Monthly Archives: June 2021

16 Jun

highs and lows

Tuesday was a good day for Bobby Bradley. The ex-Harrison Central High star went 2-for-4 with a home run and two RBIs in Cleveland’s 7-2 win over Baltimore, boosting his average to .440 (11-for-25) since his call-up on June 5. “In my head, this is 12-year-old All-Stars, as fun as we can get, just playing some summer ball,” Bradley said in an mlb.com article. These are meaningful games for the second-place Indians, who are trying to keep pace with division-leader Chicago in the American League Central. Bradley has contributed three homers and 10 RBIs – and has struck out just four times. These results are much-improved over his 2019 MLB trial, when he batted .178 with one homer and fanned 20 times in 45 at-bats. Bradley, 25, won home run crowns in four different leagues en route to the majors. The Indians would love to see him tap into that power this summer – and keep having fun, of course. … Tuesday was a bad day for Demarcus Evans. The former Petal High star yielded a walk-off grand slam to Jose Altuve in Texas’ 6-3 loss in 10 innings to Houston. After Mississippi State product Nate Lowe had given the Rangers a 3-2 lead with an RBI knock in the top of the 10th, Evans failed to retire a batter in the bottom half. He walked two prior to Altuve’s bomb. Evans, 24, making his seventh big league appearance this season – and 11th overall – suffered his second blown save and saw his 2021 ERA jump from 2.16 to 5.40. P.S. Down on the farm, Ole Miss alum Nick Fortes hit a walk-off two-run homer for Pensacola in a 5-4 win against Montgomery in the Double-A South. Fortes, a catcher/DH, is batting .284 with two homers and 12 RBIs for the Miami affiliate. … Tonight at Trustmark Park in Pearl, Mississippi State product Konnor Pilkington will go to the bump for Birmingham against the Mississippi Braves. Pilkington, a former East Central High star, is 1-1, 2.60 ERA in six starts for the White Sox’s Double-A club.

15 Jun

finding their way

Things are clicking – sort of – for the Mississippi Braves. Though manager Wyatt Toregas resigned suddenly during the Double-A club’s series at Biloxi, the team won five of six there and has taken 12 of its last 16. At 20-16, the M-Braves are second in the Double-A South South Division. A new manager has not been named; the coaching staff ran the team for the last three games at Biloxi. The M-Braves’ pitching staff leads the league in ERA, and highly rated prospect Shea Langeliers is playing like one: .265 with nine homers, 19 RBIs and 20 runs, all team-leading stats. Braden Shewmake, Atlanta’s No. 4 prospect (Langeliers is No. 3), has finally begun to swing the bat after an ice-cold start. He has hit safely in five of his last six to reach .135 with three homers and 10 RBIs. Justin Dean has 10 steals and 17 runs. Birmingham, the top scoring team in the league, comes to Trustmark Park today with a 22-13 mark, first in the North Division. The Chicago White Sox’s affiliate features the organization’s No. 6 prospect, Micker Adolfo, a 6-foot-4, 225-pound outfielder batting .244 with eight homers. Ti’Quan Forbes, the former Mississippi Mr. Baseball from Columbia High, is batting .281 with three homers for the Barons, and Mississippi State product Konnor Pilkington, from Pascagoula, is 1-1 with a 2.60 ERA in six starts.

15 Jun

omaha stakes

William Carey brought one home in 1969. Delta State did it in 2004, Jones College in 2016. Mississippi State gets to try, try again this month to do what no NCAA Division I school from Mississippi has done before: Win a national title. Carey won the NAIA crown, DSU in NCAA D-II and Jones in NJCAA D-II. The Bulldogs earned their 12th trip to Omaha and the College World Series by spanking Notre Dame 11-7 Monday in Game 3 of the Starkville Super Regional before a crazy crowd at Dudy Noble Field. State can’t take that crowd to Omaha but will take SEC player of the year Tanner Allen, highly rated MLB draft prospect starters Will Bednar and Christian MacLeod and the hottest closer going, Landon Sims. State’s side of the CWS bracket includes No. 2 national seed Texas and No. 3 Tennessee. Vanderbilt, Arizona and Stanford lurk on the other side. Knock-down, drag-out battles should be expected. But the Bulldogs are one of eight with a chance. They’ve come close before, taking second in 2013 and third in 1985 with the Clark-Palmeiro-Brantley-Thigpen team that was probably the most talented the state has seen. Winning the last game of the season is tough. In the 2011 film “Moneyball” that was – and remains — Billy Beane’s great lament: “If you lose the last game of the season, nobody gives a (flip).” That’s not entirely true. State has enjoyed another great ride in 2021. But if the Bulldogs do manage to win the last one, to bring home a “natty,” it’s hard to imagine what the celebration in Bulldog Nation would be like.

14 Jun

meanwhile, in mlb …

Yes, there is a big game in Starkville tonight, but if you can keep an eye on – or an ear tuned to – one big league game, make it Tampa Bay-Chicago White Sox (7:10 CDT) at Guaranteed Rate Field. Lance Lynn, the grizzled vet out of Ole Miss, will pitch for the White Sox against rising star Tyler Glasnow of the Rays. It’s a matchup of division leaders who own the two best records in MLB. Lynn, never better even at age 34, is 7-1 with a 1.23 ERA. He leads the American League in ERA and is fourth in WHIP (0.88). He has one complete game (nine innings) and is averaging six innings a start, admirable by today’s standards. Lynn is 111-72 career, needing one more W to tie for 499th place on all-time list. That’s no mean feat. Only one Ole Miss product has ever won more: Jeff Fassero racked up 121 wins over 16 seasons. Lynn faces quite the challenge tonight. The Rays are on a 23-5 tear with a plus-86 run differential in the stretch. But Lynn will have the full-throated support of ChiSox fans, who have taken to the big man’s emotions-on-his-sleeve personality. “I’m going to give it everything I have to help the team win,” Lynn told the Chicago Sun-Times in a recent interview. “I’ve had that since I was a little kid.”

14 Jun

hard knocks

Ole Miss is a good hitting team. The Rebels ran into a better one in Arizona. In a Game 3 that kinda figured to be a slugfest, the host Wildcats slugged best, ending the Rebels’ season with a 16-3 blowout in the Tucson Super Regional. A seven-run fourth inning effectively crushed the Rebels. “I think this is the best offense in Pac-12 history,” Arizona coach Jay Johnson told tucson.com. “I’m not a historian, so I can’t validate that. But if there’s one that’s equal, I’d like to see what that looked like.” Arizona leads the nation in hits and runs. The Wildcats put up 28 runs in the three games at Hi Corbett Field. Even in their Game 2 loss, they put 10 runners on base and scored twice against Rebels ace Doug Nikhazy in 5 1/3 innings. In Sunday’s clincher, the Wildcats piled up 20 hits and scored at least once against each of the five pitchers UM trotted out. The Rebels, who rank first in the SEC in hits and second in runs, managed just five and three on Sunday. Even if this Arizona team is “the best offense in Pac-12 history,” that’s no consolation to Rebel Nation, which has seen coach Mike Bianco win more than 800 games in his 21 seasons but manage just one trip to the College World Series.

13 Jun

license to steal

A new rule in High-A ball this season has given some players what must feel like a license to steal. The pitcher must step off the rubber before making a pickoff move. No one has taken better advantage of the rule than Delvin Zinn, the former Itawamba Community College star now with the Chicago Cubs’ South Bend affiliate. Zinn pilfered his 22nd bag on Saturday; that leads all three High-A leagues. He hasn’t been thrown out once. Zinn’s career may have stalled a bit; he was drafted in 2016 and hasn’t played above A-ball. But the 5-foot-10, 170-pound shortstop does have some speed. He stole 30 bases in A-ball two years ago under the old rules. As great as his pace is this season, Zinn isn’t going to match what Billy Hamilton did at the high Class A level in 2012. The Taylorsville Tornado stole 104 bases in the California League before adding 51 more in Double-A to set an all-time pro record with 155 bags. … In Low-A ball, where the pitcher is limited to two pickoff moves per plate appearance, steals are also up this season, though none of the Mississippians at that level are exactly running wild. Former Hattiesburg High standout Joe Gray Jr., having a really good year, has eight steals for Carolina (Milwaukee), and Meridian CC product Sam McWilliams has eight for Rancho Cucamonga (Los Angeles Dodgers). Willie Joe Garry Jr., from Pascagoula, has seven bags for Fort Myers (Minnesota) while hitting .165.

12 Jun

around the horn

The matchup of the National League’s third-leading hitter against the pitcher with the loop’s third-best ERA — who just happened to be teammates eight years ago at Mississippi State — went to the latter on Friday night in Milwaukee. So did the game. Brandon Woodruff retired Adam Frazier in three at-bats while working seven strong innings in the Brewers’ 7-4 win over Pittsburgh. Woodruff is 5-2 with a 1.53 ERA for the Brewers, tied for first in the NL Central with Chicago. Frazier’s average dipped to .328 after an 0-for-4 for the last-place Pirates. … Cleveland’s decision to give Bobby Bradley another big league opportunity is looking like a shrewd move. The former Harrison Central High standout, looking fitter than ever, hit his second homer in the Indians’ 7-0 win against Seattle and is batting .462 with six RBIs in four games. … Ocean Springs native Garrett Crochet threw two scoreless innings, fanning three, to notch his sixth hold in the Chicago White Sox’s 5-4 win against Detroit. Crochet’s ERA is 0.44, and the flame-throwing lefty has 25 K’s in 20 1/3 innings. … Down in Double-A, the Mississippi Braves lost their manager — Wyatt Toregas resigned unexpectedly (no reason given in the press release) — and then lost in 10 innings at Biloxi. The M-Braves had won four straight. … Also in the Double-A South, former Southern Miss star Chuckie Robinson homered in Chattanooga’s 1-0 win vs. Pensacola. Robinson, batting .269 with two bombs, was behind the plate for Cincinnati mega-prospect Hunter Greene’s fifth win. … MSU product Brent Rooker homered for the second straight game for Triple-A St. Paul and now has nine homers on the season. He is batting .237 with 16 RBIs as he works toward a recall to Minnesota. … Ex-Ole Miss standout Parker Caracci picked up his fourth save and trimmed his ERA to 1.50 over 13 games for High-A Vancouver in Colorado’s system. … On the college front, Ole Miss fell into a hole at Arizona, yielding four home runs and failing to score after the first inning in a 9-3 loss in Game 1 of the Tucson Super Regional. Mississippi State hosts Notre Dame today in Game 1 of that best-of-3 super regional.

11 Jun

summer session

The Cotton States League is back for 2021 with a whole new look. The wood-bat college summer league has added a Coastal division to go with its traditional New Albany-based North division. (There is also a high school league and a junior high league.) The Coastal teams, which began play last weekend, are the Biloxi Bacon, Gulfport Gamblers, Ocean Springs Ospreys, Bay St. Louis Seagulls, D’Iberville Dolphins and Pascagoula Pelicans. Games are being played at MGM Park, Biloxi High School and the AJ Holloway Sports Complex. The North, also just under way, includes the North Delta Dealers, Tupelo Thunder, Golden Triangle Jets, Woodall Mountain Lookouts, Tallahatchie Rascals, Tippah Tribe, BlackPrairie Mudcats and HillCountry Generals. North teams play at two fields at BNA Bank Park. … The Acadiana Cane Cutters of the Texas Collegiate League are stacked with Mississippi connections. Southern Miss’ Matthew Adams, Tanner Hall, Michael Latulas and Will Tynes, Ole Miss’ Ben Van Cleve, Belhaven’s Reed Vincent and Northwest Mississippi Community College’s Peyton Puckett are on the roster. The TCL season began this week. Tynes and Vincent pitched Thursday night. … The Cape Cod League, cancelled in 2020, opens its season on June 20, with a handful of Mississippi college players listed on the preliminary rosters. Bourne shows Mississippi State’s Will Bednar, Xavier Lovett and Cade Smith and Southern Miss’ Slade Wilks. Ole Miss’ Peyton Chatagnier and Derek Diamond are with Orleans. Falmouth has five state products: Bulldogs K.C. Hunt, Davis Rokose, Landon Sims and Mikey Tepper along with Bryson Ware, a Pearl River Community College alum now at Auburn. P.S. In the wake of the cancellation of the college season in 2020, several new summer leagues – Southeast Collegiate, Deep South Collegiate, Honor the Game — sprang up around the state, but it’s unclear if any will operate this year.

10 Jun

divergent

Braxton Lee, signed out of independent ball last week, went 2-for-5 Wednesday in his debut with Cincinnati’s Double-A Chattanooga club, the latest stop in what has been a whirlwind career for the 27-year-old one-time major league outfielder. Lee played at Picayune High, Pearl River Community College and Ole Miss, where he had a nice season (.281, 30 steals) for the 2014 team that reached the College World Series semifinals. Lee was drafted by Tampa Bay in 2014 and began his pro career at Hudson Valley. From there he made stops in Port Charlotte and Montgomery before being traded in mid-2017 to Miami. The Marlins sent him to Jacksonville (where he won the Southern League batting title). He stood out for Salt River in the 2017 Arizona Fall League, then made the big leagues with the Marlins to start 2018. He spent time at four different levels that year, including Triple-A New Orleans, Class A Jupiter and Double-A Jacksonville. He went 3-for-17 in two stints in the majors. The New York Mets claimed Lee on waivers in the fall of 2018, and he spent 2019 bouncing between Binghamton and Syracuse in that system. With no minor league season in 2020, he had no team to play for. He declared free agency last fall and signed with the independent Southern Maryland Blue Crabs, playing four games (batting .438 under manager Stan Cliburn) before his contract was purchased by the Reds. Through it all, Lee has batted .266 in 606 minor league games. … Jacob Lindgren’s second – or third — chance at returning to The Show ended on June 4, when the Mississippi State product from Biloxi was released out of Triple-A by the Chicago White Sox. The 28-year-old left-hander had a 10.13 ERA in eight games for Charlotte. A second-round pick out of Starkville in 2014, he made the majors with the New York Yankees the very next year, appearing in seven games. Unfortunately, injuries – two Tommy John surgeries — derailed him thereafter. He spent time in Atlanta’s system and was signed by the White Sox in 2019. Lindgren had some positive results that season and was invited to their alternate site in 2020 and to big league camp this spring. The onetime strikeout machine had eight K’s and 15 walks in eight innings for Charlotte. P.S. Former State standout Jacob Robson, promoted to Triple-A upon his return from playing for Team Canada in an Olympics qualifier, went 4-for-5 with a homer and three RBIs Wednesday for Toledo in Detroit’s chain. Robson, a sixth-year pro with previous Triple-A experience, was hitting .424 in Double-A this season. The Tigers might have plans for him.

10 Jun

where are they now?

Of the Mississippians drafted in 2020, Garrett Crochet was the only one to make his pro debut last season, jumping right into the MLB fray with the Chicago White Sox. The Ocean Springs native, the 11th overall pick (out of Tennessee), has fared quite well: 0.37 ERA over 22 career games. Of those whose pro debuts were delayed until 2021, Jordan Westburg has had the best start. The ex-Mississippi State star, the 30th overall pick by Baltimore, already has earned a promotion to High-A ball. After batting .366 with three home runs and 24 RBIs in 20 games at Low-A Delmarva, Westburg was moved to Aberdeen on June 1. He is at .250 with six RBIs in six games there. Justin Foscue, the 14th overall selection out of MSU, is batting .182 with two homers and six RBIs in 12 games at High-A Hickory in the Texas’ system. He is currently on the injured list, as are the two players drafted out of Ole Miss last year. Third-rounder Anthony Servideo is at Low-A Delmarva (Orioles), where he is at .246 with seven RBIs in 20 games. Fourth-rounder Tyler Keenan is batting .163 with a homer and 12 RBIs with Seattle’s High-A Everett club. Former State star J.T. Ginn, drafted in the second round by the New York Mets, made his second career start on Wednesday, throwing four innings for Low-A St. Lucie. Coming off Tommy John surgery, Ginn has a 1.29 ERA in seven innings. Colt Keith, a fifth-round pick from Biloxi High, is 2-for-7 in two games for Low-A Lakeland (Detroit). Blaze Jordan, the highly publicized slugger picked in the third round out of DeSoto Central, has yet to debut in Boston’s system.