The Fall of Brian Dopirak

May 18, 2007 by cubsnet

The Cubs used to have two big hitting first basemen in the minor leagues. One of them -- Brandon Sing -- is no longer in the system and has a 494 OPS for the Orioles' AA team this season. The other, Brian Dopirak, is still in the system, but he's no longer big hitting and has just been demoted from AA to high-A Daytona.

Dopirak was hitting just .218/.247/.269 for Tennessee this season. He went 0-4 with 2 K's in his first game for Daytona.

It certainly was not supposed to be this difficult for Dopirak. He was the Cubs' 2004 minor league player of the year when he hit .307/.363/.593 for low-A Lansing. He was also named by John Sickels as the Cubs' top prospect. Despite posting just a 670 OPS the next season for high-A Daytona, the Cubs added him to the 40 man roster after the year and promoted him to AA for 2006.

Unfortunately, Dopirak again disappointed last year, posting a 663 OPS in 52 games after breaking his foot on opening day.

Taking Dopirak's roster spot at Tennessee is 6'6" lefty reliever Jerry Blevins, who has had a dream season for Daytona so far this year: 23.2 innings, 1 earned run on 13 hits and 5 walks, with 32 K's.

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