Minor League Report (9/8): Austin Martin Homers, Brooks Lee Dazzles at Short

[Nash Walker]

The Twins’ Minor League affiliates couldn’t get the bats rolling in a quieter offensive night. Even then, the Kernels picked up another win and a top prospect hit a homer for the Surge.

Image courtesy of Ed Bailey, Wichita Wind Surge

TRANSACTIONS
INF/OF Dalton Shuffield promoted from Cedar Rapids to St. Paul
C Dillon Tatum promoted from Fort Myers to Wichita
C Ricardo Olivar promoted from FCL Twins to Fort Myers
Wind Surge placed C Kyle Schmidt on the Injured List

SAINTS SENTINEL
Mud Hens 5, Saints 2
Box Score

The Saints had trouble getting their offense going in a 5-2 loss to the Mud Hens Thursday. Simeon Woods Richardson started and allowed two runs over five strong innings. Woods Richardson struck out seven and walked three. It's been a wonderful bounce back season for SWR, who now owns a 3.12 ERA across both levels of the upper minors. Opponents are hitting just .212/.286/.307 off SWR this season and he's six years younger than his average competition at Triple-A. 

The Saints tallied five hits on the night, including four doubles from Matt Wallner, Mark Contreras, Elliot Soto, and John Andreoli. The game was tied at two after an RBI groundout from Michael Helman in the fifth. The Mud Hens took the lead in the sixth and never looked back. 

The Saints are 65-66 on the season. 

WIND SURGE WISDOM
Naturals 6, Wind Surge 3
Box Score

The Wind Surge took a tough loss in the late innings Thursday night. Leobaldo Cabrera tied the game on an RBI single in the second. In the fifth, Austin Martin hit his second homer of the year to tie the game at three. Martin entered the game hitting .304/.467/.348 (.815 OPS) in 30 September plate appearances. It's been a down year for Martin but a strong finish could provide momentum for 2023. DaShawn Keirsey Jr. went 2-for-3 with a double and a walk, while Aaron Sabato also doubled. 

Francis Peguero was outstanding in relief, pitching 1 1/3 innings with one hit and no runs allowed. It was all Naturals from that point on. They scored one in the eighth and two in the ninth, securing the victory. Despite notching nine hits and drawing five walks, the Surge couldn’t score more than three. They left 25 men on base. 

The Surge are 71-57.  

KERNELS NUGGETS
Kernels 2, Cubs 1
Box Score

Travis Adams was terrific in his start for the Kernels in Thursday’s win. Adams allowed one run over five innings. The Kernels followed that up with four scoreless from the bullpen, including scoreless innings from Bobby Milacki, Sean Mooney, and Miguel Rodríguez. The trio struck out seven in a masterful pitching performance. Brooks Lee’s defense also helped. 

Trailing 1-0 in the fifth, Jeferson Morales blasted a go-ahead two-run homer to left. It was Morales’ seventh homer of the season. The Kernels had only five total hits, but the swing from Morales was enough to seal the victory. Willie Joe Garry Jr. tallied two hits in the win. 

The Kernels are 73-56. 

MUSSEL MATTERS
The Mussels’ doubleheader was rained out Thursday. 

TWINS MINOR LEAGUE PLAYERS OF THE DAY
Twins Minor League Hitter of the Day - Austin Martin (2-for-4, HR, BB)
Twins Minor League Pitcher of the Day - Simeon Woods Richardson (5 IP, 3 H, 2 R/ER, 3 BB, 7 K)

PROSPECT SUMMARY
#2 Brooks Lee - (1-for-3, BB)
#4 Austin Martin - (2-for-4, HR, BB)
#6 Simeon Woods Richardson - (5 IP, 3 H, 2 R/ER, 3 BB, 7 K)
#9 Matt Wallner - (1-for-4, 2B, R)
#14 Edouard Julien - (0-for-3, 2 BB)

FRIDAY’S PROBABLE STARTERS
Saints - Jordan Balazovic
Surge - Brent Headrick
Kernels - TBD
Mussels - TBD (Doubleheader)

QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS? LEAVE THEM BELOW!

 

 

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[FlyingFinn]

How many games get rained out for Fort Myers? It seems like about one per week or maybe 15-20 in the season. I realize most of them get made up but they then play 7 inning double headers. 

Martin certainly is doing better after coming back from injury.

[ashbury]

What kind of an insane throw was that from Brooks Lee?  The guy really is something!

[Seth Stohs]

11 minutes ago, FlyingFinn said:

How many games get rained out for Fort Myers? It seems like about one per week or maybe 15-20 in the season. I realize most of them get made up but they then play 7 inning double headers. 

Martin certainly is doing better after coming back from injury.

This is actually pretty normal at this time of the year in Florida. Then about every other year there is a hurricane passing through too. 

[RJA]

Let's hope Martin is finding himself a bit.  It is always a bad sign when the story lead is that Martin hit his second home run of the year!  Hopefully, home runs won't be as noteworthy of mention next year.  SWR's year is ending well.  I would suspect if he performs well early next year at St. Paul, he will get an invite to Target Field.  Great stuff.  Varland and SWR may end up being the best of our young pitchers--pray for health.  Finally, Julien is remarkable.  He is 0 for 3 but has two walks.  He has an insane ability to get on base.  He is another guy that could move up next year.  I love our young position players, now if the pitching could catch up and everyone could stay healthy, we could have some fun.

[mac098]

On the plus side its nice to see our top prospects actually hitting the ball. Brooks has been on a tear since being drafted so he is looking like he is starting to get on that fast track to the MLB. Martin seems to have regressed a little bit this year. Maybe teams have started to figure him out? If he can keep up this momentum he has this month, maybe we'll see him get that invite to ST next year. SWR is performing as advertised and he seems like he is ready for the next step. It is gonna be interesting and fun to see some of these young guys ready for the show and pitch against MLB competition. 

[Trov]

SWR had a rough run mid-season and ended up on IL.  Since the IL stint he has been pretty good. He started off great in April, had terrible May, then was out most of June with injury.  Since, coming back, even with his promotion, he has given up 11 runs in about 36 innings pitched, and struck out 46 walking 12.  

Martin also has been doing decent since his return from his injury.  He missed over a month, and since he has been on base at least 1 time, most games more than 1 time, in every game but 2.  He had back to back 0 for 4 with no walks or HBP.  Sure it is not a ton of games, but fact he missed over a month and can do that is nice.  The 1 draw back is only 5 extra base hits in those times. He has stolen 11 bases with only being caught 1 time, so even his walks or singles have been getting to second. His prospect rankings have taken a huge hit, but I am still optimistic he can play at this level. 

[jmlease1]

I'm definitely a fan of SWR. I'm really glad to see him handling promotion to AAA well and continuing to look like a pitcher with real upside. He's back to being a pitcher who is hard to hit, he's found his command again and brought the BBs down to a reasonable level, and he's still getting Ks. This is the most he's pitched in a season as a pro since he was 18, and while he didn't quite have the healthy year that i was hoping for him, he's still made 19 starts and absolutely earned the promotion to AAA. At 21.

Next season will be a big one for Martin: he's had some injury issues, the power has been slow to develop, he hasn't truly found a defensive home, and the hits haven't been coming like expected. But the on-base skills are definitely there and the speed is a real asset. And defensively it does feel like the team knows that he can slot into the OF without any real difficulty and they're still trying to figure out what his future is for the infield, which makes it less of a concern? but he's going to have to figure out how to be a more effective hitter, and do it consistently. It's interesting to look at his splits: even when he's struggling, he never falls completely off the cliff: looks like he's only had one time all year where he's gone 2 games without getting on base. (He gets HPBs like he's Don freakin' Baylor) He might be the argument against jumping a player up to high too fast; have to wonder if his development didn't get screwed up by starting his professional career in AA?

Fun to see Brooks Lee make such great play at SS. I don't the draftniks were saying he won't stick at SS, but I like the way the Twins seem to be saying "you're a SS until you show us you can't play here".

[chpettit19]

Is that a different setup for Martin? He looked to have his hands up earlier than usual. Does anyone who watches the minor league games know if he's gotten rid of the hands low, bat straight up part of his setup or am I just seeing the tale end of his setup in that clip where his hands go up?

[Karbo]

Not to beat a dead horse, but again I question why they don't push the starters further than the 5th inning.

[FlyingFinn]

2 hours ago, Trov said:

SWR had a rough run mid-season and ended up on IL. 

Wasn't the IL stint for SWR all about Covid or was there an actual injury as well?

[ensignchair]

2 hours ago, chpettit19 said:

Is that a different setup for Martin? He looked to have his hands up earlier than usual. Does anyone who watches the minor league games know if he's gotten rid of the hands low, bat straight up part of his setup or am I just seeing the tale end of his setup in that clip where his hands go up?

I did some looking last week and noticed the same thing. From what I can tell, his hands were higher in college, but since he was drafted (until now) they have been lower. Hopefully this makes his numbers inflate and justify why he was drafted so high. 

[MN_ExPat]

1 hour ago, Karbo said:

Not to beat a dead horse, but again I question why they don't push the starters further than the 5th inning.

Not saying that you can't/shouldn't let a Minor League starter go longer, but at the same time it isn't always necessary. 

If I was king of minor pitching development (and let's all be thankful I'm not  [Insert picture of Racoon firing an M60 into the air while riding an armored Hog into an dumpster fire]), I might push to let them occasionally go into the 6th or even 7th if their "dealing", but honestly I truly wouldn't do anything different.

[MN_ExPat]

13 hours ago, ashbury said:

What kind of an insane throw was that from Brooks Lee?  The guy really is something!

[ashbury]

2 minutes ago, MN_ExPat said:

If you're saying Aliens had something to do with that one throw, I don't know how I'd contradict you.

[chpettit19]

2 hours ago, Karbo said:

Not to beat a dead horse, but again I question why they don't push the starters further than the 5th inning.

A large part of it is that the minors are more for building up season long stamina. Especially at the lower levels. Those kids have never thrown this many innings over this long of a season before so they're more concerned about having their arms be able to throw at the top of their game into September and October. So the minors are typically used more about building up season long inning counts to get the body better prepared for the shorter recovery time of the offseason between seasons before having to go another 8-9 months of pitching every 6 days.

[jimbo92107]

That play by Brooks Lee showed a very high level of athletic ability. Most mlb-quality players can throw from their knees, their butt, etc. But Lee's throw was dynamic, whirling his torso while it was still in motion, yet able to nail the 1B's glove with remarkable accuracy and decent velocity. How many mlb SS can do that? A handful, maybe.

This guy is a future star, and his stardom is not very far in the future. I'd invite him to spring training, and get his butt to AAA in a hurry. You never have too many position players that can really hit, and really field.

[RpR]

14 hours ago, ashbury said:

What kind of an insane throw was that from Brooks Lee?  The guy really is something!

Strong accurate arm is part of what separates an above average SS from run of the mill.

[cmoss84]

1 hour ago, MN_ExPat said:

Is Brooks Lee an extra-terrestrial? Ancient alien theorists say YES. 

[DocBauer]

6 hours ago, chpettit19 said:

A large part of it is that the minors are more for building up season long stamina. Especially at the lower levels. Those kids have never thrown this many innings over this long of a season before so they're more concerned about having their arms be able to throw at the top of their game into September and October. So the minors are typically used more about building up season long inning counts to get the body better prepared for the shorter recovery time of the offseason between seasons before having to go another 8-9 months of pitching every 6 days.

100%

But just to add to the discussion, it's also about FREQUENCY of their arm build up, not just IP. College and HS arms, with little exception, only pitch once a week until pro ball. Then it becomes not only a longer season, but at times starting twice a week.

Additionally, I think some forget at times that SP aren't the only arms being developed. While those arms are perhaps the most "important" ones in the system, teams are still trying to develop potential bullpen arms as well. They need to throw as well in order to develop. 

Not unlike developing the entire roster as well. It's part of the reason catchers will spend time at DH and 1B in order to keep working on hitting skills but also let everyone also get turns behind the dish. Got to play to develop.

[chpettit19]

32 minutes ago, DocBauer said:

100%

But just to add to the discussion, it's also about FREQUENCY of their arm build up, not just IP. College and HS arms, with little exception, only pitch once a week until pro ball. Then it becomes not only a longer season, but at times starting twice a week.

Additionally, I think some forget at times that SP aren't the only arms being developed. While those arms are perhaps the most "important" ones in the system, teams are still trying to develop potential bullpen arms as well. They need to throw as well in order to develop. 

Not unlike developing the entire roster as well. It's part of the reason catchers will spend time at DH and 1B in order to keep working on hitting skills but also let everyone also get turns behind the dish. Got to play to develop.

Very well said!