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Hernandez was lights out for Augusta and struck out seven batters The team may not be winning, but times are fun down in Augusta right now. The GreenJackets are running out a number of the top Atlanta Braves draft picks for their debuts this week, but Herick Hernandez’s seven strikeouts in 3 2⁄3 innings is going to be tough to top. In addition Luis Guanipa returned to the lineup today after missing a week following an injury.
(64-65) Gwinnett Stripers 4, (68-59) Columbus Clippers 5
Box Score
Statcast
Nacho Alvarez Jr, 3B: 1-5, RBI, .303/.418/.500
Harold Ramirez, RF: 2-4, RBI, .400/.478/.400
Drake Baldwin, C: DNP, .308/.420/.476
Hurston Waldrep, SP: 5 IP, 7 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 4 K, 4.50 ERA
Tommy Doyle, RP: 2 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 4 K, 3.31 ERA
There was good and bad aspects of this game for Hurston Waldrep, and ultimately he did go five innings of one run ball thanks to the success of his secondaries at forcing weak contact. This was one of his best games at finding a consistent arm slot and shape on his slider, and the pitch had decent results even though he wasn’t always locating it like he was earlier in the season in Mississippi. Waldrep was pulling his pitches to his glove side, which isn’t great for a player who relies on a splitter as his primary pitch, but neither the split nor slider suffered from his issues locating. His fastball was was once again a big problem as six of the seven hits he allowed were on the pitch and he didn’t get a single fastball whiff. Following the 14 swings without a whiff Waldrep’s fastball whiff rate sits at 7.5%, which is the fourth-worst number among 545 Triple-A pitchers who have thrown 100 or more four-seam fastballs this season. You’ll have to excuse some incomplete data here as savant search hasn’t updated as of the time of writing, but it’s not like hitters are hitting him weakly either. Waldrep has the second-worst xSLG allowed on four seam fastballs in that same group of players, and has allowed an average exit velocity of 92.7 mph. It’s worth considering that these are small samples that we’re dealing with, but it has always been a question as to whether Waldrep’s odd cut-carry shape would actually work in pro ball given that he didn’t really miss many bats even in college despite his fastball’s velocity.
Nacho Alvarez only went 1-5 on the day, flaring a single into right field in the ninth inning, but had a couple of hard hit balls that just missed making this a much bigger day. Alvarez hit two fly balls to straight away center field that fell just short of home runs, the later of the two chasing the center fielder all the way back against the wall. Harold Ramirez has been terrific for the Stripers since being picked up on a minor league deal earlier this week, and he’s probably the most interesting piece among Atlanta’s minor league outfield depth right now. Ramirez was awful this season in the major leagues as his batted ball quality plummeted and he seemingly forgot how to hit fastballs, but for a few seasons there he was playing like and trending towards being a solid outfield bat, especially in a platoon role, and could be an interesting pairing with Jarred Kelenic if the Braves can reclaim some of his offensive production from 2022-2023. Eli White was back in the lineup after being pulled early in yesterday’s game, and had a hit in the eighth inning. He was then hit on the hand/wrist by a 98 mph fastball from former Braves draftee Franco Aleman, and he remained in the game but certainly his status is worth watching in the next couple of days.
Swing and Misses
Hurston Waldrep - 9
Tommy Doyle - 7
(58-64) Mississippi Braves 7, (64-57) Pensacola Blue Wahoos 8
Box Score
Ethan Workinger, LF: 2-5, 2 RBI, .205/.247/.274
David McCabe, DH: 1-5, 2B, .145/.306/.217
David Fletcher, SP: 5 IP, 4 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 4 BB, 1 K, 6.05 ERA
Ryan Bourassa, RP: 1 IP, 1 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 4 BB, 1 K, 18.00 ERA
It was a rare day for the Mississippi Braves as their offense was rolling and getting contributions from top to bottom. Unfortunately it was also a rare day where the pitching wasn’t holding the other team and they dropped a game in the division standings. With David Fletcher starting things always tend to get interesting, and Fletcher did not have the knuckler on his side today as he walked four batters and gave up three home runs to the Blue Wahoos. Fletcher crossed the 90 inning threshold for the season, which is an impressive number for a guy who didn’t start pitching full time until late May, but he also has the lowest strikeout rate (8.4%) among any pitcher in minor league baseball with at least 30 innings. Buried in all of the transactions this week I missed the promotion of Ryan Bourassa, an undrafted free agent signing that had found plenty of success down in Rome this season. Bourassa dominated mostly much younger competition at that level and I was curious to see if he could translate that success against more advanced hitters. Bourassa did miss some bats — mostly with his downer breaking ball — but the command issues that troubled him some in Rome were even more apparent in Double-A as he walked four batters in his debut with the M-Braves.
David McCabe had a hard hit double in this game, turning on a pitch down and in and driving it into right field. McCabe is in an interesting spot mechanically right now, where he is kind of walking a thin line between opening up to turn on pitches and flying open too soon, though I do like him trying to turn and lift pitches to utilize his raw power more effectively. He often would fall into an opposite field gap approach last season and while he does have the power to hit the ball out to all fields a tendency to not pull the ball combined with fringy bat speed is a recipe to get beat by fastballs on the inner half. McCabe is cheating a bit on fastballs right now and has some swing-and-miss on breaking balls, but I’m going to reserve judgement until he gets a full offseason of time to recover from his Tommy John surgery and recover his timing a bit.
Ethan Workinger was a huge part of Mississippi’s offensive output in this game as well, slapping a first inning single the opposite way and then following McCabe’s double with a two-RBI single up the middle. Workinger is struggling to find his swing path right now and has been hitting the ball weakly and on the ground too often. He has a pretty nasty hitch/jitter in his hands right before he starts his swing that I’m not a fan of, and can lead to him loading his hands and elbow inconsistently which likely exacerbates some of his issues finding hard contact. Cade Bunnell hit his first home run of the season in this game and it’s a surprise to me he took this long to get one. Bunnell hasn’t had consistent playing time this season like he has in seasons past, but had 15+ home runs in each of his first three professional seasons.
Swing and Misses
Ryan Bourassa - 6
David Fletcher - 6
(57-62) Rome Emperors 1, (70-51) Greensboro Grasshoppers 3
Box Score
Jace Grady, RF: 1-4, .186/.289/.267
Kevin Kilpatrick Jr., CF: 0-3, BB, SB, .232/.314/.330
Blake Burkhalter, SP: 6 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 11 K, 2.59 ERA
William Silva, RP: 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 2 K, 9.95 ERA
Blake Burkhalter had the good stuff again, and racked up his highest strikeout total in his short professional career with 11 of them on Thursday evening. Burkhalter had to contend with a delay to start the game, but he came out firing and struck the first batter out on three pitches. Burkhalter had better feel for his slider in this game and utilized it to get swing and miss along with being able to spot his cutter on the glove side even if early in the game he struggled to move it vertically as well as he usually does. Burkhalter did showcase a tendency to overthrow a bit when he gets ahead in the count, and his upper body would open early and typically lead to him pulling pitches towards his glove side. Towards the end of the game his command seemed to settle in even better, and he showed a couple of variants in the shape of his breaking ball. Even against a lineup full of left-handed batters he didn’t show his changeup, so it’s possible the Braves are having him now shift to throwing a slow curveball as a secondary offering against lefties.
Unfortunately for Burkhalter he got absolutely no support from his offense, with the Emperors totaling two hits and one run. It was all Kevin Kilpatrick and his baserunning that got that run home, as he did a great job around the bases to put pressure on the defense. Kilpatrick walked and then stole second base before making a great decision on a ground ball against the shift to take off to third even on a grounder in front of him knowing there was no one to cover. This set him in position to score on a ground ball from Drew Compton, though it took a bad throw from the second baseman who was pulled in close to the grass for Kilpatrick to beat the throw home. The offense was anemic otherwise and has been for the past couple of weeks. Ambioris Tavarez hasn’t had a hit yet in his first two games back, though I’ve liked a couple of aspects of his approach that have showed his maturation. In his strikeout he got fooled on a first pitch slider a bit off of the plate, but was able to recognize and lay off when the pitcher went back to that same pitch and location, though the pitch which looked quite a bit outside was called a strike. Tavarez stayed poise and fought the rest of the at bat, though he was ultimately beat with high heat. Tavarez was on a great streak before his broken hand and his approach is much better than it was last year, and while it may be too late in the year for him to get his rhythm back at the plate he doesn’t seem like he’s come back having fallen into old habits.
Swing and Misses
Blake Burkhalter - 18
William Silva - 5
(44-76) Augusta GreenJackets 2, (65-56) Columbia Fireflies 1
Box Score
Luis Guanipa, CF: 1-3, BB, .181/.252/.202
Junior Garcia, LF: 2-4, .160/.288/.170
John Gil, SS: 2-4, .234/.326/.297
Herick Hernandez, SP: 3.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 7 K, 0.00 ERA
Rayven Antonio, RP: 4 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 4 K, 5.27 ERA
Herick Hernandez was dominant in his first professional outing, striking out seven of the 11 batters he faced in 3 2⁄3 perfect innings. Unfortunately given the camera angle for this game there wasn’t much we could gather in regards to how his pitches looked, but if the reactions of the batters are to be trusted he was nasty out there. Hernandez looked to be throwing a fastball, slider, and changeup, with the fastball sitting 92-95, the slider sitting 81-85, and his changeup sitting around 84-87. He was able to get swing and miss with all three pitches, and I’m extremely excited to hopefully see a game of him where we can actually judge pitch shape. It seemed he was missing location a bit but hitters at this level are pretty much going to chase no matter what, and in a major conference in college he put up similarly impressive strikeout numbers so it shouldn’t be a surprise to see him succeeding in Single-A.
Thankfully Luis Guanipa did not miss much time, getting added back to the Augusta roster prior to this game and setting up back in the leadoff spot. This was the best collective game we’ve had from the youngsters with each of the FCL-starring trio reaching base twice in the game. Guanipa’s hit was on a fastball that ate him up a bit up and in, but he was able to fight it off and line it down the first base line for a bit of an oops single. Both of John Gil’s base hits were ground balls that got through the infield and that’s really been the issue for Gil. Especially on pitches in the lower half of the zone and on curveballs/sliders he just swings over the top of them as his swing doesn’t have a ton of adjustability and he struggles to get his bat down to the lower half of the zone without diving out with his upper body. Gil really seems to be caught in between right now and is favoring contact at the fear of getting fooled by breaking pitches like he was a few weeks ago, and it’s led to too many half swings and poor batted balls. Gil is definitely trying to find an approach that works for him and that’s normal for a guy his age, but I love what I see when Gil is able to get a fastball and let loose on a swing. He has quick hands and creates leverage when he swings hard and should be a guy that grows into power. Junior Garcia is finally getting going a bit and had two more hits in this game including a nice-looking line drive single in the first inning. Garcia’s swing path through the zone is solid, but he tends to wrap the bat and take a long path to get into the strike zone, which isn’t great given he doesn’t have the bat speed like Guanipa and Gil. He’s been late too often, but when he gets his timing right I think he’ll end up being a guy that hits for power and draws plenty of walks. I could foresee the Braves dropping his hands and having him keep them further in front of his body in his setup like they have with other players in an effort to shorten his path to the contact zone and allow his natural strength to shine.
Swing and Misses
Herick Hernandez - 17
Rayven Antonio - 8
Kadon Morton - 5
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Photo by Samuel Lewis/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images
Hernandez was lights out for Augusta and struck out seven batters The team may not be winning, but times are fun down in Augusta right now. The GreenJackets are running out a number of the top Atlanta Braves draft picks for their debuts this week, but Herick Hernandez’s seven strikeouts in 3 2⁄3 innings is going to be tough to top. In addition Luis Guanipa returned to the lineup today after missing a week following an injury.
(64-65) Gwinnett Stripers 4, (68-59) Columbus Clippers 5
Box Score
Statcast
Nacho Alvarez Jr, 3B: 1-5, RBI, .303/.418/.500
Harold Ramirez, RF: 2-4, RBI, .400/.478/.400
Drake Baldwin, C: DNP, .308/.420/.476
Hurston Waldrep, SP: 5 IP, 7 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 4 K, 4.50 ERA
Tommy Doyle, RP: 2 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 4 K, 3.31 ERA
There was good and bad aspects of this game for Hurston Waldrep, and ultimately he did go five innings of one run ball thanks to the success of his secondaries at forcing weak contact. This was one of his best games at finding a consistent arm slot and shape on his slider, and the pitch had decent results even though he wasn’t always locating it like he was earlier in the season in Mississippi. Waldrep was pulling his pitches to his glove side, which isn’t great for a player who relies on a splitter as his primary pitch, but neither the split nor slider suffered from his issues locating. His fastball was was once again a big problem as six of the seven hits he allowed were on the pitch and he didn’t get a single fastball whiff. Following the 14 swings without a whiff Waldrep’s fastball whiff rate sits at 7.5%, which is the fourth-worst number among 545 Triple-A pitchers who have thrown 100 or more four-seam fastballs this season. You’ll have to excuse some incomplete data here as savant search hasn’t updated as of the time of writing, but it’s not like hitters are hitting him weakly either. Waldrep has the second-worst xSLG allowed on four seam fastballs in that same group of players, and has allowed an average exit velocity of 92.7 mph. It’s worth considering that these are small samples that we’re dealing with, but it has always been a question as to whether Waldrep’s odd cut-carry shape would actually work in pro ball given that he didn’t really miss many bats even in college despite his fastball’s velocity.
Nacho Alvarez only went 1-5 on the day, flaring a single into right field in the ninth inning, but had a couple of hard hit balls that just missed making this a much bigger day. Alvarez hit two fly balls to straight away center field that fell just short of home runs, the later of the two chasing the center fielder all the way back against the wall. Harold Ramirez has been terrific for the Stripers since being picked up on a minor league deal earlier this week, and he’s probably the most interesting piece among Atlanta’s minor league outfield depth right now. Ramirez was awful this season in the major leagues as his batted ball quality plummeted and he seemingly forgot how to hit fastballs, but for a few seasons there he was playing like and trending towards being a solid outfield bat, especially in a platoon role, and could be an interesting pairing with Jarred Kelenic if the Braves can reclaim some of his offensive production from 2022-2023. Eli White was back in the lineup after being pulled early in yesterday’s game, and had a hit in the eighth inning. He was then hit on the hand/wrist by a 98 mph fastball from former Braves draftee Franco Aleman, and he remained in the game but certainly his status is worth watching in the next couple of days.
Swing and Misses
Hurston Waldrep - 9
Tommy Doyle - 7
(58-64) Mississippi Braves 7, (64-57) Pensacola Blue Wahoos 8
Box Score
Ethan Workinger, LF: 2-5, 2 RBI, .205/.247/.274
David McCabe, DH: 1-5, 2B, .145/.306/.217
David Fletcher, SP: 5 IP, 4 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 4 BB, 1 K, 6.05 ERA
Ryan Bourassa, RP: 1 IP, 1 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 4 BB, 1 K, 18.00 ERA
It was a rare day for the Mississippi Braves as their offense was rolling and getting contributions from top to bottom. Unfortunately it was also a rare day where the pitching wasn’t holding the other team and they dropped a game in the division standings. With David Fletcher starting things always tend to get interesting, and Fletcher did not have the knuckler on his side today as he walked four batters and gave up three home runs to the Blue Wahoos. Fletcher crossed the 90 inning threshold for the season, which is an impressive number for a guy who didn’t start pitching full time until late May, but he also has the lowest strikeout rate (8.4%) among any pitcher in minor league baseball with at least 30 innings. Buried in all of the transactions this week I missed the promotion of Ryan Bourassa, an undrafted free agent signing that had found plenty of success down in Rome this season. Bourassa dominated mostly much younger competition at that level and I was curious to see if he could translate that success against more advanced hitters. Bourassa did miss some bats — mostly with his downer breaking ball — but the command issues that troubled him some in Rome were even more apparent in Double-A as he walked four batters in his debut with the M-Braves.
David McCabe had a hard hit double in this game, turning on a pitch down and in and driving it into right field. McCabe is in an interesting spot mechanically right now, where he is kind of walking a thin line between opening up to turn on pitches and flying open too soon, though I do like him trying to turn and lift pitches to utilize his raw power more effectively. He often would fall into an opposite field gap approach last season and while he does have the power to hit the ball out to all fields a tendency to not pull the ball combined with fringy bat speed is a recipe to get beat by fastballs on the inner half. McCabe is cheating a bit on fastballs right now and has some swing-and-miss on breaking balls, but I’m going to reserve judgement until he gets a full offseason of time to recover from his Tommy John surgery and recover his timing a bit.
Ethan Workinger was a huge part of Mississippi’s offensive output in this game as well, slapping a first inning single the opposite way and then following McCabe’s double with a two-RBI single up the middle. Workinger is struggling to find his swing path right now and has been hitting the ball weakly and on the ground too often. He has a pretty nasty hitch/jitter in his hands right before he starts his swing that I’m not a fan of, and can lead to him loading his hands and elbow inconsistently which likely exacerbates some of his issues finding hard contact. Cade Bunnell hit his first home run of the season in this game and it’s a surprise to me he took this long to get one. Bunnell hasn’t had consistent playing time this season like he has in seasons past, but had 15+ home runs in each of his first three professional seasons.
Swing and Misses
Ryan Bourassa - 6
David Fletcher - 6
(57-62) Rome Emperors 1, (70-51) Greensboro Grasshoppers 3
Box Score
Jace Grady, RF: 1-4, .186/.289/.267
Kevin Kilpatrick Jr., CF: 0-3, BB, SB, .232/.314/.330
Blake Burkhalter, SP: 6 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 11 K, 2.59 ERA
William Silva, RP: 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 2 K, 9.95 ERA
Blake Burkhalter had the good stuff again, and racked up his highest strikeout total in his short professional career with 11 of them on Thursday evening. Burkhalter had to contend with a delay to start the game, but he came out firing and struck the first batter out on three pitches. Burkhalter had better feel for his slider in this game and utilized it to get swing and miss along with being able to spot his cutter on the glove side even if early in the game he struggled to move it vertically as well as he usually does. Burkhalter did showcase a tendency to overthrow a bit when he gets ahead in the count, and his upper body would open early and typically lead to him pulling pitches towards his glove side. Towards the end of the game his command seemed to settle in even better, and he showed a couple of variants in the shape of his breaking ball. Even against a lineup full of left-handed batters he didn’t show his changeup, so it’s possible the Braves are having him now shift to throwing a slow curveball as a secondary offering against lefties.
Unfortunately for Burkhalter he got absolutely no support from his offense, with the Emperors totaling two hits and one run. It was all Kevin Kilpatrick and his baserunning that got that run home, as he did a great job around the bases to put pressure on the defense. Kilpatrick walked and then stole second base before making a great decision on a ground ball against the shift to take off to third even on a grounder in front of him knowing there was no one to cover. This set him in position to score on a ground ball from Drew Compton, though it took a bad throw from the second baseman who was pulled in close to the grass for Kilpatrick to beat the throw home. The offense was anemic otherwise and has been for the past couple of weeks. Ambioris Tavarez hasn’t had a hit yet in his first two games back, though I’ve liked a couple of aspects of his approach that have showed his maturation. In his strikeout he got fooled on a first pitch slider a bit off of the plate, but was able to recognize and lay off when the pitcher went back to that same pitch and location, though the pitch which looked quite a bit outside was called a strike. Tavarez stayed poise and fought the rest of the at bat, though he was ultimately beat with high heat. Tavarez was on a great streak before his broken hand and his approach is much better than it was last year, and while it may be too late in the year for him to get his rhythm back at the plate he doesn’t seem like he’s come back having fallen into old habits.
Swing and Misses
Blake Burkhalter - 18
William Silva - 5
(44-76) Augusta GreenJackets 2, (65-56) Columbia Fireflies 1
Box Score
Luis Guanipa, CF: 1-3, BB, .181/.252/.202
Junior Garcia, LF: 2-4, .160/.288/.170
John Gil, SS: 2-4, .234/.326/.297
Herick Hernandez, SP: 3.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 7 K, 0.00 ERA
Rayven Antonio, RP: 4 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 4 K, 5.27 ERA
Herick Hernandez was dominant in his first professional outing, striking out seven of the 11 batters he faced in 3 2⁄3 perfect innings. Unfortunately given the camera angle for this game there wasn’t much we could gather in regards to how his pitches looked, but if the reactions of the batters are to be trusted he was nasty out there. Hernandez looked to be throwing a fastball, slider, and changeup, with the fastball sitting 92-95, the slider sitting 81-85, and his changeup sitting around 84-87. He was able to get swing and miss with all three pitches, and I’m extremely excited to hopefully see a game of him where we can actually judge pitch shape. It seemed he was missing location a bit but hitters at this level are pretty much going to chase no matter what, and in a major conference in college he put up similarly impressive strikeout numbers so it shouldn’t be a surprise to see him succeeding in Single-A.
Thankfully Luis Guanipa did not miss much time, getting added back to the Augusta roster prior to this game and setting up back in the leadoff spot. This was the best collective game we’ve had from the youngsters with each of the FCL-starring trio reaching base twice in the game. Guanipa’s hit was on a fastball that ate him up a bit up and in, but he was able to fight it off and line it down the first base line for a bit of an oops single. Both of John Gil’s base hits were ground balls that got through the infield and that’s really been the issue for Gil. Especially on pitches in the lower half of the zone and on curveballs/sliders he just swings over the top of them as his swing doesn’t have a ton of adjustability and he struggles to get his bat down to the lower half of the zone without diving out with his upper body. Gil really seems to be caught in between right now and is favoring contact at the fear of getting fooled by breaking pitches like he was a few weeks ago, and it’s led to too many half swings and poor batted balls. Gil is definitely trying to find an approach that works for him and that’s normal for a guy his age, but I love what I see when Gil is able to get a fastball and let loose on a swing. He has quick hands and creates leverage when he swings hard and should be a guy that grows into power. Junior Garcia is finally getting going a bit and had two more hits in this game including a nice-looking line drive single in the first inning. Garcia’s swing path through the zone is solid, but he tends to wrap the bat and take a long path to get into the strike zone, which isn’t great given he doesn’t have the bat speed like Guanipa and Gil. He’s been late too often, but when he gets his timing right I think he’ll end up being a guy that hits for power and draws plenty of walks. I could foresee the Braves dropping his hands and having him keep them further in front of his body in his setup like they have with other players in an effort to shorten his path to the contact zone and allow his natural strength to shine.
Swing and Misses
Herick Hernandez - 17
Rayven Antonio - 8
Kadon Morton - 5
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