Kyle Russell prepares to bat as the Lookouts play the Tennessee Smokies at AT&T Field in this file photo.After hitting .245 two years ago with the Chattanooga Lookouts and .259 last season, outfielder Kyle Russell hit .306 in April and leads the team in on-base percentage and slugging percentage.
So is Russell at ease now when stepping to the plate?
“I don’t think there’s ever a point you feel totally comfortable until you’re actually in the box at Dodger Stadium and you’re hitting over .400, like Matt Kemp is right now,” he said.
Russell’s continued improvement is among the early positives for the 2012 Lookouts, who had their first off day Monday after an 11-14 opening month. Catcher Matt Wallach (.316), catcher/infielder J.T. Wise (.312) and middle infielder Rafael Ynoa (.299) also are off to good starts, but it’s been a different story for Brian Cavazos-Galvez.
After hitting .277 in 116 games with Chattanooga last season, the outfielder is hitting .167 this time around, though he does lead the team with four home runs.
“We’re second in the league in runs, so that’s pretty solid,” manager Carlos Subero said. “J.T. Wise has done well in his first year in the league, and Ynoa has really started to come on. Russell is making some adjustments that he probably didn’t make before, and I think it’s similar to when [Scott] Van Slyke repeated here.”
Pitching was expected to be Chattanooga’s strength, but the Lookouts are just seventh in the league with a team earned run average of 3.92. The Lookouts had been ninth until Matt Magill’s strong outing Sunday, which made the former 31st-round draft pick the Southern League pitcher of the week.
Nathan Eovaldi is the Lookouts’ best pitcher when with them — he was called up to Los Angeles and sent back this past weekend without making an appearance — and Ethan Martin has been the biggest surprise. Martin is 2-0 with a 3.58 ERA, with his one drawback being his league-leading 19 walks.
“Ethan Martin has done a heck of a job so far for us,” pitching coach Chuck Crim said. “He’s a talented kid, but he’s always had trouble throwing strikes. We’re going to have to cut down on his walks, but he’s really been throwing the ball well for us all year.”
Allen Webster, the No. 2 organizational prospect according to Baseball America, is 1-4 with a 5.68 ERA. Crim said he is making changes with Webster’s mound presence and speeding up his delivery.
The Lookouts have been better defensively from a year ago, and they are 33-of-38 on stolen-base attempts, which Subero finds staggering for a team “not blessed with that much speed.”
Winning the close ones was difficult in April, as the Lookouts went 6-11 in games decided by one or two runs. Chattanooga hasn’t lost a game by more than four runs and has four wins by at least five runs.
“We’re here to be a team and want to win, but we see development in these players that may not show up in the paper,” Crim said. “We see how the development is going, but it is tough sucking up some of these losses.”
Said Russell: “It’s a shaky start, but that’s the great thing about baseball. It’s a marathon and not a sprint.”