Twins Minor League Report (4/6): And on the Third Day, There Was Baseball

TRANSACTIONS

RHP Chase De Jong was added to the 40-man roster and selected from AAA, 1B/DH Tyler Austin was subsequently DFA’d to make room.

https://twitter.com/DanHayesMLB/status/1114552537116499969

RED WINGS REPORT

Game one: Rochester 3, Lehigh Valley 12 (7 innings)

Box Score

Lewis Thorpe: 4.0 IP, 10 H, 9 R, 2 BB, 4 K, 60.2% strikes (50 of 83 pitches)

HR: Brent Rooker (1)

Multi-hit games: Wynston Sawyer (2-for-3, 2B, 1 RBI)

The Red Wings were rained out yesterday on their second scheduled game of the season, which is no fun. But that means that they got to play two games today, which is fun!

RHP Chase De Jong was originally set to start the first game but was called up to the major league club so LHP Lewis Thorpe received the ball to start today’s game instead.

Thorpe went four innings, surrendering 10 hits and nine earned runs with two walks and four strikeouts. Thorpe ran into trouble early as he gave up home runs to both Mitch Walding and Lane Adams in the first, putting the Red Wings in a deficit early.

The Red Wings answered back in the next half inning as Brent Rooker took advantage of a Luke Raley walk before him and decided that now would be the best time to hit his first Rooker Rocket of the year, a two-run blast off IronPigs starter Jerad Eickhoff that cut the lead in half.

https://twitter.com/TFTwins/status/1114705247304388609

The rally stopped there as the Red Wings only added one more run in the seventh off a Wynston Sawyer double while the IronPigs piled on eight more runs along the course of the game to go on top of the four they scored in the first inning.

Game Two: Rochester 1, Lehigh Valley 4 (7 innings)

Box Score

Austin Adams: 2.1 IP, 1 R, 0 BB, 4 K, 74.1% strikes (23 of 31 pitches)

HR: Randy César

Multi-hit games: None

The Red Wings were put in what we like to call a “tough situation” as they needed to play a doubleheader and their original Game 1 starter, Chase De Jong, was called up by the Twins. So they were forced to move Lewis Thorpe up for Game 1 and use a bullpen game in Game 2.

Austin Adams ate up innings to start and was followed by Fernando Romero and Preston Guilmet.

Randy César scored the lone run for the Red Wings when he blasted a solo homer in the fifth inning off the IronPigs starter Enyel De Los Santos

BLUE WAHOO BITES

Pensacola 5, Mobile 0

Box Score

Devin Smeltzer: 5.2 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 9 K, 74.3% strikes (61 of 82 thrown)

HR: Jimmy Kerrigan (2)

Multi-hit games: Taylor Grzelakowski (2 for 5), Jimmy Kerrigan (2 for 4, RBI, R), Caleb Hamilton (2 for 4, R)

The Pensacola Blue Wahoos continued their hot start to the season with a 5-0 victory over the Mobile BayBears that was spearheaded by another great starting pitching performance, this time from lefty Devin Smeltzer.

Pensacola took Smeltzer to the old town road and rode him until they couldn’t no more (which happened to be after 5 2/3 innings). The result was a perfect game through five for Smeltzer and 5 2/3 innings of shutout ball for him overall.

The scoring was kicked off in the third inning when Jordan Gore scored on an error and was added to in the fifth when Jimmy Kerrigan launched his second blast of the year. A Brian Schales single later in the inning would add two more and a Jaylin Davis single in the seventh would score what was the final run of the game.

A combination of Adam Bray and Ryan Mason would finish what Smeltzer started and would give the Blue Wahoos a solid shutout on the day.

Pensacola has now had a pretty absurd start to the season for their starting pitching which can pretty much be summed up by this:

https://twitter.com/BlueWahoosBBall/status/1114713172076826630

MIRACLE MATTERS

Ft. Myers 4, Charlotte 7

Box Score

Tyler Watson: 5.0 IP, 6 H, 4 R, 2 BB, 7 K, 64.3% strikes (47 of 73 pitches)

HR: Aaron Whitefield (1)

Multi-hit games: None

The Fort Myers Miracle concluded their first series of the season: an away three-game series against the Charlotte Stone Crabs.

LHP Tyler Watson and RHP Hector Lujan were the only two pitchers used for the Miracle as Lujan picked up after Watson’s five innings with three innings of his own.

The Miracle put up four hits as a team but also walked nine times in the game as Michael Helman and Ben Rortvedt both had multi-walk games. Ryan Jeffers was the only starter who did not reach base.

The LOBsters ended up being too much for the Miracle as they couldn’t take advantage of all the free passes, leading to 20 men left-on-base in today’s game.

KERNELS NUGGETS

Cedar Rapids 0, Wisconsin 2

Box Score

Cole Sands: 5.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 8 K, 61.7% strikes (50 of 81 pitches)

HR: None

Multi-hit games: Trey Cabbage (2-4)

Runs were hard to come by in the opening matchup of a quick two-game series between the Kernels and the Timber Rattlers, much of this was due to the electric performance from Kernels starter Cole Sands.

The righty Sands made his professional baseball debut today after being drafted in the fifth round out of Florida State in the 2018 MLB draft. Sands evidently had no trouble adjusting to pro ball as he mowed down the Timber Rattlers with ease, retiring the first 13 batters of the game leading to a final line in which he ended up striking out eight, walking just one, and not allowing a hit through five shutout innings.

https://twitter.com/TFTwins/status/1114718482913005568

The tall righty Tyler Palm relieved Sands in the sixth and gave up a single which was followed by a walk. After getting the next batter to fly out, a fielding error by third baseman Andrew Bechtold allowed the only two runs of the game to score (both of them unearned).

Sands was equally matched by the Timber Rattler’s pitching as the Kernels lineup put together just four hits on the day along with one walk, all leading to no runs and a 2-0 loss.

TWINS DAILY PLAYERS OF THE DAY

Twins Daily Minor League Pitcher(s) of the Day – Cole Sands featuring Devin Smeltzer

Twins Daily Minor League Hitter of the Day – Jimmy Kerrigan

PROSPECT SUMMARY

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

#1 - Royce Lewis (Ft. Myers) - 0-for-4, BB, R, K

#2 - Alex Kirilloff (Pensacola) - Injured list

#3 - Brusdar Graterol (Pensacola) - Did not pitch

#4 - Trevor Larnach (Ft. Myers) - 1-for-5, 2B, RBI, K

#5 - Wander Javier (EST) - Season has not started

#6 - Brent Rooker (Rochester) - 1-for-3, HR, R, 2 RBI, 2 K

#7 - Jhoan Duran (Ft. Myers) - Did not pitch

#8 - Lewis Thorpe (Rochester) - 4.0 IP, 10 H, 9 R, 2 BB, 4 K

#9 - Blayne Enlow (Cedar Rapids) - Did not pitch

#10 - Akil Baddoo (Ft. Myers) - Did not play

#11 - Nick Gordon (Rochester) - Injured list

#12 - Stephen Gonsalves (Rochester) - Injured list

#13 - Ryan Jeffers (Ft. Myers) - 0-for-4, 2 K

#14 - Ben Rortvedt (Ft. Myers) - 1-for-2, 2 BB, R, K

#15 - Yunior Severino (Cedar Rapids) - 1-for-4, K

#16 - Gilberto Celestino (Cedar Rapids) - Did not play

#17 - Zack Littell (Rochester) - Did not pitch

#18 - LaMonte Wade (Rochester) - 0-for-3, K

#19 - Jorge Alcala (Pensacola) - Did not pitch

#20 - Jose Miranda (Ft. Myers) - 0-for-3, BB, R

SUNDAY’S PROBABLE STARTERS

Rochester @ Lehigh Valley (12:35 P.M. CST) - RHP Zack Littell

Pensacola @ Mobile (2:05 P.M. CST) - RHP Griffin Jax

Dunedin @ Ft. Myers (11:30 A.M. CST) - RHP Bailey Ober

Cedar Rapids @ Wisconsin (1:05 P.M. CST) - RHP Josh Winder

Please feel free to ask any questions and discuss Saturday’s games.