Beck's Minor League Threecap: 4/7/24

Beck breaks down three major things you need to know from yesterday's MiLB action.

I think we’re getting the hang of this. We’ve got a full week of Threecaps down, now just every day until the end of September. It’s like riding a bike – as long as you keep moving forward you’ll never fall. Thanks for reading, let’s jump in!

Saturday’s MILB Standouts

Brilliant Bats.

Rikuu Nishida (CHW) is a very unique player. He was born in Osaka, Japan, and played his collegiate ball at the University of Oregon. His 5-foot-6, 150 lb build made him all but a lock to go late in the 2023 draft and the White Sox scooped him up in the 11th round. He is a hit-over-power profile in the purest sense, as his stature may suggest, and boasts double-plus bat-to-ball but bottom-of-the-scale underlying power. Defensively he’s likely to find himself primarily at second base. The track record for players of his size having fantasy relevance is unfriendly, but we love a short king having a big night. He went a perfect 5-5 on Saturday with a double and a walk.

There’s something brewing in New York and I’m not talking about more earthquakes. Agustin Ramirez (NYY) has homers in back to back games for Double-A Somerset after initially struggling to find his footing at the level in 2023. He thrashed the South Atlantic League to the tune of a 1.144 OPS prior to promotion.

Omar Martinez (NYY) is another catcher in the Yankees’ system making some noise in the early going. He had 18 home runs and eight stolen bases in 444 plate appearances with Single-A Tampa in 2023 but was older for the level and a little undersized, but may have some legitimate intrigue should he take a step forward at High-A this year. He exited Saturday’s slate with four hits including a home run, three runs, two RBIs, and a run scored.

It was a somber week for Oakland. Moving the team out of the city to play in a park that seats ten thousand and is considered hitter-friendly in the PCL is a black eye for the sport. I wish I could say that the system is in a much better spot than the big league club but that would be disingenuous. What I can say confidently is that 2023 second-rounder Henry Bolte (OAK) and third-rounder Colby Thomas (OAK) had excellent nights down on the farm. Bolte finished with a double, a homer, and four RBIs in a three-hit night. Thomas had a solo home run in a four-hit evening.

We got a double liftoff from AJ Vukovich (ARI) as he mashed home runs in the fourth and eighth innings of Saturday’s game against San Antonio. He and Deyvison De Los Santos (3-5, HR, RBI) were the lone bright spots for the Sod Poodles as they dropped the contest by a final of 18-5. Vukovich is getting his third taste of Double-A this year.

Brandon Pimentel (WSH) is a new name for me. He was an undrafted rookie in 2023 out of the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV) and played well in a short sample post-signing (1.092 OPS in 41 plate appearances). He’s starting 2024 with Low-A Fredericksburg and kick-started his season with eight total bases by way of a home run and two doubles on Saturday. He’s a left-left first baseman, which perhaps carries less offensive burden than a right-right first baseman, but he’ll have to show significant offensive upside to get on fantasy radars.

Premier Pitchers.

I’m sounding the alarm on 🚨George Klassen (PHI)🚨. I’ve been known to crush on pitching prospects, but I have not been as impressed with an arm after one start in a very long time. Klassen was a very inconsistent starter with Minnesota with big command problems, but he came out shoving in his professional debut. He sat 97.6 mph on his fastball (topping out at 99.8 mph), was firing 91 mph / sliders (I’ve been told it’s a cutter, but the horizontal movement was more akin to a slider), and mixing in a curveball in the low 80’s with two-plane break. He finished the evening with five shutout innings, nine strikeouts, zero walks, and just one hit. Pure dominance from start to finish with a 44% whiff rate, a 46% CSW, and a 69% strike rate. He is an immediate add.

Jaden Hamm (DET) caught eyes on Saturday with seven strikeouts in 3.1 innings for West Michigan. He was taken in the fifth round of the 2023 draft out of Middle Tennessee State and was lauded for his outlier fastball at the time. He got rave reviews during minor league spring training with notable backfield performances. 

Noah Schultz (CHW) was doing Noah Schultz things yesterday. He struck out 10 of the 13 batters he faced over 4.1 shutout innings without surrendering a walk. The Naperville native threw just 27 innings last year but flashed his top-of-the-rotation potential, though there may be some reliever risk given his extensive injury history and frame. He threw 53 pitches during Saturday’s outing, 40 of which landed for strikes.

It was Chase Dollander grabbing headlines in the Rockies’ system on Friday, but Sean Sullivan (COL) showed him up just one day later. He generated a whopping 25 whiffs in six scoreless innings of work en route to a 13 strikeout performance – the highest single-game total of the year. He was a second rounder out of Wake Forest last summer after enjoying a very productive final campaign with the Deacons (2.45 ERA and 111 strikeouts  in 69.2 innings of work). He’s a lefty that relies on deception to baffle hitters and mixes in a fastball, slider, and changeup.

Drue Hackenberg (ATL) might come from the most athletically gifted family in all of baseball. His brother Adam is a prospect in the White Sox system, his brother Christian was a second round pick in the NFL draft in 2016, and his third brother Brandon was a first round pick in the 2021 MLS draft. Drue went to the Braves in the second round of last summer’s draft, which was a bit of a surprise at the time, but he also came with some high praise. He’s a sinker/slider arm who induces a lot of ground balls and could be a back of the rotation arm if all goes well. He went six innings on Saturday, striking out six, walking none, and allowing just one earned.

Let’s Check Out Some Leaders.

I’ll be separating these leaderboards into Triple-AAA and… everyone else given the disparity between total games played.

Triple-A

Hitters

Hits: Heston Kjerstad (BAL) - 18

Home Runs: Heston Kjerstad (BAL), Kyle Stowers (BAL) - 6

RBI: Heston Kjerstad (BAL) - 25

Runs: Jackson Holliday (BAL) - 18

Pitchers

ERA: Lotta fellas posting zeroes!

Strikeouts: Jhonathan Diaz (SEA), Jack Leiter (TEX), Andrew Wantz (LAA), Brent Headrick (MIN) - 15

IP: Darius Vines (ATL) - 12

Double-, High-, and Single-A

Hitters

Hits: James Triantos (CHC), Tanner Allen (MIA), Petey Halpin (CLE), Quinn McDaniel (SFG) - 6

Home Runs: Agustin Ramirez (NYY), Ray-Patrick Didder (SDP), Gabriel Rincones Jr. (PHI), AJ Vukovich (ARI), Braylen Wimmer (COL) - 2

RBI: Brandon Pimentel (WSH) - 9

Runs: Jake Snider (COL) - 6

Pitchers

ERA: Waaay too many to list here, all zeroes!

Strikeouts: Sean Sullivan (COL) - 9

IP: Owen Murphy (ATL) - 6.2