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Millers' Luna thriving in new role
Pittsburgh, Pa.
Ruben Luna hadn't quite lived up to the massive hype that surrounded his 2009 mid season acquisition from the Syracuse Slammers. He was expect to be another big bat in a lineup that at the time featured hitters Fred Schubert, Travis Wallis, Tom Griffiths, and rookie Ethan Bafford.
That never quite happened.
In 2009 for the Millers he hit a paltry .244/.306/.379 which was good for a .685 OPS. Still, banking on his history of success (four straight years of a .800+ OPS) the Millers extended him for 3 years and 41 million. It has been a major bust coming into the season, and when he opted in for the final year of this contract, the Millers shopped him hard.
"Honestly, we were looking to dump him for the cap relief," Millers GM Mike said, "Ultimately we couldn't work anything out and it paid off for the best."
Moving to a full time DH role, Luna has exploded this season hitting in the cleanup spot. He's batting .304/.381/.562 with a .943 OPS, and 27 of his 59 hits going for extra bases.
"I love the challenge of navigating a pitcher through a game, being involved in every decision that the team has defensively has always been my favorite part of the game. But when Lonnie and Mike came to me in spring training and told me that I was going to DH 95% of the time, it allowed me to focus on my bat." Luna said.
When asked about how he feels physically, Luna said with a big smile, "I forgot what it was like to feel good in the box, I'm feeling confident, my knees feel good, my back isn't hurting me and I'm in a good place."
Of course, this wouldn't be possible without the emergence of off season acquisition Mike del Rio, who's enjoying a career year. The 27 year old native of Puerto Rico is batting .308/.336/.470 with 9 HRs (3 shy of his career high of 12).
The most impressive statistic that the catcher boasts is the 64.3% of runners trying to steal that he's thrown out this year. The usually quiet and shy del Rio was clear when he was asked about his high percentage of runners caught stealing.
"I don't like base runners. I tell my pitcher all the time, you just pitch to me, don't worry about those guys, if they want to run, I'll take care of them."
So far the numbers back him up.
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Roadie
The Millers will spend the next 7 days on the road, first a 4 game set vs the Knights in the big apple, followed up by a cross country flight to take on the Dinos in LA.
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Upcoming homestand
Don't forget to get your tickets to Wednesday July 4th's game at home against the Dallas Snappers, it's the Elvis Presley 'I'm all SHOOK up' night, where the first 25,000 in attendance will get a Dave Shook bobble head where he's dressed in an Elvis outfit, and following the game there will be a fireworks show to celebrate the nation's independence.
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