Atlanta Braves Farm Report: Opening Week Minor League Recaps

The Minor League season has made it through its first week of action. The Atlanta Braves major league team is coming off of a 5-1 homestead, and after 4 games a few of the minor league teams are looking strong as well.

This past Thursday marked the beginning of the 2019 season for all four Atlanta Braves minor league levels. With a late start to the week, only 4 games were played, as each team had their inaugural series carry into the weekend.

As a whole, the first week was a productive one, as several of the top-prospects in the organization have started off hot.

Opening Night for the minors ended up being a great one for the Atlanta Braves organization, as all but one of the four teams won their opening game.

Throughout the weekend, several of the Atlanta Braves teams suffered from some mediocre starting-pitching, but overall the bats stayed relatively strong and even carried their respective teams to a few wins.

OVERALL RECORD THIS WEEK: 7-9

(3-1) Gwinnett Stripers (AAA)

The Stripers opened up their 2019 campaign with a win and some efficient pitching by Mike Foltynewicz. The rest of the Gwinnett rotation followed suit as they pitched solid this past weekend as well.

The weekend ended with the Stripers taking 3 out of 4 from the Tides, and several notable prospects have quickly gotten on track this season.

CALL-UP ALERT: On Sunday, Stripers catcher Alex Jackson was recalled by the Atlanta Braves to provide backup for the Atlanta Braves at catcher after Brian McCann went down on Saturday night with a strained hamstring (placed on the IL Sunday morning). Catcher Raffy Lopez will take Jackson’s place for Gwinnett, with Sal Giardina backing up Lopez in Gwinnett.

Tyler Flowers is also banged up from being hit by a pitch on his wrist/hand, so Jackson should get quite a bit of playing time over the next several days.

THURSDAY @ Norfolk: Won, 3-1

• (W, 1-0) Mike Foltynewicz
• (H, 1) Corbin Clouse
• (H, 1) Elian Leyva
• (S, 1) Thomas Burrows
• (CF) Rafael Ortega: (3-4)  HR, 2B, 2 R, RBI, K

(SP) Mike Foltynewicz:

• 5 innings pitched
• 0 ER
• 2 walks
• 2 strikeouts

FRIDAY @ Norfolk: Lost, 0-4

• (L, 0-1) Bryse Wilson
• (1B) Pedro Florimon: (1-4)  2B, 3 K

(SP) Bryse Wilson

• 5 innings pitched
• 5 hits
• 3 ER
• 2 walks
• 6 strikeouts
• 1 home run allowed

SATURDAY @ Norfolk:  Won, 7-0

• (W, 1-0) Mike Soroka
• (3B) Austin Riley (3-5)  2 HR , 2B , 3 RBI , 3 R

(SP) Mike Soroka

• 5 innings pitched
• 0 hits
• 0 ER
• 0 walks
• 7 strikeouts

SUNDAY @ Norfolk: Won, 4-3

• (W, 1-0) Thomas Burrows
• (LF) Travis Demeritte (2-4) HR, R, RBI

(SP) Touki Toussaint

• 3 innings pitched
• 1 hits
• 1 ER
• 4 walks
• 1 strikeout

PITCHING

It’s no small matter that we received a strong and healthy start by Mike Foltynewicz on Thursday night. Not to mention, the fact that he was able to dissect the Norfolk hitters for 5 innings off of just 56 pitches.

All of that’s great, but I think the pitcher of the week goes to the young Mike Soroka. He pitched a dominant game on Saturday night and his return to Atlanta might excite Atlanta Braves fans just as much as Folty’s return when thinking of the potential that he offers.

Soroka pitched a no-hitter for 5 innings, while also striking out 7 and walking none. He was even more efficient than Foltynewicz, as the Canadian made it through 5 frames on just 49 pitches (35 strikes). No, that’s not a typo!

The Tides hitters never got the ball off the ground, only managing 8 groundouts when they did make contact against Mike Soroka.

Because of the strong starting-pitching by the Stripers, Gwinnett’s bullpen wasn’t used much, but a few relievers made some strong appearances:

• Corbin Clouse (2 games / 4 K)
• Dan Winkler (1 game / 0 ER)
• Thomas Burrows (2 games / 1 save)

Hopefully, Dan Winkler will find his groove as the season progresses. I think there’s a large group of Atlanta Braves fans that enjoyed his time with the big league team. ‘Wink’ just had a rough Spring (8.44 ERA) recently, so he should get that ironed out.

FORMER BRAVE ALERT: (INF/OF) Jace Peterson had to face the Stripers tough pitching over the weekend. Peterson, now playing for Norfolk, went 1-for-11 with 2 strikeouts in the Stripers vs. Tides series. For some reason, I always liked that guy.

HITTING

While it’s great that he’s coming out of the gate hot, it’s a shame there’s not a place for him in Atlanta at the moment; but third baseman Austin Riley is at it again, already.

He has 4 games under his belt and is hitting .286 at the moment, which doesn’t lead the team; but he does lead the Stripers with 2 home runs — all coming from one game on Saturday night. Riley also has a double and 3 RBIs.

The Gwinnett bats have been relatively hot across the board, especially the hitters that we all expected to hit well. Travis Demeritte had a 2-for-4 performance on Sunday, hitting a home run and knocking in a run. Demeritte has a double so far this season and is running a healthy .400 batting average at the moment.

Centerfielder Rafael Ortega has also been excellent to start the season. Ortega led the Stripers to a win on Opening Night with his 3-for-4 game at the plate, slugging a home run and a double, scoring two runs and knocking in a run.

All in all, the Stripers bats didn’t waste any time to get cranking, hence their 3-1 record at the end of Opening Week. It was a beautiful combination of mostly strong offense and strong pitching, and that usually bodes well for a baseball team.

Here’s the rest of the lineup’s results this past Thursday and weekend:

(2B) Andres Blanco:   

• 0-for-9
• .375 OPS

(DH/OF) Adam Duvall

• .250 batting average
• .607 OPS
• 1 double

(1B) Pedro Florimo

• .385 batting average
• 929 OPS
• 1 double

(CF) Ryan LaMarre  

• .250 batting average
• .750 OPS
• 1 triple

(2B) Scott Kazmar Jr. 

• 0-for-7

(C) Alex Jackson     

• .143 batting average
• .393 OPS
• 3 strikeouts

What’s Next for the Stripers?

(all times EST)

vs. Durham Bulls (TB)

• Monday, April 8 @ 7:05PM
• Tuesday, April 9 @ 12:05PM

@ Louisville Bats (CIN)

• Thursday, April 11 @ 7PM
• Friday, April 12 @ 7PM
• Saturday, April 13 @ 2PM
• Sunday, April 14 @ 2PM

(Photo by Michael Reaves/Getty Images)

(2-2) Florida Fire Frogs (A+)

The Fire Frogs were matched up with the Daytona Tortugas in a 4-game series to start of 2019, and the leaders on offense really came up big for Florida.

Winning 2 out of 4 is no small feat, and the Fire Frogs did so with some shotty pitching wedged in the middle of some excellent pitching: Huascar Ynoa in Game 1 on Thursday, and Hayden Deal in Game 4 on Sunday evening.

Expect more of the same going forward, as this team lacks some of the strong arms that the levels above it possess, but A+ ball is where these guys start figuring some stuff out and become the pitchers they’re going to be.

THURSDAY @ Daytona:  Won, 5-1

• (BS, 1)(W, 1) Walter Borkovich
• (RF) Izzy Wilson (1-4)  3B, 3 RBI, 2 K

(SP) Huascar Ynoa

• 4 innings-pitched
• 0 hits
• 0 ER
• 3 walks
• 6 strikeouts

FRIDAY @ Daytona:  Won, 5-4

• (W, 1-0) Daysbel Hernandez
• (S, 1) Jon Kennedy
• (1B) Drew Lugbauer (1-3) HR , 3 RBI , R , BB

(SP) Tristan Beck

• 4 innings-pitched
• 7 hits
• 3 ER
• 2 walks
• 3 strikeouts

SATURDAY @ Daytona:  Lost, 4-5

• (L, 0-1) Freddy Tarnok
• (2B) Brett Langhorne (1-4)  2 RBI , R

(SP) Freddy Tarnok

• 4.1 innings-pitched
• 6 hits
• 5 ER
• 3 walks
• 5 strikeouts

SUNDAY @ Daytona: Lost, 3-5

• (L, 0-1) Cutter Dyals
• (C) William Contreras (1-3)  R, RBI, BB, K

(SP) Hayden Deal

• 6 innings-pitched
• 2 hits
• 0 ER
• 0 walks
• 5 strikeouts

PITCHING

Sunday evening’s loss by the Fire Frogs wasn’t ideal, but starter Hayden Deal did the best he could to get the win. Deal struck out 5 Tortugas hitters and walked none from 72 pitches (49 strikes) in 6 innings. He only gave up 2 hits Sunday, and of the other 9 balls put in play — eight of them were groundouts.

Relievers Troy Bacon and Justin Kelly led the Frogs bullpen this past week, as both pitchers made an appearance and struck out 4 apiece in there games.

HITTING

The guys that, going into the season, were expected to lead the Fire Frogs on offense in 2019, are the guys that have been swinging the bat the best so far. That’s a good thing, since that’s what leaders are supposed to do.

Shortstop Riley Delgado and left fielder Izzy Wilson have been the top hitters thus far in this young season. And even more exciting is that outfielder Greyson Jenista is right behind them. Jenista was literally taken in the Draft last year, so seeing him succeed early is exciting.

To the stats: Delgado has been getting on base and hitting well, as he’s sporting a .389 average and a .950 OPS to go along with a triple. Izzy Wilson has done it all: batting .308 and OPSing .856 with a double and a triple thus far.

The homers haven’t really been there yet, but first baseman Drew Lugbauer is doing his best to provide that. He’s got a home run, a double, and an OPS of .875 in 4 games.

Here’s how the rest of the Florida lineup did:

(C) William Contreras   

• .214 batting-average
• .527 OPS
• 1 RBI

(LF) Jefrey Ramos

• .250 batting-average
• .563 OPS
• 3 RBIs

(INF) Brett Langhorne

• .143 batting-average
• 2 RBIs
• 1 stolen base

(SS) Riley Unroe   

•  .200 batting-average
• 1 double
• 1 stolen base

What’s Next?

(all times EST)

vs. Jupiter Hammerheads (MIA)

• Monday, April 8 @ 6PM
• Tuesday, April 9 @ 6PM
• Wednesday, April 10 @ 6PM
• Thursday, April 11 @ 12PM

@ St. Lucie Mets (NYM)

• Friday, April 12 @ 6:30PM
• Saturday, April 13 @ 6:30PM
• Sunday, April 14 @ 12PM

(Photo by Streeter Lecka/Getty Images)

(1-3) Rome Braves (A)

The Rome Braves kicked off their 2019 season with a 4-game series in Rowan County, NC as they faced the Kannapolis Intimidators, a team in the Northern division of the Single-A South Atlantic League and an affiliate of the Chicago White Sox.

The Intimidators are a team that has seen several highly touted prospects in recent years: Eloy Jimenez and Chris Sale just to name a few. Now guys like centerfielder Steele Walker (2nd round pick in 2018) and shortstop Lenyn Sosa are moving through the system and expected to be leaders for Kannapolis in 2019.

The bats were hot for the Braves in Game 1 versus Kannapolis, but then had some pitching issues throughout the weekend.

THURSDAY @ Kannapolis: Won, 9-1

• (W, 1-0) Nolan Kingham
• (3B) Brendan Venter (4-5) HR , 2B , 5 RBI , R

(SP) Nolan Kingham

• 5 innings-pitched
• 3 hits
• 0 ER
• 0 walks
• 1 strikeout

FRIDAY @ Kannapolis:  Lost, 1-2

• (L, 0-1) Jasseel De La Cruz
• (2B) Greg Cullen (1-4)  RBI

(SP) Jasseel De La Cruz: 

• 2.2 innings-pitched
• 2 hits
• 2 ER
• 2 walks
• 3 strikeouts

SATURDAY @ Kannapolis:  Lost, 4-6

• (L, 0-1) Jose Olague
• (1B) Griffin Benson (1-4)  HR , 2 RBI , R , K

(SP) Jose Olague

• 4.2 innings-pitched
• 10 hits
• 5 ER
• 1 walks
• 3 strikeouts

SUNDAY @ Kannapolis: Lost, 1-3

• (L, 0-1) Trey Riley
• (2B) Greg Cullen (1-5)  HR, RBI, R, K

(SP) Trey Riley

• 5 innings-pitched
• 5 hits
• 2 ER
• 1 walk
• 2 strikeouts

PITCHING

As you can see from the daily scores above, the starting pitching is probably going to be the weak-link for this Rome Braves team. These last 4 games didn’t feature a quality-start, nor a start in which a Rome pitcher struck out more than 3 batters.

Thursday night’s starter, Nolan Kingham, had the most success for the Braves. Kingham went 5 innings and pitched around just 3 hits and zero runs, with one strikeout. The offense put up 9 runs for Kingham on Thursday, so it should’ve been a stress less game for the former Texas pitcher.

Overall, Kingham needed 65 pitches to get through his outing (39 strikes), but limited any damaging contact from the 5 groundouts and 4 fly outs he gave up.

The bullpen was strong for Rome, as they had several different relievers come into games and hold the score where it was:

(RP) Tanner Lawson

• 2.1 innings pitched
• 4 strikeouts
• 0 ER

(RP) Jake Higginbotham

• 2.1 innings pitched
• 4 strikeouts
• 0 ER

(RP) Alan Rangel

• 2.2 innings pitched
• 4 strikeouts
• 0 ER

The bullpen is going to be critical if Rome continues to have issues with their starters not being able to make it into 5th inning consistently this season.

HITTING

The Rome bats probably performed the best these past 4 days in terms of playing well as a team. Six different hitters hit a home run this past week, and 7 different players split the gap with doubles. That’s a pretty good showing top-to-bottom for a batting lineup.

First baseman Brendan Venter, who was born in South Africa and drafted last year by the Braves in the 13th round, has led the Rome Braves with a home run, 5 RBIs, a double and a .417 batting average. He had a heck of an Opening Day, as he went 4-for-5 with a home run and plated all of his 5 RBIs.

Right fielder Trey Harris, 32nd round last year pick out of Mizzu, is hot so far with a home run and a .385 batting average. He’s got a nice 1.082 OPS, as well.

Here’s how the rest of the Rome hitters did this past week:

(2B) Greg Cullen          

• .313 batting average
• 1 home run
• 2 RBIs

(1B/DH) Griffin Benson

• .143 batting average
• 1 double
• 3 RBIs

(SS) Braulio Vazquez:      

• .200 batting average
• 1 double

(3B) Darling Florentino

•  .250 batting average
• 1 double
• 4 total bases

(OF) Jose Bermudez     

• .167 batting average
• 1 double
• 2 games

(OF) Andrew Moritz:        

• .231 batting average
• 1 double
• 4 total bases

(SS) Carlos Paraguate

• 0-for-11

More from Tomahawk Take

• Atlanta Braves 2012 Prospect Review: Joey Terdoslavich
• Braves News: Braves sign Fuentes, Andruw’s HOF candidacy, more
• The Weakest Braves Homers Since 2015
• Atlanta Braves Sign Joshua Fuentes to Minor League Deal
• Braves News: New Year’s Eve comes with several questions about the 2023 Braves

What’s Next?

(all times EST)

@ Columbia Fireflies (NYM)

• Monday, April 8 @ 7:05PM
• Tuesday, April 9 @ 11:05AM
• Wednesday, April 10 @ 11:05AM

vs. Greenville Drive (BOS)

• Thursday, April 11 @ 7PM
• Friday, April 12 @ 7PM
• Saturday, April 13 @ 6PM
• Sunday, April 14 @ 2PM

Check back next Monday for the latest on the Atlanta Braves minor league teams. This upcoming week will be a full slate of games, so it’s a great opportunity for these prospects to show out.

Tell us what you think about the start of the season for these prospects in the Atlanta Braves system, and what you expect out of them in 2019.