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The inaugural season under the Emperors moniker has a chance to be a championship season Gwinnett Stripers
Record: 68-70, 33-30 2nd half, 4th in IL West (7.5 GB)
It was an interesting week for the Gwinnett pitching staff, where command woes tended to plague the starting pitching and the team had a handful of blow up games from the pitching staff. That said there were some solid results even from those who struggled with their command, some a continuation of trends and some a reversal of them. For Ian Anderson they are still chugging along with the same approach, introducing a bit more horizontal shape to all of his pitches and switching his main breaking ball to a slider. That slider still accounts for less than 20% of his pitches in most starts, but in limited utilization has become another weapon to throw at hitters that has run a whiff rate above 40% since the start of August. The Braves have managed to stretch Anderson out to 100 pitches and he has gone 90+ in his last five starts, though it seems there is starting to be some wear and tear building up. After settling back into an average fastball velo over 93 mph Anderson has experienced a dip over his past two games, averaging 91.9 mph on 8/28 and 92.4 mph in his past start, with his command also taking somewhat of a hit. It appears to be fatigue more than anything else, which isn’t entirely surprising since it’s been a couple of years since he pitch significant innings.
The new guy on the block Drue Hackenberg has certainly had some interesting outings, but after a streak of solid play in Double-A his command of his fastball has regressed back towards where it was at the beginning of the season and he is just scattering pitches at this point. There have been positive developments from him this season, with a cutter that has taken forefront as a potentially above average major league pitch and his fastball velocity jumping to sit in the mid-90’s, but his command has been off-and-on especially with his potentially plus curveball. He can vary between dominant and too wild to really settle into games, but the one constant has been hitters struggling to make solid contact against him all season. After a debut in which he only forced one whiff he did get 12 in his past game along with weak contact, allowing him to skirt through six inning with no earned runs allowed, but 10 walks in his first 12 innings isn’t promising. To give the same treatment as Anderson though, it’s fair to consider that Hackenberg has taken a significant jump in workload this season and may be dealing with fatigue this late in the year.
AJ Smith-Shawver took a long time to settle into a rhythm this season, with the Braves focus on redefining what his slider should be taking the forefront of his struggles with allowing hard contact. Smith-Shawver’s smoothed and more downhill mechanics have been a bit inconsistent and thus has his command been, but a few interesting trends have arisen towards the end of the season. His fastball has begun to carry a bit more over his past few starts, similar to where he was when he was having success at the beginning of the season, and although his velocity isn’t quite touching the heights of him hitting triple digits like in April and May the downward trend of his average velocity has started to level out a bit. His changeup has remained and even progressed in its dominance, matching the success of even someone like Hurston Waldrep’s dominant splitter, and it seems the Braves have finally settled on a pitch mix they want from him. The command of his secondaries has been a question all season and he especially struggled to throw a slider with any semblance of success in the early summer months, but over his past few outings he has shown a consistent, short slider shape that has become more and more a part of his arsenal, and one that he both commands better and gets more swing-and-miss than others he has shown this season. The main aspect for Smith-Shawver is just not leaving his breaking balls in the middle of the plate, so having something he can bury more frequenty helps.
Two pitchers had some interesting changes last week, with Huascar Ynoa’s being the most notable. Ynoa has spent most of the season well under the 93 mph mark on his fastball, but in his latest bullpen appearance averaged 96.3 mph despite a very poor performance. If he can regain velocity throughout the season that will significantly improve his chances of sticking with the Braves next season, where previously he looked like a DFA or sure non-tender candidate. Hurston Waldrep’s fastball has been an open issue for him since coming off of the injured list, and sadly I can’t report an improvement in results. Waldrep got zero whiffs on the pitch again, and since coming off of the injured list has an abysmal 2.9% whiff rate on his fastball. He also averaged a season-low 93.3 mph on the pitch, but there were a couple of intriguing signs. Whether intentional or not, Waldrep’s release point is lower than it was in his Triple-A and MLB debuts. After those two games his arm angle dipped, possibly connected to his elbow injury, and the carry on his fastball plummeted without any extra run on the pitch to counteract that. That has started to improve a bit though — the induced vertical break on his fastball has improved in three straight outings and the arm side movement in two straight — and batters are not hitting the ball quite as hard even though they are making insane amounts of contact. Waldrep’s fastball has to be better, but if he can show this movement and the velocity he had earlier in the season it could be a sign of a quick reversal of fortune though his command has plateaued as well.
For Nacho Alvarez and Drake Baldwin there is also progress being made, with the Braves putting an emphasis on having both pull the ball more consistently. That has led to some inconsistent results, with both players seeing increases in whiff rates to go along with their increases in pull rates. Alvarez is still mostly just rolling over pitches to the pull side, though in Saturday’s game he put up probably his best swing this year on an inside fastball. Alvarez turned on and hit a line drive triple down the third base on a fastball on the inner edge, getting his hands started early and really getting around with his barrel better than he has in past weeks. Baldwin hit the ball hard to his pull side and hit a splitter for a home run though he too had a lot of his hard hit balls end up on the ground. Baldwin’s struggles to lift the ball to all fields have been a weakness, but he’s still raking against pretty much everything and everybody and has done a much better job on the inner half in the past few weeks. For both players this sort of switch in approach will likely have a regression period where they struggle implementing changes, but both seems to be on a path to mitigating their fastball and especially inner half fastball weakness that have thrown varying levels of concern on their profiles.
Mississippi Braves
Record: 61-70, 30-33 2nd half, 4th in SL South (7.5 GB)
The final home series in Mississippi Braves history has come and gone, and it could have gone quite a bit better. There is no worse way to end your tenure than with a six game sweep in front of your home friends, but Mississippi’s anemic offense was shut out three times in the series. The offense as a whole is lacking in hitting talent and performance, and right now there really isn’t even a bright spot on that side of the ball to go over. David McCabe has struggled in the past couple of weeks and seen his strikeout rates stay steady around 30%, and really only Cal Conley had any sort of success at the plate. Conley had eight hits last week to make him by far the best offensive performer, and he also had a great week on defense making every play at shortstop and really showing his improvement on that side of the ball.
Mississippi’s pitching was certainly better, but most of the team’s great prospects have moved on to Triple-A and only Lucas Braun has put up sustained success as starter in the past couple of months. Braun was the victim of Mississippi’s offensive ineptitude, allowing one earned run and still taking the loss in a complete game, but it really wasn’t one of his better starts. Braun struggled with his arm slot throughout the game, and this was especially apparent as he was missing on his arm side with his fastball quite a bit. Braun seemed to make adjustments and utilized his slider and curveball more frequently, both of which he was able to get whiffs with and locate better than his fastball, but his command issues still led to four walks in the game. Braun went to basically all fastball and slider when he first was promoted to Mississippi, but they have slightly altered his curveball and started to reintroduce it to his arsenal. Braun throws it with a bit more tilt, allowing it to play into his east-to-west approach, and it’s big movement and ability to provide a third velocity range to work at has helped him vary his arsenal and let his slider eat as his main pitch that everything else plays off of. Braun isn’t showing his changeup much anymore, though the Braves have had a tendency to scrap and then reintroduce changeups in the past so I wouldn’t be surprised to see it back in the future.
Jhancarlos Lara is starting off Double-A in a fimiliar pattern, struggling immensely and unable to find his command. We saw this at both Augusta and Rome before he turned it around at both levels, and right now it seems the biggest adjustment is just commanding an altered pitch mix. Lara has thrown significantly more sliders and cutters at Double-A than he has at prior levels, and while they are now using the four seam fastball in a more normal way it is still a struggle for him to locate all of his pitches. I projected Lara to the bullpen coming into the season and that hasn’t changed, though I have been impressed by his slider’s development from being largely velocity dependent to one he can spin relatively well and has done better to spot down and away from hitters.
Rome Emperors
Record: 64-64, 28-36 2nd half, 5th in SAL South (11.5 GB)
The regular season is over for the A-levels, and for the Emperors they are heading to the playoffs in a great position. The offense has started to get hot again behind Drew Compton especially, and they have won seven of their past nine games with them scoring six or more runs in four of their six games against Hickory. Compton has been outstanding, hitting safely in all seven games he has played this month with five of those being multi-hit games. He has more walks than strikeouts in that period as well, and on Thursday had his first multi-home run game though in fairness one was an inside-the-parker. Despite some stretches where hits weren’t falling Compton has been by far Rome’s most consistent offensive threat, and given his age I hope he gets an opportunity in the Arizona Fall League this year. He could use some at bats against more advanced pitching, and while it probably won’t do much to answer the questions about his power output getting him in position to start in Double-A next season should be his imperative.
For other players there has been a bit more questions about the sustainability of their performances. Kevin Kilpatrick Jr. had one of his good weeks with ten hits, but he also maintained his high strikeout rates with 10 of them. Kilpatrick just hasn’t made the improvements he has needed to in terms of making contact, so while he is prone to these hot streaks his stretches of bad play far outweigh them. It’s been pleasant to see Ambioris Tavarez off of the injured list, though so far he is back to striking out on sliders a lot. The layoff hasn’t done him favors with regards to his pitch recognition and approach, but he managed to contribute last week nonetheless. Tavarez has been hitting the ball hard to all fields when he does make contact, showing off the condensed swing that helped him put up a few strong weeks before injury. He had multiple hits in the last three games last week, and seems to be getting close to that point where he is dialed in on spin and not getting beat consistently by breaking balls.
The Braves made two significant promotions to Rome with draftees Pat Clohisy and Colby Jones, though neither have done much in High-A in a short period of time. Contact has been the issue for Clohisy as he struck out nine times in four games last week, and while Jones has made a bit more contact it hasn’t been particularly good contact. That is kind of what I expected from both, where I though Clohisy’s swing may give him more trouble the more he sees higher velocities and Jones’s aggressive approach would start to be a hindrance above Single-A. Both are issues that can be fixed and both provide some offensive and athletic upside, but obviously this was just a taste of the level for both and it will be next season before we see how either are able to adjust.
The pitching staff for this team is absurdly talented, and they will have a pick of top guys to rely on heading into the postseason. Blake Burkhalter is the only one with a confirmed spot in the postseason rotation, and a well-deserved one as he had a 2.71 ERA across 16 starts for Rome. I’m curious to see if he gets the treatment where they force extra outings in at Triple-A at the end of the season, but for right now he is starting Tuesday’s game after throwing seven innings in his past outing with Rome. Burkhalter’s biggest issue has been the consistency of his slider command, but his cutter has been a consistently dominant pitch so far at High-A along with his fastball providing some mixed results. He commanded both of those pitches well last Wednesday, though the Crawdads were able to hone in a bit on his velocity and make enough contact to drive home three runs. When Burkhalter has his slider working like he did on August 29th or on the 15th he is pretty much untouchable by this level of hitter, and if he brings that to the opener today it will be tough for even a strong Bowling Green team.
The promotions from Augusta have provided a ton of key innings for the Emperors, and what a terrific start it was for him on Tuesday. Baumann had been missing bats consistently for Augusta to end his tenure there, but in Rome it was more back to his early season basics where he relied on his sinker and changeup to produce a ton of weak, ground ball contact. Baumann went seven scoreless innings and didn’t allow a walk, marking the longest outing thus far in his career. It doesn’t seem that he’ll get a postseason start though given that the Braves skipped over his day to let Burkhalter start. That leaves us with four candidates to start the final two games of the series.
Mitch Farris has quietly been one of the system’s best pitchers all season, relying on his changeup and slider to help him produce one of the highest strikeout rates in the system. Unfortunately he struggled last week as his command just wasn’t as good as it usually is, and his lack of velocity makes him reliant on really painting the edges to get outs. Still, Farris’s body of work with the team this season — 2.95 ERA and 93 strikeouts in 82 1⁄3 innings — makes him a likely candidate for one of the final two spots. Fellow lefty Herick Hernandez made a solid debut for Rome last week, striking out five batters and walking none over three innings. His command was a bit shaky in the first inning and he got hit pretty hard, but he settled in nicely where his slider and curveball both were able to get swing-and-misses. Hernandez’s two starts in his professional career both showed why the Braves jumped on him in the fourth round this past draft, and while there is skepticism surrounding his ability to start he has shown three pitches that can get swing-and-miss along with at least solid command through a couple of A-level outings.
Adam Maier has been a ton better at commanding his fastball over his past two outings, dominating in his final outing of August then putting up a solid outing on Sunday. Maier is probably not going to pitch Friday given that he pitched Monday, though he could be a candidate to pitch in the championship if Rome wins. Maier struck out five batters and walked only one across five innings, though rather than his August 30th start when he just overwhelmed with his secondary stuff Maier more relied on pounding the zone and getting ahead early and wasn’t getting much swing-and-miss. Maier instead forced the ball on the ground consistently, where that defense led by Tavarez at shortstop and Jones at second was able to smother the Hickory hitters. JR Ritchie would be my guess for the Friday if-necessary start, given that would keep him aligned with his current schedule. Ritchie didn’t have a great game this past week though, as Hickory was able to hit him hard and his command of his fastball wasn’t as crisp as it has been. Ritchie was dominant while in Rome, but the little bits of refinement he lack in his location have been punished more frequently so far in High-A. Ritchie hasn’t been burying his slider and changeup with the same consistency as he was when he was hot in Augusta, and High-A hitters aren’t missing when he makes those mistakes.
Augusta GreenJackets
Record: 49-80, 22-42 2nd Half, 6th in CAR South (19.5 GB)
There are plenty of disappointing ways to see a season end, but none more disappointing than not being able to see it at all. Augusta wasn’t on MiLB tv to end the season, meaning I missed out on the debut of 6th round pick Ethan Bagwell. Bagwell had some solid results with three strikeouts over 2 2⁄3 innings, and he is one of the players I’m excited to key in on next season. Bagwell is a huge developmental project, but the Braves have been terrific at taking athletes and turning them into solid starting pitching prospects and Bagwell has all of the tools necessary to be the next in that lineup.
Didier Fuentes ended his near month-long injured list stint by pitching one last game last week, and he was of course dominant again. Fuentes allowed only one hit, struck out four, and walked no batters across three innings ending his season on one of the craziest streaks I’ve ever seen. On April 18th Fuentes struck out only two batters across 4 1⁄3 innings. In his fifteen starts since that date he has had a K/9 of nine or higher in every single start, with a K/9 over 9 in each of his past 14. Fuentes was the breakout prospect of the season, utilizing his rising fastball and dominant slider to carve up Low-A hitters, and I’m interested to see him in Rome next season. The development of a third pitch still is in the works, but he has been nothing but successful so far through his career.
Two pitchers, both of whom project to relievers, finished out outstanding professional debuts. Undrafted free agent Jacob Gomez is a lefty in the Hayden Harris mold, with a low-release fastball that just eats this level of hitter alive. Gomez needs to add velocity to be a big leaguer, but even sitting in the upper 80’s struck out 44% of batters and posted a 0.66 ERA and 1.46 FIP in 13 2⁄3 innings to end the season. Owen Hackman is also interesting, and has managed success as a starter with only two pitches. Hackman has one of the system’s nastiest fastballs, with a ton of carry, and in 20 2⁄3 innings for Augusta put up a 1.31 ERA and 2.42 FIP while striking out 30.8% of batters. His ability to locate his fastball up and get swing and miss in the upper half of the zone makes him dangerous, and he can pair in a 50 slider as long as he is actually able to locate the pitch around the zone enough to make hitters bit.
Offensively, yeah this team is atrocious especially after the Jones and Clohisy promotions. John Gil hit the injured list to end the season, finishing out 2024 on a slump as his struggles to make hard contact took a toll on his numbers. Gil has some swing plane issues at this point in his career, but combines bat speed, athleticism, and power potential into a frame that could stick at shortstop, with plenty of time left to develop. Junior Garcia is finally having some hits fall, but is still striking out too much. Garcia tends to hit the ball fairly hard when he does make contact, but his swing gets long and slow and he has a tendency to angle his bat to slap line drives the other way. He has a ton of physical potential with room to improve all of his physical traits, but the entire trio that was promoted from the FCL was just not ready developmentally. Luis Guanipa has struggled to stay healthy and like Gil has some swing path issues, though I was impressed by his defense when I went to Augusta. Guanipa only went 5-23 last week, and his over aggression at the plate has been a standout concern for him.
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Photo by Julio Aguilar/Getty Images
The inaugural season under the Emperors moniker has a chance to be a championship season Gwinnett Stripers
Record: 68-70, 33-30 2nd half, 4th in IL West (7.5 GB)
It was an interesting week for the Gwinnett pitching staff, where command woes tended to plague the starting pitching and the team had a handful of blow up games from the pitching staff. That said there were some solid results even from those who struggled with their command, some a continuation of trends and some a reversal of them. For Ian Anderson they are still chugging along with the same approach, introducing a bit more horizontal shape to all of his pitches and switching his main breaking ball to a slider. That slider still accounts for less than 20% of his pitches in most starts, but in limited utilization has become another weapon to throw at hitters that has run a whiff rate above 40% since the start of August. The Braves have managed to stretch Anderson out to 100 pitches and he has gone 90+ in his last five starts, though it seems there is starting to be some wear and tear building up. After settling back into an average fastball velo over 93 mph Anderson has experienced a dip over his past two games, averaging 91.9 mph on 8/28 and 92.4 mph in his past start, with his command also taking somewhat of a hit. It appears to be fatigue more than anything else, which isn’t entirely surprising since it’s been a couple of years since he pitch significant innings.
The new guy on the block Drue Hackenberg has certainly had some interesting outings, but after a streak of solid play in Double-A his command of his fastball has regressed back towards where it was at the beginning of the season and he is just scattering pitches at this point. There have been positive developments from him this season, with a cutter that has taken forefront as a potentially above average major league pitch and his fastball velocity jumping to sit in the mid-90’s, but his command has been off-and-on especially with his potentially plus curveball. He can vary between dominant and too wild to really settle into games, but the one constant has been hitters struggling to make solid contact against him all season. After a debut in which he only forced one whiff he did get 12 in his past game along with weak contact, allowing him to skirt through six inning with no earned runs allowed, but 10 walks in his first 12 innings isn’t promising. To give the same treatment as Anderson though, it’s fair to consider that Hackenberg has taken a significant jump in workload this season and may be dealing with fatigue this late in the year.
AJ Smith-Shawver took a long time to settle into a rhythm this season, with the Braves focus on redefining what his slider should be taking the forefront of his struggles with allowing hard contact. Smith-Shawver’s smoothed and more downhill mechanics have been a bit inconsistent and thus has his command been, but a few interesting trends have arisen towards the end of the season. His fastball has begun to carry a bit more over his past few starts, similar to where he was when he was having success at the beginning of the season, and although his velocity isn’t quite touching the heights of him hitting triple digits like in April and May the downward trend of his average velocity has started to level out a bit. His changeup has remained and even progressed in its dominance, matching the success of even someone like Hurston Waldrep’s dominant splitter, and it seems the Braves have finally settled on a pitch mix they want from him. The command of his secondaries has been a question all season and he especially struggled to throw a slider with any semblance of success in the early summer months, but over his past few outings he has shown a consistent, short slider shape that has become more and more a part of his arsenal, and one that he both commands better and gets more swing-and-miss than others he has shown this season. The main aspect for Smith-Shawver is just not leaving his breaking balls in the middle of the plate, so having something he can bury more frequenty helps.
Two pitchers had some interesting changes last week, with Huascar Ynoa’s being the most notable. Ynoa has spent most of the season well under the 93 mph mark on his fastball, but in his latest bullpen appearance averaged 96.3 mph despite a very poor performance. If he can regain velocity throughout the season that will significantly improve his chances of sticking with the Braves next season, where previously he looked like a DFA or sure non-tender candidate. Hurston Waldrep’s fastball has been an open issue for him since coming off of the injured list, and sadly I can’t report an improvement in results. Waldrep got zero whiffs on the pitch again, and since coming off of the injured list has an abysmal 2.9% whiff rate on his fastball. He also averaged a season-low 93.3 mph on the pitch, but there were a couple of intriguing signs. Whether intentional or not, Waldrep’s release point is lower than it was in his Triple-A and MLB debuts. After those two games his arm angle dipped, possibly connected to his elbow injury, and the carry on his fastball plummeted without any extra run on the pitch to counteract that. That has started to improve a bit though — the induced vertical break on his fastball has improved in three straight outings and the arm side movement in two straight — and batters are not hitting the ball quite as hard even though they are making insane amounts of contact. Waldrep’s fastball has to be better, but if he can show this movement and the velocity he had earlier in the season it could be a sign of a quick reversal of fortune though his command has plateaued as well.
For Nacho Alvarez and Drake Baldwin there is also progress being made, with the Braves putting an emphasis on having both pull the ball more consistently. That has led to some inconsistent results, with both players seeing increases in whiff rates to go along with their increases in pull rates. Alvarez is still mostly just rolling over pitches to the pull side, though in Saturday’s game he put up probably his best swing this year on an inside fastball. Alvarez turned on and hit a line drive triple down the third base on a fastball on the inner edge, getting his hands started early and really getting around with his barrel better than he has in past weeks. Baldwin hit the ball hard to his pull side and hit a splitter for a home run though he too had a lot of his hard hit balls end up on the ground. Baldwin’s struggles to lift the ball to all fields have been a weakness, but he’s still raking against pretty much everything and everybody and has done a much better job on the inner half in the past few weeks. For both players this sort of switch in approach will likely have a regression period where they struggle implementing changes, but both seems to be on a path to mitigating their fastball and especially inner half fastball weakness that have thrown varying levels of concern on their profiles.
Mississippi Braves
Record: 61-70, 30-33 2nd half, 4th in SL South (7.5 GB)
The final home series in Mississippi Braves history has come and gone, and it could have gone quite a bit better. There is no worse way to end your tenure than with a six game sweep in front of your home friends, but Mississippi’s anemic offense was shut out three times in the series. The offense as a whole is lacking in hitting talent and performance, and right now there really isn’t even a bright spot on that side of the ball to go over. David McCabe has struggled in the past couple of weeks and seen his strikeout rates stay steady around 30%, and really only Cal Conley had any sort of success at the plate. Conley had eight hits last week to make him by far the best offensive performer, and he also had a great week on defense making every play at shortstop and really showing his improvement on that side of the ball.
Mississippi’s pitching was certainly better, but most of the team’s great prospects have moved on to Triple-A and only Lucas Braun has put up sustained success as starter in the past couple of months. Braun was the victim of Mississippi’s offensive ineptitude, allowing one earned run and still taking the loss in a complete game, but it really wasn’t one of his better starts. Braun struggled with his arm slot throughout the game, and this was especially apparent as he was missing on his arm side with his fastball quite a bit. Braun seemed to make adjustments and utilized his slider and curveball more frequently, both of which he was able to get whiffs with and locate better than his fastball, but his command issues still led to four walks in the game. Braun went to basically all fastball and slider when he first was promoted to Mississippi, but they have slightly altered his curveball and started to reintroduce it to his arsenal. Braun throws it with a bit more tilt, allowing it to play into his east-to-west approach, and it’s big movement and ability to provide a third velocity range to work at has helped him vary his arsenal and let his slider eat as his main pitch that everything else plays off of. Braun isn’t showing his changeup much anymore, though the Braves have had a tendency to scrap and then reintroduce changeups in the past so I wouldn’t be surprised to see it back in the future.
Jhancarlos Lara is starting off Double-A in a fimiliar pattern, struggling immensely and unable to find his command. We saw this at both Augusta and Rome before he turned it around at both levels, and right now it seems the biggest adjustment is just commanding an altered pitch mix. Lara has thrown significantly more sliders and cutters at Double-A than he has at prior levels, and while they are now using the four seam fastball in a more normal way it is still a struggle for him to locate all of his pitches. I projected Lara to the bullpen coming into the season and that hasn’t changed, though I have been impressed by his slider’s development from being largely velocity dependent to one he can spin relatively well and has done better to spot down and away from hitters.
Rome Emperors
Record: 64-64, 28-36 2nd half, 5th in SAL South (11.5 GB)
The regular season is over for the A-levels, and for the Emperors they are heading to the playoffs in a great position. The offense has started to get hot again behind Drew Compton especially, and they have won seven of their past nine games with them scoring six or more runs in four of their six games against Hickory. Compton has been outstanding, hitting safely in all seven games he has played this month with five of those being multi-hit games. He has more walks than strikeouts in that period as well, and on Thursday had his first multi-home run game though in fairness one was an inside-the-parker. Despite some stretches where hits weren’t falling Compton has been by far Rome’s most consistent offensive threat, and given his age I hope he gets an opportunity in the Arizona Fall League this year. He could use some at bats against more advanced pitching, and while it probably won’t do much to answer the questions about his power output getting him in position to start in Double-A next season should be his imperative.
For other players there has been a bit more questions about the sustainability of their performances. Kevin Kilpatrick Jr. had one of his good weeks with ten hits, but he also maintained his high strikeout rates with 10 of them. Kilpatrick just hasn’t made the improvements he has needed to in terms of making contact, so while he is prone to these hot streaks his stretches of bad play far outweigh them. It’s been pleasant to see Ambioris Tavarez off of the injured list, though so far he is back to striking out on sliders a lot. The layoff hasn’t done him favors with regards to his pitch recognition and approach, but he managed to contribute last week nonetheless. Tavarez has been hitting the ball hard to all fields when he does make contact, showing off the condensed swing that helped him put up a few strong weeks before injury. He had multiple hits in the last three games last week, and seems to be getting close to that point where he is dialed in on spin and not getting beat consistently by breaking balls.
The Braves made two significant promotions to Rome with draftees Pat Clohisy and Colby Jones, though neither have done much in High-A in a short period of time. Contact has been the issue for Clohisy as he struck out nine times in four games last week, and while Jones has made a bit more contact it hasn’t been particularly good contact. That is kind of what I expected from both, where I though Clohisy’s swing may give him more trouble the more he sees higher velocities and Jones’s aggressive approach would start to be a hindrance above Single-A. Both are issues that can be fixed and both provide some offensive and athletic upside, but obviously this was just a taste of the level for both and it will be next season before we see how either are able to adjust.
The pitching staff for this team is absurdly talented, and they will have a pick of top guys to rely on heading into the postseason. Blake Burkhalter is the only one with a confirmed spot in the postseason rotation, and a well-deserved one as he had a 2.71 ERA across 16 starts for Rome. I’m curious to see if he gets the treatment where they force extra outings in at Triple-A at the end of the season, but for right now he is starting Tuesday’s game after throwing seven innings in his past outing with Rome. Burkhalter’s biggest issue has been the consistency of his slider command, but his cutter has been a consistently dominant pitch so far at High-A along with his fastball providing some mixed results. He commanded both of those pitches well last Wednesday, though the Crawdads were able to hone in a bit on his velocity and make enough contact to drive home three runs. When Burkhalter has his slider working like he did on August 29th or on the 15th he is pretty much untouchable by this level of hitter, and if he brings that to the opener today it will be tough for even a strong Bowling Green team.
The promotions from Augusta have provided a ton of key innings for the Emperors, and what a terrific start it was for him on Tuesday. Baumann had been missing bats consistently for Augusta to end his tenure there, but in Rome it was more back to his early season basics where he relied on his sinker and changeup to produce a ton of weak, ground ball contact. Baumann went seven scoreless innings and didn’t allow a walk, marking the longest outing thus far in his career. It doesn’t seem that he’ll get a postseason start though given that the Braves skipped over his day to let Burkhalter start. That leaves us with four candidates to start the final two games of the series.
Mitch Farris has quietly been one of the system’s best pitchers all season, relying on his changeup and slider to help him produce one of the highest strikeout rates in the system. Unfortunately he struggled last week as his command just wasn’t as good as it usually is, and his lack of velocity makes him reliant on really painting the edges to get outs. Still, Farris’s body of work with the team this season — 2.95 ERA and 93 strikeouts in 82 1⁄3 innings — makes him a likely candidate for one of the final two spots. Fellow lefty Herick Hernandez made a solid debut for Rome last week, striking out five batters and walking none over three innings. His command was a bit shaky in the first inning and he got hit pretty hard, but he settled in nicely where his slider and curveball both were able to get swing-and-misses. Hernandez’s two starts in his professional career both showed why the Braves jumped on him in the fourth round this past draft, and while there is skepticism surrounding his ability to start he has shown three pitches that can get swing-and-miss along with at least solid command through a couple of A-level outings.
Adam Maier has been a ton better at commanding his fastball over his past two outings, dominating in his final outing of August then putting up a solid outing on Sunday. Maier is probably not going to pitch Friday given that he pitched Monday, though he could be a candidate to pitch in the championship if Rome wins. Maier struck out five batters and walked only one across five innings, though rather than his August 30th start when he just overwhelmed with his secondary stuff Maier more relied on pounding the zone and getting ahead early and wasn’t getting much swing-and-miss. Maier instead forced the ball on the ground consistently, where that defense led by Tavarez at shortstop and Jones at second was able to smother the Hickory hitters. JR Ritchie would be my guess for the Friday if-necessary start, given that would keep him aligned with his current schedule. Ritchie didn’t have a great game this past week though, as Hickory was able to hit him hard and his command of his fastball wasn’t as crisp as it has been. Ritchie was dominant while in Rome, but the little bits of refinement he lack in his location have been punished more frequently so far in High-A. Ritchie hasn’t been burying his slider and changeup with the same consistency as he was when he was hot in Augusta, and High-A hitters aren’t missing when he makes those mistakes.
Augusta GreenJackets
Record: 49-80, 22-42 2nd Half, 6th in CAR South (19.5 GB)
There are plenty of disappointing ways to see a season end, but none more disappointing than not being able to see it at all. Augusta wasn’t on MiLB tv to end the season, meaning I missed out on the debut of 6th round pick Ethan Bagwell. Bagwell had some solid results with three strikeouts over 2 2⁄3 innings, and he is one of the players I’m excited to key in on next season. Bagwell is a huge developmental project, but the Braves have been terrific at taking athletes and turning them into solid starting pitching prospects and Bagwell has all of the tools necessary to be the next in that lineup.
Didier Fuentes ended his near month-long injured list stint by pitching one last game last week, and he was of course dominant again. Fuentes allowed only one hit, struck out four, and walked no batters across three innings ending his season on one of the craziest streaks I’ve ever seen. On April 18th Fuentes struck out only two batters across 4 1⁄3 innings. In his fifteen starts since that date he has had a K/9 of nine or higher in every single start, with a K/9 over 9 in each of his past 14. Fuentes was the breakout prospect of the season, utilizing his rising fastball and dominant slider to carve up Low-A hitters, and I’m interested to see him in Rome next season. The development of a third pitch still is in the works, but he has been nothing but successful so far through his career.
Two pitchers, both of whom project to relievers, finished out outstanding professional debuts. Undrafted free agent Jacob Gomez is a lefty in the Hayden Harris mold, with a low-release fastball that just eats this level of hitter alive. Gomez needs to add velocity to be a big leaguer, but even sitting in the upper 80’s struck out 44% of batters and posted a 0.66 ERA and 1.46 FIP in 13 2⁄3 innings to end the season. Owen Hackman is also interesting, and has managed success as a starter with only two pitches. Hackman has one of the system’s nastiest fastballs, with a ton of carry, and in 20 2⁄3 innings for Augusta put up a 1.31 ERA and 2.42 FIP while striking out 30.8% of batters. His ability to locate his fastball up and get swing and miss in the upper half of the zone makes him dangerous, and he can pair in a 50 slider as long as he is actually able to locate the pitch around the zone enough to make hitters bit.
Offensively, yeah this team is atrocious especially after the Jones and Clohisy promotions. John Gil hit the injured list to end the season, finishing out 2024 on a slump as his struggles to make hard contact took a toll on his numbers. Gil has some swing plane issues at this point in his career, but combines bat speed, athleticism, and power potential into a frame that could stick at shortstop, with plenty of time left to develop. Junior Garcia is finally having some hits fall, but is still striking out too much. Garcia tends to hit the ball fairly hard when he does make contact, but his swing gets long and slow and he has a tendency to angle his bat to slap line drives the other way. He has a ton of physical potential with room to improve all of his physical traits, but the entire trio that was promoted from the FCL was just not ready developmentally. Luis Guanipa has struggled to stay healthy and like Gil has some swing path issues, though I was impressed by his defense when I went to Augusta. Guanipa only went 5-23 last week, and his over aggression at the plate has been a standout concern for him.
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