The Dynasty Digest: May 22, 2024

Chris Clegg breaks down all of yesterday's Minor League action.

Tuesday was one of those days when there were so many good pitching performances. I wish I could give you a detailed breakdown of them all. There is no need to waste time with an intro, let’s get to the players.

MiLB Pitchers

Luis Perales, RHP, BOS, 21, A+

Perales had the most dominant start of the day when there were several good choices for the spotlight, but 12 strikeouts over five scoreless will crown you MiLB pitcher of the week. Facing just three batters over the minimum, Perales allowed one hit and two walks without giving up a run, generating an impressive 26 whiffs.

Throwing strikes at a 61 percent clip, Perales generated an impressive 46 percent CSW on the day, leaving him with one of the highest CSW rates in High-A, as the chart below was even before Tuesday’s start.

Since returning from injury, Perales has pitched 21.1 innings, having a 2.13 ERA with 39 strikeouts and six walks. His fastball is sitting in the 95-97 range, topping out at 99 mph with good movement. Perales’s 88-91 mph cutter sets him up nicely to get weak contact and then throws an upper 80s changeup and a low-to-mid 80s slider to get whiffs.

The arsenal is rather impressive and grades out extremely well on stuff plus models, and the strike-throwing has improved significantly this year. While home runs ate Perales alive in Greenville last year, largely due to fastball location, it has improved a ton this year. Perales looks like a top-100 prospect and easily the best arm in the Red Sox system.

Brandon Sproat, RHP, NYM, 23, AA

Sproat’s dominance in High-A allowed him to get a quick promotion to Double-A, which he has handled quite well. Tuesday’s start was a good example of why the Mets were so confident in Sproat, as he tossed seven innings of three-run ball, striking out nine.

The stuff was largely underrated for a while; here is what I wrote about Sproat this spring:

The second time was the charm for the Mets and Brandon Sproat, as they drafted him in 2022 as well, and he did not sign. Sproat has underrated stuff, starting with a fastball that sits 96 mph with an average of 15 inches of run in his college days at Florida. His slider sits in the upper 80s, averaging 88 mph at Florida, with more of a traditional shape. The curveball is distinct sitting around 80 mph with nice vertical and horizontal movement. Sproat rounds out his arsenal with a change that sits 88 mph and gets up 27 inches of separation from the slider as the changeup averaged 17 or more inches of fade.

Sproat has a true four-pitch mix and even though he did not pitch in pro ball, he fired 106.1 innings last season at Florida, in which the 4.66 ERA did not represent how well he actually pitched.

Coming into the spring, Sproat looked even better with increased fastball velocity and the ability to miss bats at a high clip with all pitches. This seems like a call that might be a little too easy to make, but Sproat is likely in for a big season.

After Tuesday’s start, Sproat has a 1.45 ERA across 37.1 innings between High-A and Double-A with 48 strikeouts and 19 walks. The walks are obviously a bit of an issue, but the encouraging thing is Sproat’s strike rate is north of league average and has been even better since jumping to Double-A.

Hurston Waldrep, RHP, ATL, 22, AA

Waldrep has pitched extremely well as of late and Tuesday’s start just continued that stretch as he struck out eight batters over 6.1 scoreless innings. The most notable thing is Waldrep walked just one batter and threw strikes at a solid clip.

The improvements have been notable in May as his strike rate is up four percentage points, his CSW is up 3.5 percent, and the swinging strike rate is up three percent as well. Over his last six starts, Waldrep has pitched 37.1 innings. Pretty impressive to average over six innings per start for someone that many want to label as a reliever. In those six starts, a 0.97 ERA with 34 strikeouts and ten walks.

It starts with the fastball for Waldrep, which plays well at the top of the zone, averaging above 95 mph but can get up to 99. It does not get much horizontal movement, but with nearly 16 inches of IVB, it will play, considering the velocity and the secondaries. 

Waldrep’s splitter is nasty and was probably the best individual pitch in the 2023 draft class and one of the best secondaries in the minors. It can range from 85 to 89 mph and completely falls off the table with a ton of separation from the fastball. 

The curve and slider are both distinct pitches and flash signs of being plus, with the slider showing more horizontal movement and the curve being a 12-6 shape. There is about four mph separation between the two.

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