Shuffling The Deck: A-ball Edition

While not as pronounced as in years past, the traditional realignment of players for the second half continues with the latest set of transactions today (well, that and the Hagerstown Suns start back up tonight, natch).

As the headline suggests, the majority of the movement is between the “A” teams — Potomac, Hagerstown, Auburn. As I did a year ago, here’s a breakdown of the moves over the past three days:

SYRACUSE
• 2B Danny Espinosa optioned from Washington — They can’t make him have shoulder surgery, but they can stop the accrual of service time
• RHP Caleb Clay promoted from Harrisburg — Superb first outing, seems ready to make the jump

HARRISBURG
• RHP Ryan Perry reassigned from Syracuse — The starter experiment seems over, is this a demotion to work with certain coaches or in a lower-pressure environment?
• RHP Marcos Frias reassigned from Potomac — Injured and/or ineffective most of the year, seems likely that he was sent back either due to health or having the preferred pitchers in place

POTOMAC
• RHP Robert Benincasa promoted from Hagerstown — Is the closer’s job up for grabs?
• RHP Ivan Pineyro promoted from Hagerstown — Looks like Sammy Solis is going to be out for a prolonged period of time.

HAGERSTOWN
• RHP Derek Self demoted from Potomac — Hit or miss all season long for the P-Nats; at least the new Suns unis won’t clash with his preferred red glove.
• OF Narciso Mesa reassigned from Auburn — Hit .343 in 32 games for Auburn last summer, but that wasn’t enough to get the the full-season assignment in April.

GCL
• RHP Brian Broderick assigned from Harrisburg on rehab — Pretty typical this time of year.

With the P-Nats roster at 12 pitchers and 24 players (one short of the usual for both), it would seem that another move is coming. What would seem most likely is an injured reliever coming off the D.L.

As always, if the other shoe drops within the next 24 hours or so, this space will be updated.