Front Page: Twins Minor League Report (8/16): Willians Astudillo Homers Again, Bailey Ober Shines in Double-A Debut

[Tom Froemming]

Willians Astudillo has been in Pensacola for two games. He’s homered in both of them. La Tortuga hit a bomba, Wander Javier had a four-hit night, Bailey Ober impressed in his Double-A debut and Matt Canterino had the most impressive outing of his young career. Come check out what else happened across the system Friday.TRANSACTIONS

Lewis Thorpe recalled by the Twins to replace Devin Smeltzer on the roster.

 

RED WINGS REPORT

Rochester 5, Louisville 2

Box Score

 

Kohl Stewart: 5.0 IP, 1 H, 2 R, 3 BB, 6 K, 53.4% strikes (39 of 73 pitches)

HR: None

Multi-hit games: Wilin Rosario (2-for-4, 2B)

 

A couple of pitchers on the Twins 40-man roster had encouraging outings. Kohl Stewart wasn’t particularly efficient, but he was effective. The six strikeouts he recorded are the most he’s had in an outing since mid-May. Both runs that scored while Stewart was in the game came in the first inning.

 

Fernando Romero pitched around a leadoff single to record a scoreless ninth inning, earning his second save for the Red Wings. Of his 13 pitches, 10 were strikes. Between Stewart and Romero was D.J. Baxendale, who hadn’t pitched in more than two weeks. He showed no signs of rust, delivering three shutout innings of one-hit ball.

 

It was a relatively quiet night for the bats, but they managed to build the 5-2 lead by the top of the third inning. Wilin Rosario had a pair of hits and picked up a two-out RBI in the first inning. Mike Miller, Ian Miller, Zander Wiel and Ronald Torreyes all also drove in runs. Rochester was 4-for-9 with runners in scoring position.

 

BLUE WAHOO BITES

Pensacola 4, Chattanooga 1

Box Score

 

Bailey Ober: 7.0 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 BB, 8 K, 72.7% strikes (64 of 88 pitches)

HR: Willians Astudillo (2)

Multi-hit games: Astudillo (2-for-4, HR), Caleb Hamilton (2-for-3), Jimmy Kerrigan (2-for-3)

 

Here is your La Tortuga update:

 

So that’s two homers in two games for Willians Astudillo on his rehab assignment. He was the designated hitter today, and did appear to be trying to stretch out his oblique, so I’m not sure an activation is coming anytime too soon. Still, really fun to see him back out there playing again and making progress toward a return.

 

Bailey Ober made his Double-A debut and was outstanding. He surrendered one run on two hits over seven innings pitched. He struck out eight batters, walked one and threw an impressive 72.7% of his pitches for strikes.

 

Basically, he looked like Bailey Ober. He now has 197 strikeouts and just 20 walks in 164 2/3 innings over his minor league career.

 

MIRACLE MATTERS

Jupiter 4, Fort Myers 2

Box Score

 

Jordan Balazovic: 4.2 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 2 BB, 3 K, 62.9% strikes (56 of 89 pitches)

HR: None

Multi-hit games: None

 

Jordan Balazovic continued a trend of alternating between outstanding starts and less stellar outings. He gave up five hits, which isn’t a lot, but his season high is six hits surrendered on the season. Puts into perspective how excellent he’s been this year.

 

To make matters worse, the Miracle bats could only muster five hits themselves. Gabriel Maciel hit a leadoff triple and scored on a Jacob Pearson sacrifice fly in the first inning. Their only other run came in the ninth inning.

 

KERNELS NUGGETS

Cedar Rapids 4, Wisconsin 0

Box Score

 

Matt Canterino: 5.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 5 K, 65.3% strikes (47 of 72 pitches)

HR: None

Multi-hit games: Wander Javier (4-for-5, 2 2Bs), Spencer Steer (2-for-5)

 

Matt Canterino, J.T. Perez and Erik Cha combined to throw a two-hit shutout, striking out 11 batters in the process. The Twins had been limiting Canterino’s workload, allowing him to throw just 10 innings over his first four outings as a professional, but they loosened the reins a bit tonight. Canterino, who the Twins drafted in the second round this June, gave up just one hit over his five innings. He had five strikeouts and zero walks.

 

Wander Javier was the star at the plate, going 4-for-5 with a pair of doubles. Yunior Severino hit a big two-run double in the first inning, advanced to third on an error and scored on a groundout. Up 3-0, Cedar Rapids was able to cruise to victory from there, thanks to the impressive pitching performance.

 

E-TWINS E-NOTES

Danville 2, Elizabethton 1

Box Score

 

Ryley Widell: 5.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 1 BB, 3 K

HR: None

Multi-hit games: None

 

Tough night for the E-Town bats, as the lineup combined for just four hits. Their only run scored on a Parker Phillips double that scored Matt Wallner.

 

On the plus side, the pitching was solid. Ryley Widell gave up a pair of runs in the first and the staff combined for a shutout from there. Widell finished his outing with four clean innings, Owen Griffin recorded the next five outs and Tyler Beck the final four outs.

 

GCL TWINS TAKES

GCL Twins POSTPONED

 

STARS OF THE DAY

Twins Daily Minor League Pitcher of the Day: Bailey Ober, Pensacola

Twins Daily Minor League Hitter of the Day: Wander Javier, Cedar Rapids

 

TOP PROSPECT SUMMARY

Here’s a look at how the Twins Daily Top 20 Prospects performed:

 

1. Royce Lewis (PNS): 1-for-4, R, K

2. Alex Kirilloff (PNS): 0-for-4, 2 K

4. Trevor Larnach (PNS): 1-for-4

5. Wander Javier (CR): 4-for-5, 2 2Bs, R, RBI

6. Jordan Balazovic (FM): 4.2 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 2 BB, 3 K, 62.9% strikes (56 of 89 pitches)

15. Matt Wallner (ELZ): 1-for-4, 2B, R, K

20. Travis Blankenhorn (PNS): 0-for-4, 2 K

 

SATURDAY’S PROBABLE STARTERS

Rochester at Louisville, 5:30 pm CT (Adam Bray)

Pensacola vs. Chattanooga, 6:05 pm CT (TBD)

Fort Myers at Jupiter, 4:30 pm CT (Chris Vallimont)

Cedar Rapids at Quad Cities, 6:35 pm CT (Tyler Palm)

Elizabethton at Danville, 5:30 pm CT (Tyler Benninghoff)

GCL Twins at GCL Red Sox, 9:00 am CT (TBD)

GCL Twins at GCL Red Sox, Game 2 (TBD)

 

Please feel free to ask any questions and discuss the games.

 

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[MNT1996]

I'm excited to watch Ober and Canterino progress through the system. Look like promising pitchers

[jz7233]

If Ober can stay healthy and effective, he could be Twins #4 pitching prospect soon. Jax could be #5. Forget about Duran and Alcala. I think they are overrated.

#1 Graterol

#2 Balazovic

#3 Thorpe

[jimbo92107]

Another game, another homer for El Cherubo. With just a pinch more plate discipline, Torts could make the jump to AAA!

[D.C Twins]

 

If Ober can stay healthy and effective, he could be Twins #4 pitching prospect soon. Jax could be #5. Forget about Duran and Alcala. I think they are overrated.

#1 Graterol

#2 Balazovic

#3 Thorpe

 

I think (hope) that Duran and Alcala will end up being underrated bulpen arms

 

Otherwise completely agree; 7 innings with 8Ks on 84 PITCHES....wow

[Cast of Thousands]

“He showed no signs of rust, delivering three shutout innings of one-run ball”

 

Come again?

[mikelink45]

three shutout innings of one-run ball - trying to understand but I see I am not the only one.  Love the Tortuga - he just never stops.  Great energy and competitiveness. I expect him in September.

[Richard Swerdlick]

I think that Falvine are building a young pitching core in the minors that we will be seeing much of in the next year or two. Cleveland currently has 3 pitchers in their starting rotation who were drafted in 2016. Should be fun to watch the future unfold.

[Tom Froemming]

 

“He showed no signs of rust, delivering three shutout innings of one-run ball” Come again?

*one-hit ball. Fixed, thank you

[rdehring]

Yes, La Tortuga won't be called up before September 1, unless there is an injury to a catcher. 

 

Ober moves up a level and nothing changes.  Is he this good?  

 

When talking about the Kernels rotation for the playoffs, forgot that Canterino was added to their group of starters.  He and a hot Javier sure could help this year's run towards a championship.

[terrydactyls]

There was an old coffee commercial which had the tag line: "Fine best part of waking up is Folger's in your cup.". For me, the best part of waking up is reading the Minor League Report. After last night's Twins' game, I logged in to make my daily homerun update in the game summary article and I saw that the Minor League Report was already posted. I logged out without reading it so I would have it to look forward to this morning. Thanks to all the contributors. You make hauling my fat a$$ out of bed almost worth while.

[FormerMinnasotan]

Well I’m quite impressed with Ober. While he’s only pitched 61 innings this year his overall ERA between A+, Rookie, and AA ball is 0.99. That’s insane. My hope is Ober can stay healthy as he certainly seems like a legit starting prospect.

 

I am however disappointed with Balazovic. For someone who should be a top pitching prospect he certainly has more bad games than he should given he’s pitched this long in A+ ball he should be dominating far more than not. And he’s barely pitched more innings than last year so it’s not like he’s tiring given he should be able to pitch up to 100 innings without looking gassed.

[Diesel]

Big news, per Brandon Warne: Brusdar Graterol AND Jhoan Duran are coming up to Rochester. This is big news

[Tom Froemming]

 

Ober moves up a level and nothing changes.  Is he this good?  

That's a question I ask a lot when a college guy pitches really well in Cedar Rapids. Is he just much more refined than the competition? I continue to ask that question as he jumps up to Fort Myers. Is he just performing so well because it's such a great pitching environment?

 

For me, Double A is where the picture really becomes more clear for guys like Ober and the questions start to fade. It's one thing to live in the zone and not pay for it in the lower levels, but if you can do that in the high minors it's really impressive.

 

Ober's career K:BB ratio is now 9.85, so he has quite a bit of room to slide back and still be incredibly good in that regard. The Southern League average is a 2.57 K:BB ratio. The season is winding down, so we won't get much of a sample, but it's fun to see him shove in Double A.

[railmarshalljon]

 

If Ober can stay healthy and effective, he could be Twins #4 pitching prospect soon. Jax could be #5. Forget about Duran and Alcala. I think they are overrated.

#1 Graterol

#2 Balazovic

#3 Thorpe

 

Duran just promoted to Rochester. He's 21 so he's my #3 for sure. 

 

But I do think Alcala ends up in the pen. 

[jz7233]

 

Duran just promoted to Rochester. He's 21 so he's my #3 for sure. 

 

But I do think Alcala ends up in the pen. 

I am not sure why Duran was promoted. He certainly does not deserve it. Just look at his stats. Both Duran and Alcala have struggled this year. I think they are overrated. Well it was Alcala who was promoted. He is slightly better than Duran with an ERA under 6.