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Four games and four losses. Two of the losses came in extra innings and in Dunedin the D Jays blew a ninth inning lead. After a decent start the affiliates have hit a rough patch. Buffalo, Vancouver and Dunedin all have losing records in their last ten games. Vancouver are on a six game losing streak. New Hampshire have been doing the best but they are just 5-5 over their last ten. The losses have filtered through to the prospects, many of whom haven't got going yet.

Johnny King was the brightest star in a down day for the affiliates.



Buffalo 4 Scranton 5 - 10 innings

Binghamton 6 New Hampshire 3

Hillsboro 4 Vancouver 2 - 10 innings

Jupiter 7 Dunedin 5


Three Stars

Third Star - Blaine Bullard

Second Star - Holden Wilkerson

First Star - Johnny King


Boxes


NOTES


Buffalo came into the ninth inning with just three hits and trailing by two runs. Josh Rivera doubled to score one run then William Simoneit hit a ball to deep centre. The centre fielder made a mess of it and Rivera scored. Simoneit was thrown out trying to score an inside the park home run. That sent the game to extra innings where Scranton then won it in the tenth. Rivera and Simoneit had two hits each.


Austin Voth started and didn't do great, seven hits conceded in 3.2 innings. Brendon Little walked a pair and gave up a run in his inning of work.


Gage Stanifer started for NH and it was just like his previous starts. He walked the first hitter and ended up walking six in total in just over four innings. He also struck out six which is very good but he needs to cut down on the walks. For the season he has walked 16 in 18.2 innings.


For the offense Adrian Pinto hit his first home run of the season. Jace Bohrofen singled and doubled but struck out three times. At the bottom of the order Patrick Winkel and Jay Harry had two hits each


The Vancouver game was scoreless until the eighth inning. With two outs ad runners on second and third a ground ball got by third baseman Dub Gleed and two runs scored. The C's got those two runs back in the bottom of the inning and the game went to the tenth. In the tenth a couple of walks loaded the bases, again with two outs, when a wild pitch, followed by a catcher error let two more runs score. The C's went 1-2-3 in their half of the tenth. Hillsboro scored four runs in the game, all unearned. The C's had five hits in the game, Manny Beltre had two.


The bright spot was the pitching. Johnny King started and went four shutout innings, one hit, one walk and three K's. Holden Wilkerson also went four innings and just allowed the two unearned runs in the eighth. He struck out five.


Dunedin led 4-0 after 7 innings and 4-2 after eight but gave up five runs in the ninth to take the loss. Noah Palmese was the pitcher victimised. he has made seven appearances, five have been scoreless but the other two cost the Jays eleven runs. Its boom or bust. The starter was Dane Pengelly who was effectively wild. He held the Hammerheads off the board despite walking four in 3.2 innings. Yondrei Rojas pitched in relief as his rehab starts.


The Jays had just five hits, Blaine Bullard and Dariel Ramon had two each. Bullard also stole three bases.

King Leads Through the Darkness | 9 comments | Create New Account
The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. This site is not responsible for what they say.
uglyone - Friday, May 01 2026 @ 10:27 AM EDT (#477426) #
Bullard's clearly got work to do (K% too high and linedrive rate too low), but you gotta love seeing a speed/defense prospect hitting above average (110wrc+) in his first try at pro ball while being young for the level.

He's got 14sb in 20gms too, without being caught yet.
bpoz - Friday, May 01 2026 @ 01:25 PM EDT (#477429) #
Holden Wilkerson's last 3 outings have been good. 4IP each 0 ER each. His FB is 95/96.
Mike Green - Friday, May 01 2026 @ 02:15 PM EDT (#477430) #
Bullard's line so far is very interesting.  His strikeout rate is way too high, but he's taking a lot of pitches- his swinging strike rate (14%) only needs to be brought down modestly. His line drive rate is a little low, but his batted ball profile otherwise is excellent. He has hit the ball mostly on the ground, but when he has put it in the air (12 times), he has 4 home runs and 1 pop-up.   The result of taking a lot of pitches is a pretty decent walk rate of 10%.  

I checked Statcast and one of his homers went 423 feet to centerfield with an EV of 105 mph.  Incidentally, almost all of his PAs and hits have come against RH pitching.  Bullard is a switch-hitter, and the sample size for batting RH is in the single digits.  He has hit the ball hard a few times however, and struck out 3 times, batting right-handed.  

As UO says, a good start but things to work on.  
Mike Green - Friday, May 01 2026 @ 02:58 PM EDT (#477431) #
Looking at King's stat line, it appears that he may have added a pitch, perhaps a sinker. His GB rate is way up.
mendocino - Friday, May 01 2026 @ 03:55 PM EDT (#477432) #
Geoff Pontes@GeoffPontesBA

Breaking down the Top Ten Hitters of April. Dug into the underlying data for several up arrow names

⚾️ Ronny Cruz
⚾️Jhonny Level
⚾️Sean Keys
⚾️Franklin Arias
⚾️Theo Gillen & More

Sean Keys, 3B, Blue Jays

.321/.436/.705, 3 2B, 9 HR, 25 runs, 21 RBIs, 1 stolen base

Almost no player in the minor leagues had a bigger difference between his expected production and his final line than Keys did in 2025. We highlighted this throughout the offseason, as Keys seemed like a clear bounce-back candidate.

In April, Keys did just that. His exit velocity data, launch angles and barrel rate have all taken a sizeable jump, and he’s sustained that improvement with solid bat-to-ball skills and swing decisions. Keys is showing 70-grade EV data with a 95.3 mph average exit velocity to begin the season and a 70th percentile mark of 103.9 mph. His 28% barrel rate to date is outstanding, and it’s leading to outrageous expected numbers (.476 xwOBA).

Keys is a bat-first prospect with limited defensive projection at third base, so he’s really going to have to hit to make good on his potential.
June Northey - Friday, May 01 2026 @ 04:47 PM EDT (#477433) #
Key's bad year wasn't a total nightmare - 773 OPS isn't horrid, but for a guy limited to 1B/3B it is a problem with Vlad here in the majors for another decade+. An 1.141 OPS will force issues if he can keep it up - he won't - but being at 1000+ for OPS would lock in AAA by mid-summer I'd think. Wonder if he can play LF or RF?
uglyone - Friday, May 01 2026 @ 05:40 PM EDT (#477434) #
yeah Sean's 119wrc+ last was just barely ok for a slightly overate bat-only prospect....but remember that Keys finished strong last year. Over his last 35gms:

156pa, 17.9b%, 27.6k%, .292bip, .238avg, .262iso, 148wrc+
Gerry - Saturday, May 02 2026 @ 10:28 AM EDT (#477450) #
Jake Cook is in the FCL lineup today.
Glevin - Saturday, May 02 2026 @ 06:14 PM EDT (#477462) #
I don't know why Milb makes it so hard to follow Fcl games. You can't just search under Jays organization or even Florida Complex League. You need to go to class/Rookie to see games. Very odd.
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