Batter's Box Interactive Magazine

Buffalo and New Hampshire were rained out, Vancouver and Dunedin wish they were. Dunedin were two hits while Vancouver lost a close one. Arjun Nimmala continued to impress. The FCL Jays were the lone winners.

Buffalo at Lehigh Valley - postponed

Somerset at New Hampshire - postponed

Vancouver 5 Eugene 6

Tampa 3 Dunedin 1

FCL Phillies 2 FCL Blue Jays 10

Three Stars

Third Star - David Beckles

Second Star - Aldo Gaxiola

First Star - Arjun Nimmala

Boxes

NOTES

Arjun Nimmala continued to impress for Vancouver. He homered in the fourth inning. He singled in the sixth, doubled in the eighth and reached on an error in the ninth. Just a normal 3-5 day for the 19 year old. The C's had just seven hits in the game so the rest of the team had four hits between them.

Khal Stephen made his high A debut and just pitched three innings. He needed 78 pitches for those innings or 26 pitches per inning, not very efficient. He was charged with one run on three hits. He walked two and struck out four.

Kai Peterson went two innings in relief. Last year Peterson had a mixed season. He struck out 28 in 18.1 innings in Vancouver but he walked 14. Great K numbers but bad walk numbers. He has improved this year. His strikeouts are down to 22 in 17.1 innings, still good, and his walks are down to 8. His WHIP has come down from 1.36 to 0.92.

Dunedin were two hit by the Yankees. Colby Holcombe started and gave up two runs on five hits in five innings.

Adam Macko and Landen Maroudis pitched in the FCL. Macko looks ready for a higher level, three no hit innings, four K's. Maroudis went 3.1 innings, one K.

On the hitting side Josh Kasevich went hitless. The player to note is Aldo Gaxiola, an 18 year old Mexican who mainly plays 3B. Gaxiola hit well in the DSL last season and his 4-4 day on Thursday moved his 2025 average up to .295. Last year his strikeouts were Ok and he showed some power. This season his K rate is up and the power hasn't shown up yet. But for an 18 year old he has a good base to progress. The two leading hitters, David Beckles and Yorman Licourt had two hits each.

Posted by Gerry on Friday, May 23 2025 @ 07:20 AM EDT.

Soggy Thursday | 11 comments | Create New Account

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Mike Green - Friday, May 23 2025 @ 12:39 PM EDT (#460286) #

Arjun Nimmila's line is excellent across the board- he's at 1/4 season and on pace for .291/.367/.568 for a 151 wRC+ or ir you prefer counting stats 676 PAs, 36 homers, 4 triples, 48 doubles, 68 walks and 132 strikeouts. For a 19 year old shortstop in high A, that's a Grade A prospect.

I might be higher on the farm system than most, but I can see a competitive team in 2028 albeit with many question marks. That's a big improvement from this time last year.

GabrielSyme - Friday, May 23 2025 @ 01:13 PM EDT (#460289) #

The farm system does feel stronger than in past years - maybe this is just because we've seen notable success from a few of the top prospects in Nimmala and Yesavage. I don't pay attention to other farm systems, so I can only compare to how the Jays system has looked at different times.

Next year the system could be quite strong. It's unlikely that Nimmala, Yesavage or Tiedemann will graduate, and we have a fair number of pitchers who are working their way back from injury - Tiedemann, Barriera, Maroudis, Macko, Perry, Bastardo, eventually Bloss - who should make the pitching side of the farm stronger.

Glevin - Friday, May 23 2025 @ 01:55 PM EDT (#460292) #

Farm system definitely stronger looking this year because a lot of pitchers look interesting. Hitters, aside from Nimmala not nearly as strong.

Johnny King also off to a great start in FCL. He's now pitched 8 innings, given up 3 H, 3BB, 0 ER, 12Ks. Hopefully, will be moved up to Dunedin soon so we can get more data on him!

uglyone - Friday, May 23 2025 @ 02:35 PM EDT (#460295) #

Not sure i agree there.

Barger looking good in mlb.

Roden tearing up AAA.

Clase looking pretty good at both levels.

Nimmala tearing up A+ at 19.

It's the top end of a system that really determines the feel of the system and so far this year we have a good number of top end hitting prospects looking really good.

GabrielSyme - Friday, May 23 2025 @ 02:51 PM EDT (#460299) #

Technically Barger isn't a prospect any longer, so a point for Glevin.

I'd say the hitting side is looking modestly positive, even apart from Nimmala. Pinango and Schreck are doing well at AA, Adrian Pinto has looked great in Vancouver, and there are quite a few good performances in Dunedin, with Sam Shaw and Edward Duran leading the pack. On the other side, nobody has really looked particularly good in the complex, and we've seen Wagner and Roden underperform at the major league level.

Kelekin - Friday, May 23 2025 @ 02:56 PM EDT (#460300) #

Positive news: Enmanuel Bonilla has gone two consecutive games without a strikeout!

Not much to talk about in the FCL hitter wise yet, but no surprise there, given our struggling international pipeline and not drafting high school hitters as of late.

Hoping for a nice influx with hitters this year. The system has a ton of interesting young pitchers.

Glevin - Friday, May 23 2025 @ 03:08 PM EDT (#460303) #

I don't consider Barger a prospect (over 300 careers PAs by now) but I like him obviously. Roden, yes, I wasn't thinking of him as a prospect but he is and he's the guy I'd put behind Nimmala as #2 hitting prospect and only other guy where I see a good possibility for an everyday player. Clase, I'm not sold on at all. Not a good fielder and poor hit tool. Had a good run in AAA based on a .438 BABIP. Most likely outcome is extra OFer but needs to improve defensively to even get there. He's young enough where it's possible he can make some significant changes, it's just not that likely IMO.

#3 hitting prospect for me is probably Duran followed by the group of Kasevich, Shaw, Pinango, Schreck. All are interesting but all have pretty serious flaws too. It's definitely a better group than it was last year but well behind pitching IMO (Yesavage, Stephen, Tiedemann, King, Maroudis, Berreira, Rojas, Bloss, etc...)

Kelekin - Friday, May 23 2025 @ 03:24 PM EDT (#460304) #

Duran has improved in a lot of ways and statcast backs up his progress. His barrel rate is 73rd percentile, hard hit 60th%, and 93rd percentile at swinging outside the zone. Given power was his biggest concern, the fact he is barreling the ball is huge. He has thrown out 28% of baserunners as well.

Duran lost some luster last year, but is becoming a legitimate prospect now.

Nigel - Friday, May 23 2025 @ 03:27 PM EDT (#460305) #

Glevin that is exactly my view of the hitting prospects in the system, but I would add Jimenez to Nimmala and Roden as having a decently high probability of being an every day MLB position player. There's a decent chance that someone else in the system turns out to be a useful MLB player because there are enough "maybe's" in the system that at least one will have enough things go right for them to make it. In general, I think the system is entirely like the rest of the organization right now - kind of average (you can do a lot better and a lot worse). The number one organizational problem right now is the complete break down of the IFA recruitment and development pipeline.

Kelekin - Friday, May 23 2025 @ 03:35 PM EDT (#460306) #

A bit more on Shaw:

100th percentile xwOBA, Barrel Rate, Launch Angle Sweet Spot, BB Rate, Pull Rate

There are only three categories where he's below the 50th percentile: Zone Contact (43rd%), Strikeout Rate (37th%), and Zone Swing (6th% percentile).

uglyone - Friday, May 23 2025 @ 03:43 PM EDT (#460308) #

People seem to forget that Clase was a league average hitter in 426pa in AAA last year at age 22, young for the level. Same age as a bunch of guys in A+ right that some like here as prospects. And decent in mlb as well with an 87wrc+.

that followed him being an above average hitter in AA at age 21, again young for the level, the year before. And closer to dominant the years before that at the lower levels.

And this is a guy who's strength as a prospect is speed and defense.

It's not just his babip fuelled AAA run that makes him a good prospect.

And sure Barger just graduated but it's only natural that seeing a prospect succeed as he graduates into mlb inevitably reflects well both on him as a prospect and on guys in the system that were alongside him as comparable prospects and can only make us feel better about the system.

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