What to expect from the Dutchies this year? Juan Carlos Sulbaran

With Spring Training in full swing it is time to see how the players from the Kingdom of the Netherlands will do in the upcoming season. Of course there is no crystal ball and it is still up in the air, but in general you can make a decent prediction based on the performance of previous years.

Juan Carlos Sulbaran was drafted by the Cincinnati Reds in the thirtieth round of the 2008 amateur draft. It is not quite clear where Juan Carlos was born. Wikipedia says that he was born in Curacao, while his MiLB page and his Baseball Reference page say that he was born in Davie Florida. Juan Carlos started his professional career at A Full Season level with the Dayton Dragons in 2009. In 21 starts he posted a 5-5 record with a 5.24 ERA. He spent the next year with the Dragons as well, going 4-6 in 16 games (15 starts) with a 4.99 ERA.
In 2011 he was promoted to A Advanced Bakersfield. Despite the California League is known as a hitters league, Juan Carlos improved his ERA to 4.60.
During the 2012 season the Reds traded him to the Royals. He split the season between the Pensacola Blue Wahoos of the Southern League and the Northwest Arkansas Naturals of the Texas League. During that season his ERA rose to 4.75 and his record declined to 7-11.
For the next three seasons Sulbaran would play for the Naturals with the exception of the 2013 season (when he played a part of the season for the Wilmington Blue Rocks) and the 2015 season when he played a part of the season for AAA Omaha. For the latter he had eight starts and posted a 3-3 record with a 6.17 ERA.

Juan Carlos also participated in the Premier 12 tournament with team Kingdom of the Netherlands. In two relief appearances he gave up 2 runs in 3.1 innings pitched (5.80 ERA).

So what can we expect from Juan Carlos in 2016? As a minor league free agent, he jumped ships to the Royals’ cross state rivals. As a non roster invitee, he made a relief appearance in yesterday’s game for the Cardinals. He got two quick outs but thanks to a wild pitch, a HBP and a single he loaded the bases before he served up the pitch for a ground out towards first base. Through the years he has shown flashes of brilliance but then again he also played in games where his stuff did not work at all. During his career, he managed only once to bring his ERA below 4.00 (2014 when he posted a 3.25 ERA with the Northwest Arkansas Naturals). His opponents managed to hit a decent .268 with Juan Carlos on the mound. If the Cardinals organization has a good pitching coach that can work on his irregular performance, perhaps he can get a call up to the Bigs later this year. But expect him to start at AAA Memphis. Don’t be surprised if he will be sent down to Springfield in the AA Texas League. If he manages to stay at AAA level he may be a number 4 or 5 starter.
It is very likely that he will spent the whole season at AAA, but if he gets a call up in August or September, it iwill be as a relief pitcher, not as a starter.