<img alt="MLB: MAR 08 Spring Training - Pirates (SS) at Braves (SS)" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/Bw9Tlt9j83m29uxZsB5RgJIvv3E=/0x0:3600x2400/1310x873/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73407555/2061705326.0.jpg">
Photo by David J. Griffin/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images
Nacho time has hit Coolray Field, and the Stripers have received a boost from Alvarez and teammate Drake Baldwin It was a pretty successful day for the Atlanta Braves organization. The big league Braves finally won a game, our terror at that losing streak coming to an end, and four of the five affiliates in action also won. Gwinnett and Augusta have turned into the hubs of the team, and especially Gwinnett where Nacho Alvarez and Drake Baldwin have taken up residence. Alvarez put on a power show on Thursday, though Baldwin may have shown the more impressive bat over the two games both have played.
(31-35) Gwinnett Stripers 8, (35-31) Nashville Sounds 7
Box Score
Statcast
Nacho Alvarez, SS: 1-5, HR, 2 RBI, .222/.222/.556
Drake Baldwin, DH: 1-5, .429/.556/.429
Darius Vines, SP: 3.2 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 3 ER, 3 BB, 2 K, 5.59 ERA
Jackson Stephens, RP: 1.1 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 1 K, 3.44 ERA
Nacho Alvarez is finally free of the oppressive Southern League air, and it took him all of two games to make his presence loudly known in a Gwinnett Stripers uniform. Alvarez has repeatedly been one we’re told to wait on, and that the power would be coming, and in the first inning tonight he ripped one out to dead center field and just cleared the wall for a 407 foot home run. It’s an exciting moment in a system that has largely lacked offensive firepower this season, but Alvarez isn’t the only call up making waves in a Stripers uniform. Last season Drake Baldwin went on a bit of a good streak with his three game stint in Triple-A, and already he is making a strong impression in Gwinnett after just two this season. Two batters after Alvarez’s round tripper Baldwin himself had a flirtation with the center field wall, just missing on a 103 mph fly out. In Wednesday’s game Baldwin hit a 111.6 mph shot that was the fourth-hardest hit ball of any Striper of the past two seasons. He then comes back today with two batted balls over 100 mph, including a 110.1 mph ground out that’s one of only 13 total 110+ mph batted balls by Stripers since the start of 2023. Baldwin provides unusual thump for a Gwinnett team that has been the worst in Triple-A at hard contact for much of the season, and though he didn’t factor much into the 8-7 final score it is still impressive to see him already smoking the ball.
Of course Chadwick Tromp isn’t set to renounce his third catcher role so easily, and his 3-4 day, in which he added a 110.5 mph single to that 13 mentioned above, was critical in Gwinnett’s taking the win. Tromp clubbed a massive two-run home run in the fifth inning to tie the game, then an inning later added a run in quite the opposite way with a 60.1 mph infield single to bring home a run. It was good to see an output like this from the offense, because the pitching staff certainly didn’t have its best form. Darius Vines struggled mightily throughout the game, but with the help of the baseball savant data we can glean two interesting bits of information. One, take performance here with a grain of salt because Vines used his fastball 50% of the time and if called back to the major leagues he would never have such high usage. Whatever it is, the Braves must feel Vines needs to get comfort with that fastball and as long as they are doing that his results won’t reflect his readiness. The concern though is that his velocity, already on the fringes of too weak for a major league role, has steadily dropped this season and averaged just 88.2 mph on Thursday. This is a trend that has to reverse, as while his changeup and command might be enough to survive around 91, it is an entirely different conversation when you drift down an extra 2-3 mph.
(26-32) Mississippi Braves 7, (31-27) Rocket City Trash Pandas 5
Box Score
Cody Milligan, CF: 2-5, 3B, .217/.279/.321
Keshawn Ogans, 3B: 1-3, HBP, .211/.264/.261
Geraldo Quintero, LF: 2-3, HR, BB, 3 RBI, .214/.317/.299
Ian Mejia, SP: 6 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 6 K, 1.79 ERA
Hayden Harris, RP: 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 0 K, 2.00 ERA
In their home away from home, this week at least, Mississippi had a blast even without their two big name stars on offense. Behind their seven runs, the now clear top gun in the rotation Ian Mejia had more than enough support to lead the team to a win. Mejia will not probably ever repeat the highs the month of May gave him, but the solid work he has done continued as he allowed two runs over six innings. The report for him is still much the same, in that he will tend to struggle more the second and third times through until that splitter makes some improvement, but overall this is a player who has made strides this season and has the rare go-to out pitch already in his arsenal with his slider.
Unfortunately for him Austin Smith, fresh off of the injured list, didn’t have a hot outing in relief and gave up the lead by allowing three runs. Smith is a live arm, but after so much time missed it should be expected he will take some time to round back into form. The most important development from that bullpen is Hayden Harris, who has not been in action since June 2nd, reappearing to pitch a scoreless inning. Harris has been a bit off the past two outings, not missing as many bats as in weeks past, so he’ll need to get that fastball refined back to the upper part of the zone. I’m more just happy that he’s back and we don’t have another injury to report on.
The offensive showing was led by the bottom of the order, with six of the seven runs either being scored or driven in by the duo of Tyler Tolve and Geraldo Quintero. In Quintero’s case his main contribution was putting Mississippi up big early, as he hooked a fly ball inside the right field foul pole to clear his second home run of the season — a critical three-run shot to make it 4-1. Then there is Tolve, a certainly gifted catcher with his raw power, who up until about three weeks ago was nearly unplayable. Tolve struck out absurdly often to start the year, but finally settled down in a reasonable way. While this line is BABIP-inflated, he’s done well to get his strikeout rate to 24.6% over the past 15 games, while hitting .281/.328/.439. He has yet to get his home run power rolling, really the calling card that gives him some major league third catcher potential, but he has nine doubles in that span with two of those coming in this game.
Swing and Misses:
Ian Mejia - 12
Domingo Gonzalez - 5
(32-26) Rome Emperors 6, (33-27) Bowling Green Hot Rods 4
Box Score
Ethan Workinger, LF: 4-5, 2B, HR, 3 RBI, .284/.372/.433
Sabin Ceballos, DH: 0-4, BB, .261/.351/.352
EJ Exposito, SS: 0-4, .284/.350/.525
Luis Vargas, SP: 5.1 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 6 K, 0.79 ERA
It’s time to start talking about Luis Vargas I guess. He wasn’t much on my radar coming into the season, other than knowing he had a decent slider, but wow has he been a force of nature over the past month or so of action. Vargas’s fastball velocity has ticked up, and with that he has become unafraid of attacking the top of the zone. His whiff rates are skyrocketing, his walk rates are plummeting, and suddenly he is on a stretch since moving to the rotation during which he has a 2.28 ERA and 33 strikeouts in 27 2⁄3 inning. Yesterday was itself an impressive performance, though I haven’t seen anything to budge me from a reliever projection on Vargas. He’s vastly more successful in the first three innings of his starts, and he hasn’t showcased a changeup more than a couple of time. His fastball and slider combination wrecks right-handed hitters, but if teams can stack lefties against him it has been an issue for him to get outs. Vargas has an astonishing 31.8% K-BB% against right handed batters this season (near to Sam Hentges in MLB, who is at 31.3% and a 1.95 FIP). Against left handed batters the drop is precipitous, sitting at a mere 8.0% (a number close to Cal Quantrill, of the 8.0% K-BB% and 4.34 FIP). So Vargas is a righty specialist who can probably only pitch in short bursts, but an upper 90’s fastball and solid average slider is more than enough for a major league role.
Overall for the Emperors this was an important game, getting them in the win column against the Hot Rods and bringing them back into a tie for the division (where they slightly lead on win percentage). This team has been steadily reinforced from the GreenJackets, and one of those provided big pop as Drew Compton hit his first High-A home run. Importantly for Compton he is playing some third base, a necessary role for him if he hopes to have a major league career. Compton can hit a little and has enough strength to be a replacement-type third baseman that gets some major league run out of necessity, but the bat is far from good enough to project to that sort of potential at 1B/DH. I’m skeptical of his glove as I would be with any player making that transition, but he’s only two games in playing that position so we’ll revisit this after I get some time watching him.
The real star of the show was Ethan Workinger, who has made some tweaks to his setup and started to come back into form in the past couple of weeks. Workinger is often overlooked in the system, being an unsigned guy who has moved slowly, but there is reason to continue to watch his development closely. Workinger has enough power to project to average in that front, tends to work great at bats, and can play a good enough outfield to project him to major league average defensively. I question whether his results against secondary offerings will ever get to major league quality, but he has some feel for barrel and while a fringe prospect who isn’t mobile enough for a center field job it shouldn’t be completely ignored that there is a major league ceiling there. Workinger had a home run in this game, his third in his past three series.
Swing and Misses
Luis Vargas - 13
Elison Joseph - 10
(25-34) Augusta GreenJackets 0, (33-27) Lynchburg Hillcats 2
Box Score
Isaiah Drake, CF: 2-4, .165/.228/.278
Jeremy Celedonio, DH: 1-3, .364/.444/.909
Kadon Morton, SP: 5 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 3 K, 6.23 ERA
Davis Polo, RP: 3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 1 K, 4.36 ERA
We’re going to have a conversation about Isaiah Drake and no one else on this offense, because after that none of them deserve it. Drake, however, that young man is on a roll and it has to be respected just how much better he has been in the past couple of weeks. The quality of contact and at bats has improved immensely, and I’m proud of seeing someone take their struggles in stride and turn it around so quickly. He still needs to improve against breaking balls, but there is plenty to like here and we’re seeing a case of talent and makeup winning out over immaturity (from a development, not personal, perspective). Drake will still take a ton of time to develop, but he’s ahead of where I would have guessed if you asked me a month ago. He also has looked fine in center field, though he has a couple of times bungled routine fly balls (he cost Morton a run doing that this game). I don’t really concern myself with outfield errors ever. They surely look bad and are often incredibly impactful with the amount of bases they let up, but especially for an 18 year old the anticipation, first step, quality of routes, and closing speed are all far more meaningful to projection and Drake is well in the green in these categories.
Kadon Morton is in a good spot given his lack of professional pitching experience. He isn’t good yet, and I wouldn’t expect him to be, but his slider has a quality shape to it and his velocity is solid. He looked quite good the first time through the order this game, though if he is to be a starter they will have to develop another pitch for him to work with. I think given his age and pitch mix it’s more likely the Braves also see him as a reliever, and like with other relief prospects (Vargas I believe to be another example) the intent behind starting him is solely to get him more innings to develop with. Morton desperately needs these innings, and it will be a long time before we know if there is any chance of this experience succeeding, but I’m impressed how well he is doing for a guy who hasn’t pitched since high school.
Swing and Misses
Morton - 9
(6-19) FCL Braves, (12-14) FCL Red Sox POSTPONE
Eventually they will play a game again. Right?
(2-4) DSL Braves 3, (2-4) DSL Reds 2
Box Score
Carlos Monteverde, RF: 1-4, 2B, .300/.375/.450
Juan Espinal, CF: 0-2, 2 BB, .150/.280/.150
Edward Cedano, SP: 3 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 3 K, 3.00 ERA
Yander Pinero, RP: 3 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 3 BB, 5 K, 0.00 ERA
This game was curiously low-scoring for a DSL game, and the Braves survived by the skin of their teeth. As a team they issued eight walks, but held the Reds offense to only one hit in the entire game. 17 year old Yander Pinero was electric, striking out 5 of 13 batters faced over three scoreless and hitless innings. Carlos Monteverde is taking his second crack at the Dominican Summer League, and he was a higher profile signing last year when he got $600k. He struggled a lot, but so far this season has already hit three doubles in six games though strikeouts remain high.
<img alt="MLB: MAR 08 Spring Training - Pirates (SS) at Braves (SS)" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/Bw9Tlt9j83m29uxZsB5RgJIvv3E=/0x0:3600x2400/1310x873/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73407555/2061705326.0.jpg">
Photo by David J. Griffin/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images
Nacho time has hit Coolray Field, and the Stripers have received a boost from Alvarez and teammate Drake Baldwin It was a pretty successful day for the Atlanta Braves organization. The big league Braves finally won a game, our terror at that losing streak coming to an end, and four of the five affiliates in action also won. Gwinnett and Augusta have turned into the hubs of the team, and especially Gwinnett where Nacho Alvarez and Drake Baldwin have taken up residence. Alvarez put on a power show on Thursday, though Baldwin may have shown the more impressive bat over the two games both have played.
(31-35) Gwinnett Stripers 8, (35-31) Nashville Sounds 7
Box Score
Statcast
Nacho Alvarez, SS: 1-5, HR, 2 RBI, .222/.222/.556
Drake Baldwin, DH: 1-5, .429/.556/.429
Darius Vines, SP: 3.2 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 3 ER, 3 BB, 2 K, 5.59 ERA
Jackson Stephens, RP: 1.1 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 1 K, 3.44 ERA
Nacho Alvarez is finally free of the oppressive Southern League air, and it took him all of two games to make his presence loudly known in a Gwinnett Stripers uniform. Alvarez has repeatedly been one we’re told to wait on, and that the power would be coming, and in the first inning tonight he ripped one out to dead center field and just cleared the wall for a 407 foot home run. It’s an exciting moment in a system that has largely lacked offensive firepower this season, but Alvarez isn’t the only call up making waves in a Stripers uniform. Last season Drake Baldwin went on a bit of a good streak with his three game stint in Triple-A, and already he is making a strong impression in Gwinnett after just two this season. Two batters after Alvarez’s round tripper Baldwin himself had a flirtation with the center field wall, just missing on a 103 mph fly out. In Wednesday’s game Baldwin hit a 111.6 mph shot that was the fourth-hardest hit ball of any Striper of the past two seasons. He then comes back today with two batted balls over 100 mph, including a 110.1 mph ground out that’s one of only 13 total 110+ mph batted balls by Stripers since the start of 2023. Baldwin provides unusual thump for a Gwinnett team that has been the worst in Triple-A at hard contact for much of the season, and though he didn’t factor much into the 8-7 final score it is still impressive to see him already smoking the ball.
Of course Chadwick Tromp isn’t set to renounce his third catcher role so easily, and his 3-4 day, in which he added a 110.5 mph single to that 13 mentioned above, was critical in Gwinnett’s taking the win. Tromp clubbed a massive two-run home run in the fifth inning to tie the game, then an inning later added a run in quite the opposite way with a 60.1 mph infield single to bring home a run. It was good to see an output like this from the offense, because the pitching staff certainly didn’t have its best form. Darius Vines struggled mightily throughout the game, but with the help of the baseball savant data we can glean two interesting bits of information. One, take performance here with a grain of salt because Vines used his fastball 50% of the time and if called back to the major leagues he would never have such high usage. Whatever it is, the Braves must feel Vines needs to get comfort with that fastball and as long as they are doing that his results won’t reflect his readiness. The concern though is that his velocity, already on the fringes of too weak for a major league role, has steadily dropped this season and averaged just 88.2 mph on Thursday. This is a trend that has to reverse, as while his changeup and command might be enough to survive around 91, it is an entirely different conversation when you drift down an extra 2-3 mph.
(26-32) Mississippi Braves 7, (31-27) Rocket City Trash Pandas 5
Box Score
Cody Milligan, CF: 2-5, 3B, .217/.279/.321
Keshawn Ogans, 3B: 1-3, HBP, .211/.264/.261
Geraldo Quintero, LF: 2-3, HR, BB, 3 RBI, .214/.317/.299
Ian Mejia, SP: 6 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 6 K, 1.79 ERA
Hayden Harris, RP: 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 0 K, 2.00 ERA
In their home away from home, this week at least, Mississippi had a blast even without their two big name stars on offense. Behind their seven runs, the now clear top gun in the rotation Ian Mejia had more than enough support to lead the team to a win. Mejia will not probably ever repeat the highs the month of May gave him, but the solid work he has done continued as he allowed two runs over six innings. The report for him is still much the same, in that he will tend to struggle more the second and third times through until that splitter makes some improvement, but overall this is a player who has made strides this season and has the rare go-to out pitch already in his arsenal with his slider.
Unfortunately for him Austin Smith, fresh off of the injured list, didn’t have a hot outing in relief and gave up the lead by allowing three runs. Smith is a live arm, but after so much time missed it should be expected he will take some time to round back into form. The most important development from that bullpen is Hayden Harris, who has not been in action since June 2nd, reappearing to pitch a scoreless inning. Harris has been a bit off the past two outings, not missing as many bats as in weeks past, so he’ll need to get that fastball refined back to the upper part of the zone. I’m more just happy that he’s back and we don’t have another injury to report on.
The offensive showing was led by the bottom of the order, with six of the seven runs either being scored or driven in by the duo of Tyler Tolve and Geraldo Quintero. In Quintero’s case his main contribution was putting Mississippi up big early, as he hooked a fly ball inside the right field foul pole to clear his second home run of the season — a critical three-run shot to make it 4-1. Then there is Tolve, a certainly gifted catcher with his raw power, who up until about three weeks ago was nearly unplayable. Tolve struck out absurdly often to start the year, but finally settled down in a reasonable way. While this line is BABIP-inflated, he’s done well to get his strikeout rate to 24.6% over the past 15 games, while hitting .281/.328/.439. He has yet to get his home run power rolling, really the calling card that gives him some major league third catcher potential, but he has nine doubles in that span with two of those coming in this game.
Swing and Misses:
Ian Mejia - 12
Domingo Gonzalez - 5
(32-26) Rome Emperors 6, (33-27) Bowling Green Hot Rods 4
Box Score
Ethan Workinger, LF: 4-5, 2B, HR, 3 RBI, .284/.372/.433
Sabin Ceballos, DH: 0-4, BB, .261/.351/.352
EJ Exposito, SS: 0-4, .284/.350/.525
Luis Vargas, SP: 5.1 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 6 K, 0.79 ERA
It’s time to start talking about Luis Vargas I guess. He wasn’t much on my radar coming into the season, other than knowing he had a decent slider, but wow has he been a force of nature over the past month or so of action. Vargas’s fastball velocity has ticked up, and with that he has become unafraid of attacking the top of the zone. His whiff rates are skyrocketing, his walk rates are plummeting, and suddenly he is on a stretch since moving to the rotation during which he has a 2.28 ERA and 33 strikeouts in 27 2⁄3 inning. Yesterday was itself an impressive performance, though I haven’t seen anything to budge me from a reliever projection on Vargas. He’s vastly more successful in the first three innings of his starts, and he hasn’t showcased a changeup more than a couple of time. His fastball and slider combination wrecks right-handed hitters, but if teams can stack lefties against him it has been an issue for him to get outs. Vargas has an astonishing 31.8% K-BB% against right handed batters this season (near to Sam Hentges in MLB, who is at 31.3% and a 1.95 FIP). Against left handed batters the drop is precipitous, sitting at a mere 8.0% (a number close to Cal Quantrill, of the 8.0% K-BB% and 4.34 FIP). So Vargas is a righty specialist who can probably only pitch in short bursts, but an upper 90’s fastball and solid average slider is more than enough for a major league role.
Overall for the Emperors this was an important game, getting them in the win column against the Hot Rods and bringing them back into a tie for the division (where they slightly lead on win percentage). This team has been steadily reinforced from the GreenJackets, and one of those provided big pop as Drew Compton hit his first High-A home run. Importantly for Compton he is playing some third base, a necessary role for him if he hopes to have a major league career. Compton can hit a little and has enough strength to be a replacement-type third baseman that gets some major league run out of necessity, but the bat is far from good enough to project to that sort of potential at 1B/DH. I’m skeptical of his glove as I would be with any player making that transition, but he’s only two games in playing that position so we’ll revisit this after I get some time watching him.
The real star of the show was Ethan Workinger, who has made some tweaks to his setup and started to come back into form in the past couple of weeks. Workinger is often overlooked in the system, being an unsigned guy who has moved slowly, but there is reason to continue to watch his development closely. Workinger has enough power to project to average in that front, tends to work great at bats, and can play a good enough outfield to project him to major league average defensively. I question whether his results against secondary offerings will ever get to major league quality, but he has some feel for barrel and while a fringe prospect who isn’t mobile enough for a center field job it shouldn’t be completely ignored that there is a major league ceiling there. Workinger had a home run in this game, his third in his past three series.
Swing and Misses
Luis Vargas - 13
Elison Joseph - 10
(25-34) Augusta GreenJackets 0, (33-27) Lynchburg Hillcats 2
Box Score
Isaiah Drake, CF: 2-4, .165/.228/.278
Jeremy Celedonio, DH: 1-3, .364/.444/.909
Kadon Morton, SP: 5 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 3 K, 6.23 ERA
Davis Polo, RP: 3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 1 K, 4.36 ERA
We’re going to have a conversation about Isaiah Drake and no one else on this offense, because after that none of them deserve it. Drake, however, that young man is on a roll and it has to be respected just how much better he has been in the past couple of weeks. The quality of contact and at bats has improved immensely, and I’m proud of seeing someone take their struggles in stride and turn it around so quickly. He still needs to improve against breaking balls, but there is plenty to like here and we’re seeing a case of talent and makeup winning out over immaturity (from a development, not personal, perspective). Drake will still take a ton of time to develop, but he’s ahead of where I would have guessed if you asked me a month ago. He also has looked fine in center field, though he has a couple of times bungled routine fly balls (he cost Morton a run doing that this game). I don’t really concern myself with outfield errors ever. They surely look bad and are often incredibly impactful with the amount of bases they let up, but especially for an 18 year old the anticipation, first step, quality of routes, and closing speed are all far more meaningful to projection and Drake is well in the green in these categories.
Kadon Morton is in a good spot given his lack of professional pitching experience. He isn’t good yet, and I wouldn’t expect him to be, but his slider has a quality shape to it and his velocity is solid. He looked quite good the first time through the order this game, though if he is to be a starter they will have to develop another pitch for him to work with. I think given his age and pitch mix it’s more likely the Braves also see him as a reliever, and like with other relief prospects (Vargas I believe to be another example) the intent behind starting him is solely to get him more innings to develop with. Morton desperately needs these innings, and it will be a long time before we know if there is any chance of this experience succeeding, but I’m impressed how well he is doing for a guy who hasn’t pitched since high school.
Swing and Misses
Morton - 9
(6-19) FCL Braves, (12-14) FCL Red Sox POSTPONE
Eventually they will play a game again. Right?
(2-4) DSL Braves 3, (2-4) DSL Reds 2
Box Score
Carlos Monteverde, RF: 1-4, 2B, .300/.375/.450
Juan Espinal, CF: 0-2, 2 BB, .150/.280/.150
Edward Cedano, SP: 3 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 3 K, 3.00 ERA
Yander Pinero, RP: 3 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 3 BB, 5 K, 0.00 ERA
This game was curiously low-scoring for a DSL game, and the Braves survived by the skin of their teeth. As a team they issued eight walks, but held the Reds offense to only one hit in the entire game. 17 year old Yander Pinero was electric, striking out 5 of 13 batters faced over three scoreless and hitless innings. Carlos Monteverde is taking his second crack at the Dominican Summer League, and he was a higher profile signing last year when he got $600k. He struggled a lot, but so far this season has already hit three doubles in six games though strikeouts remain high.
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