Nationals Arm Race

First off, here’s the records of our teams after three 6-game series (link to all MiLB standings here)

• AAA: 4-14 (tied for worst in league)
• AA: 6-12 (last place in division)
• High-A: 9-9 (2 games out of 1st)
• Low-A: 1-17.

I asked Keith Law a question in his chat last week about Fredericksburg, who was 0-15 at the time, asking whether they would ever win and he thought I was exaggerating. He replied as much, posting their team batting and pitching stats in amazement.

Lets do a quick run-through who’s looking good and bad around our minor league affiliates. I use links that i store in a page here: https://www.nationalsarmrace.com/?page_id=16709 so you can use the same shortcuts i’ve collected over the years.

AAA observations:

• Who’s hot: Palka, Sanchez, and Garcia not half bad at the plate.
• McFarland in the bullpen is on a hot streak, with 9 Ks in his last 4 innings.
• Who’s not: Kieboom; just 2-15 last week, still hitting under .200 for the season. WTF.
• Not ONE of our AAA starters was even halfway decent last week. Braymer is really struggling in particular, concerning since he’s one of our 40-man covering starters.

Who is next to get called up? I don’t see ANYONE really making a statement at AAA demanding a call-up. Nobody. We have seven 40-man guys in AAA (plus two more who are on IL) and there’s no burning reinforcements for the big club.

Who is next to get demoted or released? Carlos Tocci is 1-19 on the season and the team has at least 7 outfielders on the roster … time seems short for this veteran MLFA.

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AA Observations

• Who’s hot at the plate: Jakson Reetz, of all people, 5/14 in the last week with some power.
• In the rotation: Teel, Cate and Sharp had solid weeks on the mound. Teel isn’t exactly a swing-and-miss guy but he’s getting results.
• Sanchez has 20/2 K/BB on the season right now.
• Baldonado: 8Ks, 0BB in 4ip last week. not to shabby.
• Unfortuantely, Reetz is the team leader in BA for the season at a paltry .237.
• Did you know there’s not a single 40-man player in our AA team? AA is generally where the best near-MLB ready prospects get sent by most franchises as a finishing school and we don’t have a single prospect in that category.

Who is next to get promoted? I think Klobotis is making a statement: 14/1 K/BB in 8 innings, and has given up just 2 hits on the year. I think Baldonado needs to move up as well; he was in AAA 3 years ago and now is 28 overmatching kids in AA.

Who is next to get demoted or released? I mean, nobody’s hitting on this team but 21MLFA SS/2B Osvaldo Duarte is 8-51 with 21 Ks and just 4 walks in a position that is completely replaceable.

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High-A observations

• Who’s hot: the entire outfield is crushing the ball; Rhinesmith, Connell and Canning lead the team in BA and OPS over the last week, with Rhinesmith just crushing the ball in particular going 11-20 in the last week.
• Another solid start for Cade Cavalli.
• What is going on with Rutledge? In 4 starts, he now has an ERA north of 12, he’s given up 17 hits in 10 innings and has a 10/9 K/BB ratio. I’m sorry, but this just isn’t going to cut it. It’s starting to look like he’s out of his element in High-A. And it REALLY is starting to look bad for pundits who thought he is a better prospect than Cavalli.

Who is next to get promoted? Alex Troop; who has a 0.46 whip and 12/0 K/BB in 8 innings in middle relief.

Who is next to get demoted or released? Rutledge. I think he needs to go to Low-A and regroup unless he’s hurt.

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Low-A

• At least they got a win.
• their BEST hitter by OPS is hitting .219 (Jake Randa)
• Junior Martina had a nice week.
• The team did not hit a single home run in the last series.
• The starting pitching is SO BAD in Low-A that not one single pitcher qualifies for the ERA title.
• That being said, a couple of starters actually had solid starts: Karlo Seijas: 7ip, 3hits, 8ks, 0 walks. More of that please.

Who is next to get promoted: Nobody. Not one single pitcher is making a case, nor are any of the hitters.

Who is next to get demoted/released? There’s a slew of hitters with really ugly lines right now: Jeremy Ydens is 4-41 on the season, Kevin Strohschein is 8-50 with 13Ks and a walk … and 1 RBI. He’s the 1B. Nothing positive in F-burg.

Well, we’re a week into the season and we’ve seen one turn through the minor league rotations. Lets take a quick look at what we’re looking at for rotations at the four full season levels and do a quick observation of who looked hot and cold.

These rotation orders are maintained on the Big Board, where i’ve also attempted to put the bullpen into their roles (Closer, Setup, middle relief, loogy and Long Reliever/spot starters). That effort may prove to be impossible to maintain, especially in lower levels where they’ve gone to tandem starts in years past, but we’ll see how it goes.

The rotations, despite the minors going to 6-game series, seem to be 5-man rotations, which isn’t nearly as neat as it could be, but whatever.

Rotations by level:

• AAA: Nolin, Fuentes, Braymer, JRodriguez, Armenteros,
• AA: Cate, MSanchez, Teel, Sharp, LReyes
• High-A: Rutledge, Adon, Cavalli, Henry,
• Low-A: Strom, Seijas, PGonzalez, Parker, Theopile

Who looked good:

• Carson Teel: managed to go 5 innings, unlike the rest of the AA rotation. Gave up 4 hits and just one earned run. Not bad.
• Cade Cavalli: 5ip, 2 hits, 7Ks, zero runs in his pro debut? More please.
• Joan Adon: Same whip as Cavalli but still relatively unhittable despite giving up a couple of runs. I like his easy action and I think he’s a fast mover this year.
• Pedro Gonzalez: just 3 1/3 but 1 hit and 2 walks against 5 Ks in low A at age 20. I’ll take that.
• Mitchell Parker: 7Ks in 4innings in his pro debut. Works for me.

Who looked awful

• Steven Fuentes: not a great start, but a quick hook compared to the next guy.
• Jefry Rodriguez: geeze; 6 walks and didn’t make it out of the first?
• Sterling Sharp: not a good start, at all. 8 runs in less than 3 innings in AA when he was pitching in the majors last year.
• Tim Cate: somehow, his ERA is higher than Sharp’s.
• Leif Strom: 2ip, 7 runs .. ugh. He was so bad it already looks like he has been replaced in the rotation, in that he pitched a couple innings in the Theopile start.
• Karlo Seijas: the worst start of anyone: 2/3 of an inning and 7 runs.