Article: Minor League Report (7/31): Minor Leagues With A Major Deadline

[Eric R Pleiss]

The Twins had a busy day, but not as busy as some fans had hoped. They moved Sam Fuld back to Oakland in return for the soft-tossing lefty Tommy Milone. Milone will report to AAA for now, but should be up with the Twins before the end of next week. The Twins tried hard to find a buyer for Kurt Suzuki, but finding no suitors, the Twins bought high on Suzuki themselves, signing him to a two-year $12 million dollar extension, with a vesting option for a third year. To replace Sam Fuld on the 25-man roster, the Twins have promoted monstrous switch hitter Kennys Vargas from Double-A.Transactions

Left-hander Mat Batts was promoted from Elizabethton to Cedar Rapids. Batts started his career with the GCL Twins before moving up to the E-Twins and now will get a shot with the Kernels. He will take the spot of Aaron Slegers who received a promotion to Ft. Myers.

 

Red Wings Report

Rochester 2, Lehigh Valley 5

Box

 

Sean Gilmartin did not have his best stuff, surrendering five runs on five hits over six innings. He walked three and struck out four. His ERA in AAA is still just 3.98. Deolis Guerra pitched the final two innings and gave up one hit, walked one, and struck out one.

 

The Red Wings had plenty of base runners, the collected nine hits and a walk, but could not string things together to score more than a pair of runs. Six of the Wings' nine hits came from Pedro Florimon, Eric Farris, and Chris Rahl, each of them was 2-4, hitting in the seven-eight-nine spots. Josmil Pinto, who probably wasn't having a great evening after hearing about the Suzuki extension, was 1-4, but hey, no strike outs!

 

Rock Cats Review

Erie 4, New Britain 5

Box

 

Tyler Duffey pitched eight innings, but didn't have the lead while he was on the mound, as the Rock Cats rallied for three runs in the bottom of the eighth to give Duffey the win. Duffey gave up seven hits, four earned runs, a walk and two strike outs. Alex Wimmers, recently promoted to AA, picked up his first save with he Rock Cats, pitching a scoreless ninth inning.

 

Aaron Hicks had a big day at the plate for New Britain, he was 3-4 with two runs scored, a double, a home run, and an RBI. Hicks is now hitting .301/.392/.439 over 40 games in New Britain. Stephen Wickens was 2-4 with a double and an RBI, and Mike Kvasnicka was 1-4 with a three run homer that gave the Rock Cats the win in the eighth.

 

 

Miracle Matters

Clearwater 9, Fort Myers 3

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Matt Tomshaw was bad on Thursday night. He faced 20 batters in three innings. He gave up 11 hits, nine runs (all earned), walked one, and struck out four. Two of the 11 hits he gave up were home runs. The bullpen pieced together six scoreless innings, but the damage was already done. Brandon Peterson pitched 2.2 and struck out three and walked one, Todd Van Steensel went 2.1 and also struck out three, he walked two. And D.J. Johnson ended things pitching in the ninth, he struck out one and walked one.

 

Nothing much doing for the Miracle with the bats, they collected just six hits, but worked their way into five walks. They also struck out 11 times. No Miracle batter had more than one hit. Levi Michael, who is back on the field after dealing with a foot injury, was 1-3 with a walk, a run scored, and a strike out. Byron Buxton was 1-3 with two runs scored, a triple and a walk.

 

Kernels Nuggets

Burlington 1, Cedar Rapids 4

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Chih-Wei Hu picked up his fourth win for the Kernels and is now 4-0 with a 1.50 ERA at Low-A. He went six innings, gave up just one run, struck out four and walked one. Brandon Bixler pitched the seventh and the eighth without allowing any runs, and Jared Wilson pitched a scoreless ninth.

 

Max Murphy was 2-3 with a home run and two RBIs, and Mitch Garver had a home run of his own, a two run dinger on a 1-3 night. Logan Wade had two hits of his own, and a run scored, going 2-4 on the evening.

 

E-Town E-Notes

Elizabethton @ Kingsport - Postponed (rain)

 

GCL Twins Takes

GCL Twins 4, GCL Rays 5

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Onesimo Hernandez went five innings, walked five, struck out three, and gave up two earned runs on four hits, including a home run to Tim Beckham. Seth Wagner earned a hold with 1.2 scoreless innings, even though he walked three batters. Trevor Hildenberger was tagged with a blown save and the loss (0-3) with two innings of three run ball that included four strike outs and no walks.

 

The GCL Twins used 12 position players, and collected twelve hits and two walks. Corey Wimberly (rehab from AA) was 2-4 with a run scored and a double, Nelson Molina was also 2-4 with a run scored and Jack Barrie was 2-4, without a run scored. Jarrard Poteete had a double on a 1-4 night, and Manuel Guzman had a triple, accounting for the Twins' remaining extra base hit.

 

Twins Daily Minor League Hitter/Pitcher of the Day

Twins Daily Minor League Hitter of the Day - Aaron Hicks, New Britain Rock Cats

Twins Daily Minor League Pitcher of the Day - Tyler Duffey, New Britain Rock Cats

 

Friday's Probables

Rochester @ Lehigh Valley (6:05 CST) – Kris Johnson

Erie @ New Britain (6:05 CST) – Virgil Vasquez

Ft. Myers @ Lakeland (6:11 CST) – Ethan Mildren

Cedar Rapids @ Beloit (7:00 CST) – Stephen Gonsalves

Elizabethton @ Kingsport (4:00 CST), Double header – TBD

DSL Twins @ DSL White Sox (10:30AM CST) - TBD

GCL Twins @ GCL Red Sox (11:00AM CST) – TBD

 

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[chamoman]

Pretty sure you mean Hu was pitcher of the day, and not Tomshaw...

[Dantes929]

Few will be happy with a Hicks promotion but this time he is earning it.

[Ncgo4]

Hu continues his string of amazing performances. Promoted to low A ball and he IMPROVES on the 1.69 ERA he had at Elizabethton. Just just may be the least known unhitable pitcher in baseball. Is there a real scouting report on him somewhere? What is he throwing? What is he working on? 84 K's and 16 walks in 82.2 professional innings so I assume his control and velocity are pretty good.

 

A few more starts like this and I'm guessing Barrios/Stewart kinds of speculation and comparisons. I also wonder about his background in Taiwan. I don't know anything about baseball there and wonder if he threw a lot of innings, was he in professional ball there and just how did the Twins learn about him?. He's thrown less than 50 innings so far this year and it will be interesting to see if he begins to tire.

[Jeremy Nygaard]

Hu pitched in a lot of international tournaments while he was a Taiwanese prep. Has lots of hardware frim them. He's advanced - maybe not like Berrios was/is - but there are a lot of parallels. Hu has been up to 95 and throws all the pitches.

[Eric R Pleiss]

Pretty sure you mean Hu was pitcher of the day, and not Tomshaw...

Hu pitched well, no doubt about that, but I think with the Twins' phobia of letting MiLB pitchers go deep into games, what Tomshaw did was more noteworthy, so I gave him the nod.  

[Eric R Pleiss]

Few will be happy with a Hicks promotion but this time he is earning it.

Hicks had done well, and could certainly handle a promotion, as long as it only goes as far as AAA.  With Buxton continuing to impress at High-A, he could be promoted to AA before long, even with his limited playing time in 2014.

[TRex]

Hu pitched well, no doubt about that, but I think with the Twins' phobia of letting MiLB pitchers go deep into games, what Tomshaw did was more noteworthy, so I gave him the nod.  

Now maybe you are talking about Tyler Duffy? Tomshaw was the one who faced 20 batters in 3 innings!

[big dog]

Murphy's already been at CR for a week- he's got nothing to prove.  Move him up!  Free Max Murphy!

 

ok, maybe that's a bit premature...

[Mike Sixel]

Few will be happy with a Hicks promotion but this time he is earning it.

 

Who would be unhappy? I think everyone would be happy he is doing better.

[Dman]

Murphy's already been at CR for a week- he's got nothing to prove.  Move him up!  Free Max Murphy!

 

ok, maybe that's a bit premature...

Max has been amazing and I look at his box score and smile, but Swim and Garver have been pretty excellent as well. Nice to have some good hitters to watch though.

[Dman]

Gotta say Hu has been impressive so far. It seems Ike he came out of nowhere. If continues like this he will be at high A next year. We have us some very good young pitching coming up. Things are getting exciting.

[Eric R Pleiss]

Now maybe you are talking about Tyler Duffy? Tomshaw was the one who faced 20 batters in 3 innings!

Oh yeah, I bungled that one.  Oops.

[Pitz]

Interesting to see the promotions of Batts and Slegers. The (deserved) promotions of Thorpe, Hu, Gonsalves, and Batts seem to have left the rookie level clubs pretty thin on starting pitching though, but I guess thats not surprising given how many RPers the Twins keep drafting. Any word on who will take Batts' spot in the E'town rotation?

[Seth Stohs]

Few will be happy with a Hicks promotion but this time he is earning it.

He should be going to Rochester soon... I would think.

[Seth Stohs]

Oh yeah, I bungled that one.  Oops.

 

I've edited it to say that Tyler Duffey was the pitcher of the night.

[clutterheart]

Interesting Nola starts in High A

[Seth Stohs]

Interesting Nola starts in High A

 

Well yeah, he was a Top 8 pick out of college. 

[diehardtwinsfan]

Well yeah, he was a Top 8 pick out of college. 

 

He was also considered to be one of the quickest to the big leagues.  Not a bad place for him to start.  AA next year, so already a potential callup. 

[John Kelsey]

 Pressley has done nothing since he has been here.

Pressly* has a 1.42 ERA since he got called up. What do you want from him?!?!

[Seth Stohs]

Pressly* has a 1.42 ERA since he got called up. What do you want from him?!?!

 

I was going to say... he has been up for about a week... That one surprised me a little. 

[Dantes929]

When I said promote Hicks I meant to the Twins.   I just have a hard time believing they let Fuld go and not replace his defense.    If promoted to the Twins there will be posters who complain about it because he has not succeeded there in the past.    Personally, I liked him up there and while his average was terrible OBP is king for me and his was very good for a #9 hitter.