Twins Daily Minor League Report (5/10): Emmanuel Rodriguez Plays Late-Inning Hero in St. Paul

[Seth Stohs]

Image courtesy of Rob Thompson, St. Paul Saints (photo of Emmanuel Rodriguez)

This series in St. Paul between the Saints and the Bisons has been filled with close games, high-scoring and low-scoring. Are you going to CHS Field on Sunday for Mothers Day? Wichita had a really nice comeback. The Kernels have been really good, but lost on Sunday. Fort Myers had two batters that accounted for a large percentage of their offense. The FCL Twins found themselves in double figures again on Saturday. Check out all that happened throughout the Minnesota Twins organization.

Speaking of the Twins, it's so much more fun seeing them on a seven-game winning streak, and on a 13-5 stretch. Saturday's 2-1 win was really impressive. 

CURRENT W-L Records
Minnesota Twins: 20-20
St. Paul Saints: 19-15
Wichita Wind Surge: 18-14
Cedar Rapids Kernels: 19-12
Fort Myers Mighty Mussels: 15-17
FCL Twins: 5-1
DSL Twins: Scheduled to start on June 2.       

TRANSACTIONS
RHP Ruddy Gomez has been transferred to the Mighty Mussels from the FCL Twins. The Twins signed Gomez from the independent Windy City Thunder Bolts on April 15th. That day, the Twins had 28 pitchers on their various Injured Lists.  The 25-year-old will make his professional, affiliated debut when he gets into a game. The right-hander started his college ball at Division II St. Leo University and then transferred to Central Florida. 

SAINTS SENTINEL
St. Paul 2, Buffalo 1
Box Score
There have been some crazy games in this season, but this was just a good, well played, well-pitched game. The Saints got some late-inning heroics from a top prospect to help them win a close, competitive game. 

Down 1-0 during the playing of the National Anthem, the Saints had a bit of a rally in the bottom of the seventh. With one out, Jeferson Morales walked. Emmanuel Rodriguez followed by hitting an opposite-field, two-run homer to give the Saints the 2-1 lead. It was his second home run of the season, in consecutive games, and both were opposite field shots.   

In the top of the eighth, Buffalo’s Alan Roden led off with a single. With one out, Will Robertson lined a single to center. Roden attempted to go from first to third, but Rodriguez threw a one-hopper to Will Holland who put on the tag for the inning’s second out. Tyler Beede came on for the ninth inning and earned the Save.   

Zebby Matthews made the start. He gave up only an unearned run on five hits over 5 1/3 innings. He had four strikeouts to go with no walks. Kody Funderburk got the final two outs of the sixth inning, both on strikeouts. Alex Speas worked out of some tough situations but threw two zeroes on the board. He gave up three hits and issued a walk.

The Rodriguez home run almost appeared out of nowhere. The Saints were not hitting, getting on base with much consistency. They had just three hits and four walks. Mickey Gasper had a single and two walks. He played first base in this game after catching a couple of games since his demotion. The other hit was a double by Patrick Winkel, his third of the season. Jefferson Morales walked twice and was hit by a pitch.

Carson McCusker’s 12-game hitting streak came to an end. 

The Buffalo Bisons are the Triple-A affiliate of the Toronto Blue Jays. Check out our sister site, Jays Centre, and their Top 20 Blue Jays prospect rankings. 

WIND SURGE WISDOM
Wichita 3, NW Arkansas 1
Box Score
So not only did he stay in the game after getting hit by a line drive on the side of his head and work two more innings, but Christian MacLeod made his next scheduled start.     

The southpaw tossed four scoreless innings. He gave up three singles, walked none and had three strikeouts.  

Pierson Ohl came on in relief and threw two innings. He gave up one run on three hits. He had one strikeout but issued no walks. 

Unfortunately, the Wind Surge were unable to get on the scoreboard. Jarret Whorff came in and threw a scoreless seventh inning.     

In the top of the eighth, Tanner Schobel led off with a single to left. He stole second, and with one out, Kala’i Rosario drilled a triple to tie the game at 1-1. Kyler Fedko grounded to shortstop for the second out, but it was enough to drive in Rosario with the go-ahead run. (Is this an example of The Contact Play working?) 

Whorff came back out for the eighth inning and had a quick, 10-pitch, scoreless inning. He had three strikeouts over two perfect innings. 

With one out in the top of the ninth, Noah Cardenas singled off of the pitcher. Jake Rucker reached on an error, and Jorel Ortega singled to load the bases. Schobel followed with a fly ball to left field, easily deep enough to drive in Cardenas and give his team an insurance run. 

John Stankiewicz came in for the ninth. He gave up a single. He erased it by getting a double play. Another ground out and the Wind Surge had a very nice win. 

Wichita had 10 hits in the game. All nine starters had at least one hit. Cardenas had two hits. Along with Rosario’s triple, Andrew Cossetti added his third double. Check out the defense of Tanner Schobel and Noah Cardenas. 

KERNELS NUGGETS
Cedar Rapids 5, Beloit 8
Box Score
When a team comes to bat, scoring a run is great, but putting up a crooked number is even better. In this game, both teams scored runs in four innings. The difference was that the Kernels had just one crooked number on the board, a “2” in the top of the eighth. The Sky Carp had two crooked numbers. They posted a “3” in the bottom of the fifth and the bottom of the seventh, and that was the difference in this game. 

Jeremy Lee was on the mound to start for the Kernels on Saturday. He put a “0” on the board in three of his first four innings. However, he came out for the fifth and got one out. He gave up one run, but he left the game with two runners on base. Lefty Wilker Reyes came on and allowed both runners to score before getting out of the inning. Reyes went 2 ⅓ innings and gave up three runs on seven hits. Cole Percival gave up one run on one hit and three walks.      

The Kernels got on the scoreboard first in the top of the second inning. Danny De Andrade doubled. He moved to third on a balk and scored on a Nate Baez sacrifice fly. The top of the third started with singles from Jaime Ferrer and Jose Salas singled. Ferrer scored on a fielder’s choice off the bat of Kaelen Culpepper. 

In the fifth inning, Jaime Ferrer led off with his second double of the season. After a sacrifice bunt and a hit batter, Brandon Winokur drive in Ferrer with a sacrifice fly. At the time, the Kernels had a 3-1 lead. 

Fast-forward to the top of the eighth, and the Kernels were down 7-3. Brandon Winokur led off with a single. Gabriel Gonzalez followed by ripping a triple over the center fielder’s head. Gonzalez scored on a wild pitch to cut the deficit to 7-5. But that’s as close as it got.      

The Kernels had just seven hits and three walks. Ferrer was the lone Kernel with more than one hit. He was 2-for-4 with a double. De Andrade knocked his 12th double. Gonzalez’s triple was his first of the year.     

MUSSEL MATTERS
Fort Myers 0, Dunedin 3
Box Score
Dylan Questad was on the mound to start the game for the Mussels. The 2023 draft pick from Wisconsin gave up three runs on seven hits. He walked two and had two strikeouts. 

Hunter Hoopes tossed two scoreless innings. He gave up one hit, walked two and had three strikeouts. Ruddy Gomez came out of the bullpen and pitched a one-hit, scoreless inning in his Fort Myers debut. His second inning was more dominant. Two easy ground balls to second and an infield pop up. 

Unfortunately, the Mussels offense was really unable to get anything going against the Dunedin pitchers. They managed just six hits and had three walks in the game. Jay Thomason hit his seventh double and accounted for all three of the team’s walks. He also stole his 12th and 13th bases of the season. Daniel Pena went 2-for-3. 

The Dunedin Blue Jays are the Low-A affiliate of the Toronto Blue Jays. Check out our sister site, Jays Centre, and their Top 20 Blue Jays prospect rankings. 

COMPLEX CHRONICLES
FCL Twins 12, FCL Red Sox 5
Box Score
On Saturday morning, the Twins won for the fourth straight time to improve to 5-1. For the second time in their last three games, they reached double-digits in runs scored. They got a solo homer in the first inning and then scored 10 runs in the second and third innings (combined). 

With two outs in the bottom of the first innings, Bryan Acuna hit his first home run of the season to give the Twins a 1-0 lead. 

Down 2-1 going to the bottom of the second, the Twins responded with a six-spot in the second. The inning started out in strong FCL fashion. Irvin Nunez was hit by a pitch. After an out, Yilber Herrera and Ricardo Paez walked to load the bases. After the second out, Eduardo Beltre had an RBI hit-by-pitch, and Acuna had an RBI walk. After a pitching change, Luis Fragoza doubled in two runs to make it 5-2. Yandro Hernandez switched places with Fragoza and drove in two more runs to make it 7-2.  

The Twins added four more runs in the bottom of the fourth inning. With one out, Herrera walked. He stole second and went to third on a throwing error. He then scored on a wild pitch. Merphy Hernandez walked, went to second on a wild pitch and then stole third base. He scored when Eduardo Beltre reachen on an error. Beltre went to second on a wild pitch, and he scored on an Acuna single. Fragoza walked. Yandro Hernandez reached on an error to load the bases again. Nunez walked again to score Acuna and make it 11-2. 

In the bottom of the fifth, Eduardo Beltre reached on an error, stole second, and scored on another error.

Joel Garcia made the start. He tossed the first three innings and gave up two runs on three hits. He walked one and had seven strikeouts. Anderson Ramos worked the next two innings. He gave up three runs on three hits and a walk. He had four strikeouts. Finally, Will Armbruester, who the Twins signed from independent Windy City about 10 days after they signed Ruddy Gomez, gave up three hits over two scoreless innings. 

The Twins had 12 runs scored with six hits and seven walks. They were helped by five Red Sox errors. There were two hit batters and four wild pitches. Bryan Acuna was 2-for-3 with a walk, the first-inning homer, three runs and three RBI. Luis Fragoza went 2-for-3 with a walk, a double and two RBI. 

Since his Opening Day grand slam in his second at-bat of the season, Eduardo Beltre is 0-for-14. He’s been playing solid defense, taking his walks, stealing bases, and most importantly, hustling enough to get on base via a lot of errors. 

PLAYERS OF THE DAY
Hitter of the Day  
Emmanuel Rodriguez (St. Paul): 1-for-3, HR(2), R, 2 RBI, OF Assist
Bryan Acuna (FCL Twins): 2-for-3, BB, HR(1), 3 R, 3 RBI, K.

Pitcher of the Day 
Zebby Matthews (St. Paul): 5.1 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 4 K. 73 pitches, 48 strikes (65.8%)

PROSPECT SUMMARY
Check out the Prospect Tracker for much more on our updated Twins Top 20 prospects after seeing how they did on Saturday.

#3 - Emmanuel Rodriguez (St. Paul) - 1-for-3, HR(2), R, 2 RBI, 2 K
#6 - Kaelen Culpepper (Cedar Rapids) - 0-for-3, BB, RBI, K (DH)
#9 - Brandon Winokur (Cedar Rapids) - 1-for-4, R, SF RBI, 2 K (SS)
#14 - Gabriel Gonzalez (Cedar Rapids) - 1-for-4, BB, 3B(1) R, RBI, K
#16 - Eduardo Beltre (FCL Twins) - 0-for-3, 3 R, RBI, K, SB(3).
#17 - Tanner Schobel (Wichita) -1-for-4, R, SF RBI, SB(2), K.
#18 - Yasser Mercedes (Fort Myers) - 1-for-4, K.
#19 - Carson McCusker (St. Paul) - 0-for-4, K

SUNDAY’S PROBABLE STARTERS
Buffalo @ St. Paul (2:07 PM CST) - RHP David Festa (2-1, 3.60 ERA)
Wichita @ NW Arkansas (2:05 PM CST) - RHP Darren Bowen (2-0, 1.50 ERA).
Cedar Rapids @ Beloit (1:05 PM CST) - RHP Ty Langenberg (0-1, 5.93 ERA).
Dunedin @ Fort Myers (11:05 AM CST) - RHP Eli Jones (1-3, 4.91 ERA).
FCL Twins - No Game Scheduled.  

Please feel free to ask questions about the teams, the roster, and discuss Saturday’s games, or anything else Twins minor-league related!

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[jkcarew]

Emmy looks like the weight of the world has been lifted from his shoulders rounding 3rd base there. Two in two games.

[terrydactyls]

Jose Salas has been mentioned quite often in these recaps.  I checked the box score and he's hitting .294.  Has he finally figured out how to hit a baseball?  Good for him.

[FlyingFinn]

22 minutes ago, terrydactyls said:

Jose Salas has been mentioned quite often in these recaps.  I checked the box score and he's hitting .294.  Has he finally figured out how to hit a baseball? 

Great start. SSS. But this is his 4th year at high A ball and he is already Rule 5 eligible.

[Linus]

3 hours ago, FlyingFinn said:

Great start. SSS. But this is his 4th year at high A ball and he is already Rule 5 eligible.

Is that right?  Holy Smokes. 

[FanFromPhilly]

Why did they pull Zebby after 73 pitches?  In 7 games, 5.1 innings is the longest he has gone, the game log doesn't show his pitches per start.  Maybe they don't ever see him pitching more than 5 innings?

[TL]

Matthews has not pitched more than 105 innings in a season. Probably figure they need him strong for the major league club later this year. 

[Doctor Wu]

Another good day on the farm. Fun to see E-Rod clicking both at bat and in the field, and that goes for Schobel too. Keep it up guys!

[bean5302]

3 hours ago, FanFromPhilly said:

Why did they pull Zebby after 73 pitches?  In 7 games, 5.1 innings is the longest he has gone, the game log doesn't show his pitches per start.  Maybe they don't ever see him pitching more than 5 innings?

Matthews' velo has been down a bit recently where he's been scuffling a lot. I'd imagine it's a few things at play. Trying to ensure he doesn't develop fatigue and wanting other pitchers to get some opportunities are probably top of the list.

2 hours ago, TL said:

Matthews has not pitched more than 105 innings in a season. Probably figure they need him strong for the major league club later this year. 

Matthews pitched 134.2 innings last year.
97.0 innings in MiLB (22.2 A+, 55.1 AA, 19.0 AAA)
+37.2 innings in MLB
134.2 innings total.

[bean5302]

Matthews max velocity back up to 97.8mph yesterday. I'm glad to see it. I don't think it's any coincidence the velo returned, and so did a performance we've come to expect for Matthews. Makes me think this new found velocity might mean his stamina will need close monitoring as the season progresses.

Nice to see Emma delivering with some power. It's a good sign. I dropped him all the way down to #8 on my prospects list a couple weeks ago as he hadn't hit a single homer in his first 100 PA in AAA. If Rodriguez can deliver as a power threat, it'll offset the likelihood he struggles as much as Julien.

I think maybe 1 more status quo start, and it'll be time to replace Raya with one of our AA starters. 

Anybody else concerned about Jarret Worff's usage? He's already got 19.2 innings this year as a reliever, on pace for well over 80 innings this year. Lots of 2-3 inning relief appearances followed by 3-4 days rest. Glad to see his doing so well, but it seems like an abnormal usage.

[rdehring]

Great seeing two prospects, EmRod and Zebby, who just might help the Twins before the season is over have good games.  Have been seeing comments that made me think Zebby has struggled, yet, see his ERA is under 2.00.  Can't be struggling too much.

Also nice to see MacLeod off to a very nice start to the season.  He is coming off an injury, isn't he?

Seems like Acuna is also off to a good start.  Surprised he is back at the FCL for what, a third season?  Anyone here know why?

[Mike Sixel]

7 minutes ago, rdehring said:

Great seeing two prospects, EmRod and Zebby, who just might help the Twins before the season is over have good games.  Have been seeing comments that made me think Zebby has struggled, yet, see his ERA is under 2.00.  Can't be struggling too much.

Also nice to see MacLeod off to a very nice start to the season.  He is coming off an injury, isn't he?

Seems like Acuna is also off to a good start.  Surprised he is back at the FCL for what, a third season?  Anyone here know why?

My guess on Acuna is he's 19, and also they wanted him to start in warm weather. I would bet he's in A ball in two months. 

[PDX Twin]

Quote

Down 1-0 during the playing of the National Anthem,

Um, how is this possible? Did they get a one-run penalty during warmups?

[Guest]

Glad to see Emmy didn't injure a thumb during his home-run trot...

28 pitchers on various ILs?  Wot?!

[Scott51104]

Impressive bat flip by Teilon Serrano. Just hope the pitcher was not the grandson of Don Drysdale.