Odds and Ends – MiLB

Just a few notes today. Following some of the amazing posts in the past few days, I indeed feel somewhat like a little leaguer as my writing is solely focused on the minor leagues and naturally cannot lead to much discussion.  However, little league provided me with some of my best long-term memories, way back in the early fifties.

Minor league ball keeps me somewhat in touch with those memories where the game is still a game and not a business.

Landon Knack – MiLB Pitcher of the Month High-A Central

With the Loons, the 24-year-old right-hander went 3-0 in July with a 1.54 ERA in five appearances (four starts). He allowed 14 hits and one walk while striking out 37 in 23.1 innings and was promoted to Double-A Tulsa on July 31. Knack, 24, was selected by the Dodgers in the second round of the 2020 MLB Draft out of East Tennessee State University.

On Thursday Knack made his debut with the AA Tulsa Drillers. He didn’t miss a beat as he did not allow a hit until Ivan Herrera’s two-out single in the fourth.  Except for an error his first three innings would have been perfect.  He allowed but one hit, walked only one, and struck out six. Of his 72 pitches, 49 were strikes, some of which registered 100 mph on the radar gun at Hammons Field in Springfield.

Gavin Stone – MiLB Pitcher of the Week (July 26 – August 1)

Stone earned Pitcher of the Week honors in the Low-A West Division of MiLB on July 31 with a dominating appearance against the Modesta Nuts in which he threw six scoreless innings allowing only a hit and a walk. He struck out nine.

Stone was the Dodgers fifth-round selection in the 2020 First-Year Player Draft out of Central Arkansas University. The 22-year-old right-hander has a 3.79 ERA on the season over 59.1 innings pitched. He has struck out 81 and walked 20.

Three More UFO’s

Since my last post, the Dodgers have signed three more UFO’s bringing their total to 10. The new signees are left-hander Francisco Mateo out of the College of Central Florida and right-hander Garrett McDaniels out of Mount Olive University. The third UFO is left-handed pitcher Jack Dreyer out of the University of Iowa who is coming off TJ sugery.

Justin Time …

First baseman Justin Yurchak was recently promoted from the Great Lakes Loons to the Tulsa Drillers. At the time of his promotion, Yurchak was leading the High-A Central Division with a .356 batting average. He went hitless in his first three games with the Drillers but has erased that memory in the last two games in which he has six hits and five runs batted in. 

Left-hander Justin Bruihl has found his way with the AAA OKC Dodgers. He started the season with the Drillers and was promoted to the OKC Dodgers after posting a 1.20 ERA and 0.67 WHIP with Tulsa.

He had two poor outings in early July resulting in eight earned runs. In his other 16 appearances, he has allowed one earned run and none in his last 11 appearances bringing his ERA down to 3.79. He has struck out 30 in 22.2 innings with the OKC Dodgers and walked seven.

Take Note …

Outfielder James Outman was recently promoted to the Drillers from the Loons. At that time most thinking was that Ryan Ward, Andy Pages or Brandon Lewis might be promoted before Outman. However, he had a strong July slashing .314/.442/.686 with an OPS of 1.128. He hit six home runs in 18 games and drove in 13  out of the lead off spot.

Outman who plays a good center field has suited up 12 times with the Drillers. He is slashing .333/.448/.688 with an OPS of 1.136. He has four home runs and driven in 12 runs while striking out 13 times and walking 10. On the season in the two levels, he has stolen 22 bases and been caught twice.

Andy Pages has surged back to life at the plate. He has 22 home runs, one behind the league leader and 65 runs batted in only two behind the league leader.  A pair of streaks were extended for Pages on Thursday with a 1-for-2 night with two walks, as he’s reached base safely in his last 23 games and recorded a hit in his last nine.

Some of us were unhappy to see Keibert Ruiz leave the fold but we do understand the nature of the game. Many of us now see Diego Cartaya as the heir apparent to Ruiz’s role. That may well be true as he is a highly valued prospect who is now on the 7-day IL.

If it was not for Cartaya and the hype around him, the Dodgers have another catcher in the pipeline who may have been seen as a catcher of the future. He still may be that future catcher. He is not on their Top 30 Prospect List but I feel is deserving of such recognition.

Carson Taylor was selected by the Dodgers in the fourth round of the 2020 First-Year Player Draft out of Virginia Tech. In 50 games with the Loons, he has a triple slash of .280/.382/.429 and an OPS of .811. He has five home runs and 38 runs batted in while striking out 38 times and walking 32. This guy is a player. The 22-year-old switch hitter may well get a look-see with the Drillers before the 2021 season is over.

Jose Ramos has made it onto the Top 30 Prospect List. The information below is from that Top 30 list. It is the first time I have seen Ramos mentioned in the same breath as Andy Pages. Ramos will play the entire 2021 season as a 20-year-old.

The Dodgers signed MLB Pipeline’s top-rated international prospect in the 2018-19 class, Venezuela catcher Diego Cartaya, for $2.5 million and also found a bargain in that crop when they landed Ramos out of Panama for $30,000. He didn’t get a chance to come to the United States before 2021, making his debut in the Rookie-level Dominican Summer League in 2019 and getting limited to Los Angeles’ Dominican instructional league program last year during the coronavirus pandemic. He has made up for lost time this year, crushing the ball for three weeks in the Rookie-level Arizona Complex League and continuing to mash following promotion to Low-A.

Five-foot-11 and 150 pounds when he turned pro, Ramos now checks in at 6-foot-1 and 200 pounds and resembles Dodgers prospect Andy Pages both physically and in terms of tools. He features well-above-average raw pop from the right side of the plate and hit a couple of tape-measure blasts in the ACL before departing. He manages the strike zone and off-speed pitches reasonably well for a young slugger and has a chance to hit for average as well as power.

Ramos has lost some speed as he has matured physically but he’s still at least an average runner, and his instincts give him the possibility of staying in center field. He has split time between center and right field in 2021 and his plus-plus arm is a weapon. He recorded 17 assists in his first 78 pro games in the outfield.

Currently, with the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes, Ramos in 12 games is slashing .400/.475/.760 with an OPS of 1.235. He has three home runs, 11 runs batted in and 11 of his 20 hits have been for extra bases.

Right-hander Marshall Kasowski has surfaced with the Dodgers in the Arizona Complex League. In 2.2 innings he has allowed one earned run while striking out six and walking one. Time is not on his side now so hopefully, he can get back to full-time service before the season ends.