Minor Leagues

Zarion Sharpe hoped to hear his name called during the recent five-round MLB draft. Unfortunately, he went undrafted. He was interested in signing a pro contract and last week, he reached an agreement to sign with the Minnesota Twins. Recently, we caught up with the lefty from UNCW to discuss his career and signing with the Twins.

Zander Wiel had a big night, leading the Chattanooga lineup to an impressive output in support of Lewis Thorpe. Also, Willians Astudillo hit his 10th home run for the Red Wings and Ryan Jeffers had another multi-hit game for Cedar Rapids. Come check out the rest of Thursday’s edition of the Minor League Report.

Zach Strecker pitched at the University of Kentucky. The Twins have quite the pipeline through the college. In recent years, pitchers like Taylor Rogers, Alex Meyer, Logan Darnell and Andrew Albers all came to the Twins after spending time at Kentucky.

Strecker made 81 appearances over the last four years for the Wildcats. All of them came in relief. In the summer of 2015, he pitched for Willmar in the Northwoods League and pitched 57 innings over 10 games. Nine were starts. But in college, he was a reliever.

Following the draft, the Twins needed a couple more arms in the GCL, so they called on Strecker. He came in and pitched well in whatever role he was asked, usually working multiple innings out of the bullpen. Sometimes coming in to close out a game.

Zach Littell threw six shutout innings in his Triple A debut, LaMonte Wade hit a three-run homer in an 11-run night for Chattanooga and Trey Cabbage was 3-for-4 with a homer in a big offensive night for Cedar Rapids. Also, Blayne Enlow returned from the DL and both Nick Gordon and Royce Lewis had multi-hit games (among many others).

You've probably heard the news by now that the Twins are out, and the Colorado Rockies are in, as New Britain's class AA affiliate. It's been a strange few months here in Connecticut on the baseball and political fronts, culminating with yesterday's news.

Back in June, Rock Cats managing partner Josh Solomon triumphantly (and surprisingly) announced from the steps of Hartford City Hall that the Rock Cats would be moving from their longtime home of New Britain to a brand new stadium in Hartford, effective for the 2016 season.

You've probably heard this crazy statistic: In 2014, the Twins had one pitcher (late-season call-up Lester Oliveros) throw a pitch that was clocked at 97 MPH or above. By comparison, the American League Champion Kansas City Royals registered 2,287 such pitches.

Major league baseball is trending toward pitchers -- especially relievers -- with big velocity, and while the Twins may appear far behind the curve based on the above finding, they're certainly not ignorant to this reality. The club's draft strategy in recent years has reflected an increased emphasis on power arms -- even those that are clearly slated for future roles in the bullpen -- and no one personifies this altered approach better than Nick Burdi.

The Twins selected the hard-throwing righty in the second round of last year's draft, and already he has become one of the most noteworthy relief prospects in all of the minor leagues.

You won’t find many games as one-sided as the ones played by Fort Myers and Elizabethton Friday. Those two clubs socked a combined seven homers, and both won by double-digit margins. The Lookouts and Kernels were also victorious Friday night, but the Red Wings fell in extras despite an impressive performance from Stephen Gonsalves.

Find out everything that happened in the Twins minor league system on Friday.

You might not guess it just to look at him, as he patrols center field for the Cedar Rapids Kernels, but there’s a good chance that Tanner English is among the most athletic ballplayers on the roster.

You may wonder why big leaguer Max Kepler is on the photo of the minor league report. We find it important to recognize the accomplishments of the Twins minor leaguers, and we’ll do that in the report below. However, Kepler’s two home run, seven RBI game is a good reminder that the big-picture dreams and goals for all of the minor leaguers is to get where Max Kepler - who started the 2015 season in Ft. Myers, you may remember - is today; in the big leagues, having success, maybe even getting interviewed by Marney Gellner.

You may not have heard as much about him as other Twins prospects, but Sean Poppen is making himself a pitching prospect to watch in the season’s second half. The 25-year-old from Harvard hits 96 and has a good three-pitch mix. Meanwhile, a Tommy John pitcher was activated by the Miracle. A Kernels starter was terrific in his return from the IL. So much going on in the Twins minor league system.

Misael Urbina Update - On Thursday, he went 2-for-5 and is now hitting .313.

You may have noticed that the 2018 Adopt-A-Prospect forum opened up on Monday. Over the next couple of weeks, you'll be able to adopt Twins minor leaguers and write about them and promote them throughout the season.

Round 1 of the Adopt-A-Prospect began on Monday. About 40 of the Twins top prospects were made available for adopting. Next week, more Twins minor leaguers will be adoptable as well.

You don't see a lot of pure relievers taken within the first 50 picks of the MLB draft, but the Twins used their second pick in 2014 – 46th overall – to select Nick Burdi. They had big plans for him and his dominating fastball, which had first caught their attention several years earlier.

Those big plans still remain in place, even if a rather tumultuous 2015 season has set them back a little bit.