Harrisburg's first-half offense highlighted by Turner, Skole, Renda, Lozada and Ramsey

Triple-A Syracuse shortstop Trea Turner has recorded at least one hit in 10 of his last 11 games. In the last 10 games, Turner is hitting .417 (15-for-36) with four multi-hit games. He has had two games in that span with at least three hits.

On the season, between three teams, Turner is batting .318 with 17 doubles, six triples, seven homers and 45 RBIs in 84 games.

Turner hit .359 in 10 games with Double-A Harrisburg Senators.

Looking at first half power numbers offensively for the Senators, Matt Skole leads the way with 12 homers and 53 RBIs. Mario Lisson leads with slugging percentage of .434, including five doubles, four homers and 20 RBIs. Kevin Keyes had eight doubles and five homers with 26 RBIs. Tony Renda had 16 doubles and Rick Hague 15 doubles. Brian Goodwin had four triples. Renda led with 18 stolen bases and Derrick Robinson added 15 thefts. Renda also was the team leader with 49 runs scored.

Not all of the players played all 90-plus games at the Double-A level, but Jose Lozada hit .356 in 22 games and Caleb Ramsey totaled .309 in 33 games. Shortstop Wilmer Difo hit .286 in 44 games with 10 stolen bases.

Turner led the was with a .879 OPS, Lozada had a .807 and Cutter Dykstra with a .807 mark. Lozada was the team leader with an on-base percentage of .455, Dykstra at .391 and Isaac Ballou tallied .378 mark.

But one reason Harrisburg struggled at times in the first half was their inconsistent offense. The team had a league-low batting average of .245 in the first half. They also had only 36 total homers, last place in the Eastern League. New Hampshire led the way with 61 roundtrippers just past the first half of the season. Harrisburg's league low of 1,007 total bases was 200 less than the top team, Reading (1,207). Their OPS was also lowest in the Eastern League at .650. They did steal 87 bases, second only to New Britain's 115, so Harrisburg was a aggressive when they got a chance on base.

Harrisburg was also walked 282 times, third most in the league through 91 games, and 584 strikeouts was about middle of the pack.

So with these kind of offensive numbers, it shows how good the pitching has been during the first half for a team that is still hanging in there at 45-46 on the season.

The top two teams in each division make the playoffs, so even though Harrisburg is six games back of first place, they are only four games behind Altoona for a postseason berth.