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JR Ritchie had a solid outing, but Rome couldn’t give him the run support to extend the series to a third game It wasn’t the best of days for the Atlanta Braves Minor League system. None of the affiliates won and Rome was decisively swept out of the playoffs despite some solid work from JR Ritchie. Still some guys did shine, with the best Triple-A start yet from Drue Hackenberg and a home run from Drake Baldwin in the same game.
(69-72) Gwinnett Stripers 2, (65-74) Buffalo Bisons 3
Box Score
Statcast
Nacho Alvarez Jr, 3B: 1-3, BB, .304/.408/.493
Drake Baldwin, C: 1-4, HR, .299/.409/.496
Drue Hackenberg, SP: 6 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, 1.50 ERA
Allan Winans, RP: 2 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 2 K, 3.08 ERA
Well Gwinnett may not have salvaged at least one win for us on Thursday, but that was much more like what we want to see from Drue Hackenberg on the mound. Hackenberg did a much better job of controlling his fastball, keeping it on the edges of the zone and managing to once again rely on weak contact as his means for surviving six solid innings. Hackenberg had a bit lower fastball velocity than his prior two starts, but the tradeoff for that was not walking five batters. The only pitch Hackenberg really hasn’t managed to land since being promoted is his curveball, even though it has been his best swing-and-miss pitch in his short time in Gwinnett and all year, focusing in on the fastball usage which I presume is likely the Braves wanting him to emphasize commanding the pitch better. Hackenberg’s cutter looked strong in this game and he managed to locate it well, and if he can continue to land the fastball/cutter like this and mix in better curveballs he should see better results in the near future.
Yet another game and yet more good results off of the bat of Drake Baldwin, who hit a fourth inning home run to account for the first of Gwinnett’s runs. Baldwin hit a couple of hot ones in his first two at bats, and against a Quad-A arm like Paolo Espino that’s kind of the results you would expect him to get. Both of Baldwin’s 105+ mph batted balls - a hard first inning ground out and that fifth inning home run - were 87 mph fastballs that Espino left in the middle of the zone and a hitter of Baldwin’s quality just isn’t going to miss those. Baldwin’s tough matchup came in the eighth inning against lefty reliever Brandon Eisert, one of those type of guys with a low, wide release point that can cause havoc against same-handed batters. Baldwin got absolutely wrecked by Eisert and his slider, as Eisert just threw three sliders in a row away that Baldwin swung and missed at, the last one being a chase off of the edge. This is the first time I’ve seen Baldwin look completely outmatched at the plate as it was clear he was struggling to even see the ball from Eisert’s release.
Nacho Alvarez on the other hand had no issues seeing Eisert, as he ended up working a walk that helped Gwinnett a little bit of life late in the game. The Stripers had fallen behind 3-2 in the top of the inning, and with a runner on second base Alvarez drew that walk to bring up Baldwin in a big spot with two runners on and two outs. Unfortunately Baldwin struck out to end the threat and Gwinnett went down quietly in the ninth inning. Alvarez overall had a solid day at the plate, though he just missed making it a big one with the location of his batted balls. He hit a deep fly out in the first inning on a hanging Espino slider, but a pitch like that you would ideally like him pulling out to the power gap he hit to dead center field where he didn’t get good enough wood on it to get it out. In the fourth inning he hit his best one, lining one hard the other way, but it was right at the first baseman for a line out. He finally got a hit to fall in the sixth inning by rolling a ball through the right side of the infield.
Swing and Misses
Drue Hackenberg - 11
Allan Winans - 2
Ken Giles - 2
(61-71) Mississippi Braves 4, (64-67) Biloxi Shuckers 5
Box Score
Cody Milligan, CF: 1-2, 2 BB, SB, .238/.300/.353
David McCabe, DH: 1-4, .121/.260/.168
Landon Harper, SP: 4 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 1 K, 1.41 ERA
Rolddy Munoz, RP: 1.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 2 K, 3.98 ERA
(61-72) Mississippi Braves 1, (65-67) Biloxi Shuckers 8
Box Score
Cody Milligan, CF: 1-2, BB, .238/.300/.353
David McCabe, DH: 0-3, .121/.260/.168
David Fletcher, SP: 3.2 IP, 6 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 3 BB, 2 K, 6.37 ERA
It was an ugly double-header for Mississippi, as the offense couldn’t keep pace with Biloxi and they dropped their seventh and eighth straight games. Briefly they found opportunity in game one thanks to Mississippi native Brandon Parker, who in the fifth inning came through in a huge spot. Following walks to Keshawn Ogans and Cade Bunnell, Parker came to the plate looking to cut into Biloxi’s 2-0 lead and did a whole lot more. Parker got a fastball on the inner half and got around on it, driving a no-doubt three-run home run over the left field fence to give Mississippi a lead. Mississippi kept on doing work with a walk from Cody Milligan and David McCabe’s only hit of the day following, but they couldn’t come up with any more runs in the inning. The lead lasted all of zero outs in the bottom of the fifth inning, as Jake McSteen came on in relief and had a blow up outing, giving up three runs on four hits before he even recorded an out.
Landon Harper had a solid evening on the bump, though he wasn’t quite his normal self with command. Harper walked a couple and threw more pitches out of the zone than we’re accustomed to seeing, but settled in much better after a tough first inning and relied on weak ground ball contact and good infield defense to get him through four innings. Mississippi answered after that fifth inning with two hits to lead off the sixth, but Mississippi never did come up with the big hit and scored only one run in the inning. Cal Conley led off in the seventh with a hit, slicing a single into left field, but got caught stealing to take away a scoring chance for the Braves in the final inning. A few pitches later Cody Milligan smacked a single off of the glove of the second baseman then advanced and successfully stole third base, but the M-Braves failed to come through.
Game two was a far less dramatic affair all around. David Fletcher and his knuckleball were not fooling the Shuckers hitters, and they put up four runs off of the starter to bury the M-Braves. The bullpen imploded further in the fifth inning and gave up four runs between Patrick Halligan and Elison Joseph, putting out any last dash of hope for a win on Thursday. Cody Milligan had a bit of life at the plate with a hit and a walk, but Mississippi couldn’t string together anything and didn’t score until a Cade Bunnell sacrifice fly in the ninth inning.
Swing and Misses
Patrick Halligan - 5
Elison Joseph - 4
Landon Harper - 4
Rolddy Munoz - 3
(0-2) Rome Emperors 1, (2-0) Bowling Green Hot Rods 4
Box Score
Drew Compton, 1B: 1-4
Jace Grady: 1-3, BB
JR Ritchie, SP: 5 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 4 K, 3.60 ERA
Jared Johnson, RP: 1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 1 K, 0.00 ERA
It was a quick exit from the playoffs for Rome, as once again the failure to capitalize with runners on early in the game would come back to haunt them as the offense never hit enough to make an impact. Rome had just one extra base hit across their two games, and the one they did have in this game led directly to their only run scoring. Joe Olsavsky reached on a fly ball that it seemed the left and center fielder must have miscommunicated on, or lost in the lights, as it fell within what should have easily been the reach of the left fielder but the center fielder Homer Bush was the one going for it. Jacob Godman then beat out a roller to the right side (debatably) to put two runners on and bring up the top of the lineup, but Rome would only come away with one run. A fantastic charging play from the shortstop kept Kevin Kilpatrick Jr. from beating out a single, and although it did score a run it was the only one of the game for Rome. Godman would later be caught at home on a fielder’s choice, and to be quite honest Rome didn’t deserve to even score the run they did as they didn’t have a single even remotely well-hit ball. The only one that was reasonably hard hit was from EJ Exposito, and of course this was the one which the third baseman snagged for an inning-ending force play at second base. In the ninth inning Ambioris Tavarez gave Rome a chance when he lined a hard single up the middle with one out, but the other three Emperors struck out in the inning and they came up empty to end their season.
Rome went to JR Ritchie to try to shut down this Bowling Green offense, but like in his last couple of outings Ritchie did not have his best command. While he mostly avoided walks he often found himself in bad counts or leaving pitches over the plate, and one of his two walks came back to bite in the second inning. That inning was led off with a walk, and a sacrifice fly would eventually score the game’s first run. Ritchie rarely pitched without having to sweat through some amount of trouble, with only the fourth inning being clean, though when he was around the edges of the strike zone he was nasty. His fastball was able to get above the bats of the Bowling Green hitters and force swing and miss, and both his slider and especially his changeup have slowly started to get a bit sharper. Though neither were being spotted the way he needs to do the movement on them was superb, especially his changeup which is his most-improved pitch since we saw him at the beginning of last season. Ritchie really started to settle into the game in the third inning with back-to-back strikeouts following a leadoff walk, but in a key spot Tavarez bounced a routine throw to first that Compton couldn’t scoop, and it allowed the second run of the game to score. Ritchie would allow one more run in the fifth inning, but the hit that led to it came on a fairly good pitch. Colton Ledbetter hit a fastball right at the top of the zone, rolling a jam shot through the shifted infield that he was able to hustle into being a double. A ground out would advance the runner to third, where a fastball got loose from Ritchie and the wild pitch scored a third run. Overall though, Ritchie has been fantastic at High-A given how little professional experience he has, and may not need to spend much time in Rome next season. Right now though his biggest issue has been his fastball command, as he has been tending to pull the pitch to his glove side with some bad location misses in that direction. Some of this could be fatigue as well, and if the command recovers to where it was a few weeks ago he should be fine.
Swing and Misses
JR Ritchie - 12
Austin Smith - 2
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JR Ritchie had a solid outing, but Rome couldn’t give him the run support to extend the series to a third game It wasn’t the best of days for the Atlanta Braves Minor League system. None of the affiliates won and Rome was decisively swept out of the playoffs despite some solid work from JR Ritchie. Still some guys did shine, with the best Triple-A start yet from Drue Hackenberg and a home run from Drake Baldwin in the same game.
(69-72) Gwinnett Stripers 2, (65-74) Buffalo Bisons 3
Box Score
Statcast
Nacho Alvarez Jr, 3B: 1-3, BB, .304/.408/.493
Drake Baldwin, C: 1-4, HR, .299/.409/.496
Drue Hackenberg, SP: 6 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, 1.50 ERA
Allan Winans, RP: 2 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 2 K, 3.08 ERA
Well Gwinnett may not have salvaged at least one win for us on Thursday, but that was much more like what we want to see from Drue Hackenberg on the mound. Hackenberg did a much better job of controlling his fastball, keeping it on the edges of the zone and managing to once again rely on weak contact as his means for surviving six solid innings. Hackenberg had a bit lower fastball velocity than his prior two starts, but the tradeoff for that was not walking five batters. The only pitch Hackenberg really hasn’t managed to land since being promoted is his curveball, even though it has been his best swing-and-miss pitch in his short time in Gwinnett and all year, focusing in on the fastball usage which I presume is likely the Braves wanting him to emphasize commanding the pitch better. Hackenberg’s cutter looked strong in this game and he managed to locate it well, and if he can continue to land the fastball/cutter like this and mix in better curveballs he should see better results in the near future.
Yet another game and yet more good results off of the bat of Drake Baldwin, who hit a fourth inning home run to account for the first of Gwinnett’s runs. Baldwin hit a couple of hot ones in his first two at bats, and against a Quad-A arm like Paolo Espino that’s kind of the results you would expect him to get. Both of Baldwin’s 105+ mph batted balls - a hard first inning ground out and that fifth inning home run - were 87 mph fastballs that Espino left in the middle of the zone and a hitter of Baldwin’s quality just isn’t going to miss those. Baldwin’s tough matchup came in the eighth inning against lefty reliever Brandon Eisert, one of those type of guys with a low, wide release point that can cause havoc against same-handed batters. Baldwin got absolutely wrecked by Eisert and his slider, as Eisert just threw three sliders in a row away that Baldwin swung and missed at, the last one being a chase off of the edge. This is the first time I’ve seen Baldwin look completely outmatched at the plate as it was clear he was struggling to even see the ball from Eisert’s release.
Nacho Alvarez on the other hand had no issues seeing Eisert, as he ended up working a walk that helped Gwinnett a little bit of life late in the game. The Stripers had fallen behind 3-2 in the top of the inning, and with a runner on second base Alvarez drew that walk to bring up Baldwin in a big spot with two runners on and two outs. Unfortunately Baldwin struck out to end the threat and Gwinnett went down quietly in the ninth inning. Alvarez overall had a solid day at the plate, though he just missed making it a big one with the location of his batted balls. He hit a deep fly out in the first inning on a hanging Espino slider, but a pitch like that you would ideally like him pulling out to the power gap he hit to dead center field where he didn’t get good enough wood on it to get it out. In the fourth inning he hit his best one, lining one hard the other way, but it was right at the first baseman for a line out. He finally got a hit to fall in the sixth inning by rolling a ball through the right side of the infield.
Swing and Misses
Drue Hackenberg - 11
Allan Winans - 2
Ken Giles - 2
(61-71) Mississippi Braves 4, (64-67) Biloxi Shuckers 5
Box Score
Cody Milligan, CF: 1-2, 2 BB, SB, .238/.300/.353
David McCabe, DH: 1-4, .121/.260/.168
Landon Harper, SP: 4 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 1 K, 1.41 ERA
Rolddy Munoz, RP: 1.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 2 K, 3.98 ERA
(61-72) Mississippi Braves 1, (65-67) Biloxi Shuckers 8
Box Score
Cody Milligan, CF: 1-2, BB, .238/.300/.353
David McCabe, DH: 0-3, .121/.260/.168
David Fletcher, SP: 3.2 IP, 6 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 3 BB, 2 K, 6.37 ERA
It was an ugly double-header for Mississippi, as the offense couldn’t keep pace with Biloxi and they dropped their seventh and eighth straight games. Briefly they found opportunity in game one thanks to Mississippi native Brandon Parker, who in the fifth inning came through in a huge spot. Following walks to Keshawn Ogans and Cade Bunnell, Parker came to the plate looking to cut into Biloxi’s 2-0 lead and did a whole lot more. Parker got a fastball on the inner half and got around on it, driving a no-doubt three-run home run over the left field fence to give Mississippi a lead. Mississippi kept on doing work with a walk from Cody Milligan and David McCabe’s only hit of the day following, but they couldn’t come up with any more runs in the inning. The lead lasted all of zero outs in the bottom of the fifth inning, as Jake McSteen came on in relief and had a blow up outing, giving up three runs on four hits before he even recorded an out.
Landon Harper had a solid evening on the bump, though he wasn’t quite his normal self with command. Harper walked a couple and threw more pitches out of the zone than we’re accustomed to seeing, but settled in much better after a tough first inning and relied on weak ground ball contact and good infield defense to get him through four innings. Mississippi answered after that fifth inning with two hits to lead off the sixth, but Mississippi never did come up with the big hit and scored only one run in the inning. Cal Conley led off in the seventh with a hit, slicing a single into left field, but got caught stealing to take away a scoring chance for the Braves in the final inning. A few pitches later Cody Milligan smacked a single off of the glove of the second baseman then advanced and successfully stole third base, but the M-Braves failed to come through.
Game two was a far less dramatic affair all around. David Fletcher and his knuckleball were not fooling the Shuckers hitters, and they put up four runs off of the starter to bury the M-Braves. The bullpen imploded further in the fifth inning and gave up four runs between Patrick Halligan and Elison Joseph, putting out any last dash of hope for a win on Thursday. Cody Milligan had a bit of life at the plate with a hit and a walk, but Mississippi couldn’t string together anything and didn’t score until a Cade Bunnell sacrifice fly in the ninth inning.
Swing and Misses
Patrick Halligan - 5
Elison Joseph - 4
Landon Harper - 4
Rolddy Munoz - 3
(0-2) Rome Emperors 1, (2-0) Bowling Green Hot Rods 4
Box Score
Drew Compton, 1B: 1-4
Jace Grady: 1-3, BB
JR Ritchie, SP: 5 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 4 K, 3.60 ERA
Jared Johnson, RP: 1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 1 K, 0.00 ERA
It was a quick exit from the playoffs for Rome, as once again the failure to capitalize with runners on early in the game would come back to haunt them as the offense never hit enough to make an impact. Rome had just one extra base hit across their two games, and the one they did have in this game led directly to their only run scoring. Joe Olsavsky reached on a fly ball that it seemed the left and center fielder must have miscommunicated on, or lost in the lights, as it fell within what should have easily been the reach of the left fielder but the center fielder Homer Bush was the one going for it. Jacob Godman then beat out a roller to the right side (debatably) to put two runners on and bring up the top of the lineup, but Rome would only come away with one run. A fantastic charging play from the shortstop kept Kevin Kilpatrick Jr. from beating out a single, and although it did score a run it was the only one of the game for Rome. Godman would later be caught at home on a fielder’s choice, and to be quite honest Rome didn’t deserve to even score the run they did as they didn’t have a single even remotely well-hit ball. The only one that was reasonably hard hit was from EJ Exposito, and of course this was the one which the third baseman snagged for an inning-ending force play at second base. In the ninth inning Ambioris Tavarez gave Rome a chance when he lined a hard single up the middle with one out, but the other three Emperors struck out in the inning and they came up empty to end their season.
Rome went to JR Ritchie to try to shut down this Bowling Green offense, but like in his last couple of outings Ritchie did not have his best command. While he mostly avoided walks he often found himself in bad counts or leaving pitches over the plate, and one of his two walks came back to bite in the second inning. That inning was led off with a walk, and a sacrifice fly would eventually score the game’s first run. Ritchie rarely pitched without having to sweat through some amount of trouble, with only the fourth inning being clean, though when he was around the edges of the strike zone he was nasty. His fastball was able to get above the bats of the Bowling Green hitters and force swing and miss, and both his slider and especially his changeup have slowly started to get a bit sharper. Though neither were being spotted the way he needs to do the movement on them was superb, especially his changeup which is his most-improved pitch since we saw him at the beginning of last season. Ritchie really started to settle into the game in the third inning with back-to-back strikeouts following a leadoff walk, but in a key spot Tavarez bounced a routine throw to first that Compton couldn’t scoop, and it allowed the second run of the game to score. Ritchie would allow one more run in the fifth inning, but the hit that led to it came on a fairly good pitch. Colton Ledbetter hit a fastball right at the top of the zone, rolling a jam shot through the shifted infield that he was able to hustle into being a double. A ground out would advance the runner to third, where a fastball got loose from Ritchie and the wild pitch scored a third run. Overall though, Ritchie has been fantastic at High-A given how little professional experience he has, and may not need to spend much time in Rome next season. Right now though his biggest issue has been his fastball command, as he has been tending to pull the pitch to his glove side with some bad location misses in that direction. Some of this could be fatigue as well, and if the command recovers to where it was a few weeks ago he should be fine.
Swing and Misses
JR Ritchie - 12
Austin Smith - 2
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