that’s about it.
When someone tries to bring up something interesting or controversial, unless his name is Jamal, it gets removed – simple plain and pure selective censorship. I note that the deleted item has been changed from ‘Removed by administrator’ to removed by writer – that is just a flat out lie..PERIOD! So, the O-R reporter cannot even be honest about that!!
Wake up people, this sort of crap is becoming more and more pervasive in our country since the Clinton years and is now coming to a point where we should not tolerate it!
I fully expect that this too will be removed. I hope some of you get to read it before it does.
Jerry (I am actually fearful of giving my full name)
Just so you uneducated types understand:
The GOVERNMENT is prohibited from censoring the press.
The PRESS is ABSOLUTELY free to censor itself, and its anonymous bloggers.
7th grade civics. Of course, for some of you, that's still 3-4 years away.
For you liberal idiots, censorship in ANY form, by ANYONE, is tyranny!
Dishonesty is a hallmark of the Observer-Reporter and it’s employees.
Common sense is a lot more than 3-4 years away from Mr. Greeg.
You may have the last word Mr.Gregg. One cannot debate censorship.
It was deleted because it was one of the stupidest and most childish things I've read in quite some time - at least since the last comment I deleted. But if you insist on posting and reading immature stuff like that, here is what was deleted:
Swine Flu will wipe out entire Frontier League season!!
Now Jamal can bring all his friends and not get anybody upset.
Bring them on Jamal!!!!!
Jack
BTW: Please be sure to bring Barack with you.
By the way, the last comment I deleted was written by Jamal, so I guess you can't say I'm playing favorites. Just trying to keep the bantering above the second-grade level. Also, when a comment is deleted on Blogger, the comment line is automatically generated by Blogger. I have nothing to do with what it says.
Anonymous wrote
How about those older ladies?!?! I know Claude's friend likes them.
Bubba Higgins
April 30, 2009 5:25 PM
It seems to me that if the moderator wanted to REALLY keep it above the second grade level,
the above post would have been deleted. What does it have to do with baseball AND, what the heck is it supped to mean? At least the now restored post was baseball related. I think Chris just wants to show who is the boss! Well, as we all know by now, it’s HIS blog so let him do want he wants and we can all watch it just die.
If you want to see some truly juvenile stuff you should check of the other blogs that the O-R garbage wrapper has!
Jack
What was silly about the Swine flu remark?
I guess Chris thinks it is beyond human compression that it just could happen.
I know for sure that if Jamal brings his buddy’s to the WT games – I’m gone for
good!! I ain’t any stupid chances to watch a really minor league baseball game.
Name withheld to save my rear end
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