AAA: Round Rock 1, Oklahoma City (LAD) 4
Round Rock: 5 hits, 4 walks, 8 strikeouts
Opponent: 8 hits, 4 walks, 10 strikeouts
Record: 21-12, 1.5 GB
SP Cody Bradford: 6 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 7 SO, 90 P / 61 S, 0.91 ERA
2B Justin Foscue: 2-2, HR (4), 2 BB, SB (5), .281/.397/.500
1B Blaine Crim: 1-3, BB, .295/.402/.453
Cody Bradford pitched well again. The change in particular was a menace: 23 thrown, 16 swings, eight misses. An uncommonly high portion of Bradford’s changes land within the strike zone, but with his spotless delivery and contrasted against his high-in-the-zone fastball, batters are unable to do much with it. Two of the hits were on the light side: A Yonny Hernandez grounder that snuck past Davis Wendzel at shallow third, and a high, shallow fly that LF Sandro Fabian, CF Rafael Ortega, and SS Jonathan Ornelas lost in the twilight. Ortega ducked and covered his head; the ball landed 30 feet to his right.
Foscue reached safely four times. In his first trip up against top-100 prospect Gavin Stone, Foscue reached down to rocket a low slider 401 feet the other way at a 19-degree angle. He later stole his fifth base of the season. In his prior 163 career professional games, he also stole five, and he swiped only three in 139 college games. Foscue isn’t fast, not even in a “once he’s out of first gear” sense, but he seems to have developed a talent for taking advantage of what’s given.
In his first game of 2023, veteran catcher David Freitas hit a grand slam off Nick Krauth for all of Oklahoma City’s runs. Round Rock would have overtaken OKC for first place with a victory.
Catcher Promotion Day: Sam Huff to the Rangers, Jordan Procyshen to Round Rock, Liam Hicks to Frisco.
AA: Frisco 4, Wichita (MIN) 5 (10)
Frisco: 9 hits, 0 walks, 12 strikeouts
Opponent: 8 hits, 3 walks, 11 strikeouts
Record: 13-15, 3 GB
SP TK Roby: 6 IP, 6 H (1 HR), 4 R, 1 BB, 5 SO, 79 P / 49 S, 6.83 ERA
RP Grant Wolfram: 2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 3 SO, 1.88 ERA
RP Marc Church: 2 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 0 BB, 3 SO, 2.08 ERA
RF Kellen Strahm: 2-4, HR (2), .231/.333/.363
Wichita scored the go-ahead run in the 10th on a flyout and groundout. The game ended when Evan Carter was thrown out at home attempting to score from third on a wild pitch. I don’t blame him for trying. The ball didn’t skitter away quite as far as it seemed it would, and the catcher made a terrific throw. Carter was 0-5 with three strikeouts yesterday and 1-17 over the last four. Carter’s relative quietness combined with Leody Taveras’s 118 OPS+ has temporarily quelled talk of getting Carter up to Arlington forthwith. That’s fine.
TK Roby is being BABIPed to death (.412 average on balls in play) but has also allowed 13 doubles, most in AA.
Hi-A: Hickory 1, at Bowling Green (TAM) 12
Hickory: 1 hit, 2 walks, 8 strikeouts
Opponent: 14 hits, 6 walks, 7 strikeouts
Record: 12-14, 7 GB
SP Larson Kindreich: 2.2 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 3 BB, 2 SO, 65 P / 30 S, 4.32 ERA
Daniel Mateo’s game-starting single was Hickory’s only hit. The Crawdads would place five others aboard by various means and score one.
Hickory IL’ed RHP Winston Santos. Florencio Serrano has replaced him.
Lo-A: Down East 8, Delmarva (BAL) 2 (6)
Down East: 10 hits, 5 walks, 10 strikeouts
Opponent: 3 hits, 4 walks, 9 strikeouts
Record: 16-10, 1 G up
SP Dylan McCarty: 4.1 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 3 BB, 1 HBP, 7 SO, 69 P / 39 S, 1.23 ERA
1B Abi Ortiz: 1-2, HR (4), 2 BB, .279/.366/.500
LF Yosy Galan: 1-4, HR (5), .264/.372/.542
CF Anthony Gutierrez: 2-3, BB, .282/.333/.353
3B Gleider Figuereo: 1-4, HR (2), .171/.308/.289
2B Danyer Cueva: 2-2, BB, .250/.274/.350
SS Cam Cauley: 2-3, 2B, SB (7), .247/.309/.356
After a slow start, Down East has averaged 7.3 runs per game in the last two-plus weeks and leads the league with 22 homers.
Anthony Gutierrez leads the organization in grounder rate (66%) and pull rate (60%). Last year, he was near the middle of the Texas pack in both categories. He’s having a nice enough season so far, but as you might guess, his power is down compared to last year.
Today’s Starters
AAA: Kyle Cody
AA: Ryan Garcia
Hi-A: Mitch Bratt
Lo-A: Joseph Montalvo
Five Years Ago Yesterday
Nomar Mazara (MLB), Charles Leblanc (hi-A), and Tyreque Reed (lo-A) hit walk-off homers, and Hanser Alberto (AAA) hit a walk-off three-run double. Reed’s homer came as a pinch-hitter in his 2018 and full-season debut.