Monthly Archives: March 2022

13 Mar

changing lanes

J.T. Ginn appeared to have a bright future with the New York Mets. That future, still bright, is now with Oakland. The Mets, all in on 2022, have traded former Mississippi State star Ginn and another top pitching prospect to the A’s for All-Star right-hander Chris Bassitt. The Mets gave Ginn a $2.9 million signing bonus as a second-round draft pick in 2020, not long after his sophomore year at MSU was halted by Tommy John surgery. The Brandon native made his pro debut last summer and pitched well at two levels of A-ball, flashing the form that earned him national freshman of the year honors with the Bulldogs in 2019. Ginn, 22, went 5-5 with a 3.03 ERA last year, working 92 innings with 81 strikeouts and 22 walks. He already has been slotted in as Oakland’s No. 4 prospect by MLB Pipeline, and he might make the big leagues quicker with the A’s than he would have with the Mets.

11 Mar

spotlight on …

Pearl River Community College has risen to No. 2 in the NJCAA Division II poll heading into its conference-opening doubleheader Saturday against Northwest at Poplarville. The Wildcats are 11-3, having last played last weekend, when Tate Parker’s walk-off homer beat Coastal Alabama-North. Parker, from Gulfport, leads PRCC’s potent lineup with a .426 average, six homers (tied for third nationally) and 19 RBIs. McComb’s Alex Perry is hitting .385 with five homers, and Oak Grove product Turner Swistak is 2-0 with a 0.64 ERA in four games, three starts. Northwest, not ranked, is 10-6 with six straight wins. Notable: Ryan Lee hit for the cycle in a game last week, reported to be the first time for a Rangers player since 2006. East Central is No. 5 in the national poll, Meridian No. 7, Northeast No. 15 and Jones No. 20. MACCC play starts this weekend.
Delta State has won seven straight, including a road victory against nationally ranked Southern Arkansas on Wednesday, and is 10-5 heading into a Gulf South Conference series vs. Lee University this weekend in Cleveland. DSU is 5-3 in the league. Chad Ragland is the reigning GSC player of the week; he hit .556 with a cycle in four games last week and went 2-for-5 with two RBIs in the win over SAU. Ragland is at .433 for the year for the NCAA Division II Statesmen.

10 Mar

here comes the sun

The deal is done. The MLB lockout is over. At long last, major league camps will be opening for spring training, reportedly as soon as Sunday. Here’s the list of Mississippians on 40-man rosters who’ll be headed to Florida and Arizona:
Hitters
Anthony Alford (Petal HS), Pittsburgh; Tim Anderson (East Central CC), Chicago White Sox; Bobby Bradley (Harrison Central HS), Cleveland; Nick Fortes (Ole Miss), Miami; Adam Frazier (Mississippi State), Seattle; Nate Lowe (MSU), Texas; Hunter Renfroe (MSU), Milwaukee; Austin Riley (DeSoto Central HS), Atlanta; Brent Rooker (MSU), Minnesota.
Pitchers
Garrett Crochet (Ocean Springs), Chicago White Sox; Demarcus Evans (Petal), Texas; Kendall Graveman (MSU), Chicago White Sox; Dakota Hudson (MSU), St. Louis; Lance Lynn (Ole Miss), Chicago White Sox; Mike Mayers (Ole Miss), Los Angeles Angels; James McArthur (Ole Miss), Philadelphia; Konnor Pilkington (MSU), Cleveland; Drew Pomeranz (Ole Miss), San Diego; Ryan Rolison (Ole Miss), Colorado; Nick Sandlin (Southern Miss), Cleveland; Justin Steele (Lucedale), Chicago Cubs; Chris Stratton (MSU), Pittsburgh; Spencer Turnbull (Madison Central HS), Detroit; Brandon Woodruff (MSU), Milwaukee.
Free agents of note: Corey Dickerson (Meridian CC); Jarrod Dyson (Southwest CC); Chris Ellis (Ole Miss); Billy Hamilton (Taylorsville HS); Mitch Moreland (MSU); Cody Reed (Northwest CC).

10 Mar

three stars

From Wednesday’s slate of compelling matchups and mismatches around the Magnolia State:
Peyton Chatagnier: The Ole Miss second baseman/leadoff batter starred in a nomination for play of the year, cleverly stealing three bases — and making the ESPN SportsCenter highlights — in the Rebels’ 16-1 win against winless Alcorn State at Swayze Field in Oxford. Chatagnier swiped second on a pickoff attempt, took third when he noticed no one was covering and then sprinted home after the Alcorn catcher, who had run up the line to take the belated throw from second, left the plate unguarded. Chatagnier also homered in the game and scored four times as the 11-1 Rebels, a consensus top five team, dispatched the 0-8 Braves.
Tanner Hall: The Southern Miss right-hander, who baffled Mississippi State last week, was at it again against Tulane, throwing eight strong innings — four hits, an unearned run and eight strikeouts — in the Golden Eagles’ 7-2 win over the Green Wave at Taylor Park in Hattiesburg. Hall is 2-0 with an 0.84 ERA in five appearances for 10-3 USM.
Hunter Hines: The freshman from Madison Central High, batting in the 3-hole as the DH, accounted for both of Mississippi State’s runs in a 7-2 loss against Texas Tech in a matchup of nationally ranked teams at MGM Park in Biloxi. Hines is batting .367 with four homers, 14 RBIs and 14 runs for the Bulldogs (7-7).

08 Mar

save the date

One month from today, the Mississippi Braves, defending champions in the Double-A South, will take the field for the 2022 season opener against visiting Montgomery. The centerpiece of the team is expected to be the center fielder, Michael Harris II, Atlanta’s No. 1 prospect per Baseball America. Braves instructor Greg Walker called Harris “a special talent” in an mlb.com story posted Monday, and 2021 M-Braves catcher Shea Langeliers labeled Harris “an unreal athlete” in the same piece. Harris, 6 feet, 195 pounds, hit .294 with seven home runs and 27 steals at High-A Rome last season. A lefty hitter and thrower, he also won a Gold Glove. He was a two-way prospect at Stockbridge (Ga.) High, but the Braves drafted him as a hitter in the third round in 2019, and he has not disappointed. Pearl has likely seen the last of Langeliers, the Braves’ ’21 minor league player of the year, but several other M-Braves who were on the field for the title-clinching victory last September could be back. Among them: sluggers Drew Lugbauer, Greyson Jenista and C.J. Alexander and speedsters Justin Dean and Trey Harris. Other highly rated prospects who could move up from A-ball include outfielder Jesse Franklin V, a former Michigan star who hit .244 with 21 homers, 61 RBIs and 19 bags at Rome, and 6-3 shortstop Vaughn Grissom, who batted .319 with seven homers and 16 steals in A-ball. He played most of the season at Low-A Augusta. The top-rated pitching prospect who might make it to Pearl is Ryan Cusick, a 6-6, 235 right-hander drafted in the first round last summer out of Wake Forest. Pegged as the Braves’ No. 6 prospect by MLB Pipeline, he pitched in six games at Augusta and struck out more than two batters an inning. Joey Estes, the No. 14 prospect, went 3-6 with a 2.91 ERA at Augusta. … April 8 will be here soon. Regardless of what happens with MLB, the M-Braves and Biscuits will hook up at Trustmark Park. Something to look forward to.

07 Mar

what’s going on …

It was quite a wild weekend for state college teams.
Here’s a quick summary: Ole Miss lost for the first time. Mississippi State lost two of three games and may have lost its ace. Southern Miss won a series at Louisiana-Lafayette with a rubber game rally. Jackson State pounded hapless Alcorn State three times at Braddy Field. Mississippi College beat the No. 1 team in NCAA Division II (see previous post). Delta State swept a conference series on the road. William Carey took two of three from Blue Mountain in an SSAC opening series. Belhaven, playing at Trustmark Park in Pearl, swept a conference series. Millsaps opened conference play by winning a home series. MUW, playing its first home games in Columbus, took two of three from Greenville University.
Here are some observations, not necessarily astute: Ole Miss, ranked as high as No. 2, hit 19 bombs — five by Tim Elko — in its first nine games before getting blanked at Central Florida on Saturday in a 1-0, 12-inning loss. The Rebels (10-1) showed they could win without a homer as they bounced back for a 9-1 victory in Game 3 on Sunday. … State (6-6) scored 33 runs at Tulane but lost two of three. The Bulldogs’ staff ERA is 4.49 due mainly to a leaky bullpen. Landon Sims’ arm injury, if serious, could be an even bigger problem. … Hunter Riggins won 27 games over a stellar career at Delta State and is now 3-0 with a 0.45 ERA for USM (8-3). The Hernando native threw a shutout on Saturday at ULL. … New Alcorn State coach Reginald Williams could be in a for a long year as he attempts to rebuild the program. The Braves fell to 0-7 after getting swept by Jackson State this weekend. The Tigers (8-5) outscored the Braves 39-5. Alcorn made eight errors in Sunday’s game, a 14-3 defeat. … Carey’s A.J. Stinson improved to 3-0 with a six-hitter against Blue Mountain on Saturday in the rubber game of their SSAC series at Hattiesburg. Stinson struck out 11 in a 128-pitch effort in the 10-2 win in the second game of a twinbill. The Crusaders are 14-4, the Toppers 10-7. … A three-run homer by Hunter White and some clutch relief work by Will Swift carried Belhaven (7-5) to a 4-2 win over Howard Payne on Saturday and a sweep of their American Southwest Conference series. … Sam Pitre homered and drove in four runs and Ryan Erwin picked up his fourth win in relief as Millsaps (11-5) whipped Centre College 15-5 on Sunday in the rubber game of a Southern Athletic Association series.

06 Mar

down goes no. 1

Off to a tough start this season, Mississippi College got something to hang its hat on Saturday: a win over the No. 1-ranked team in NCAA Division II. Behind the strong pitching of Jackson Bridges and Brooks Warren, the Choctaws beat the University of Tampa 4-3 at Tampa, Fla., for just their sixth win in 18 games. Tampa, a longtime D-II powerhouse with eight national titles, is 15-2. Bridges, from Tupelo by way of Meridian Community College, went eight-plus, improving to 3-0 with a 2.73 ERA in five starts in 2022. He carried a 4-2 lead into the ninth but yielded a leadoff home run and was replaced by Warren, a onetime Southern Miss pitcher from French Camp. Warren walked the first batter he faced, then struck out the side. The left-hander has a 1.69 ERA on the year. Matthew Priest had a couple of hits and two RBIs for MC, and Brandon’s Tristan Tigrett and Jackson Breedlove also drove in runs. MC led 3-0 in the third inning. The Choctaws lost to fourth-ranked Southern Arkansas 8-1 at home on Tuesday, then dropped a pair of close games at Tampa on Friday. The gauntlet continues on Tuesday when they get No. 19 Arkansas Tech at Frierson Field in Clinton.

04 Mar

local flavor

Heads up, Biloxi Shuckers fans. A home-grown player appears headed that way next month. Joe Gray Jr., the ex-Hattiesburg High star, said in an mlb.com article that Double-A Biloxi is where he’s aiming to launch his 2022 season and build on the big year he had in A-ball. “That’s going to mean a lot,” Gray said of not just reaching the game’s pivotal level in his fourth pro season but playing close to home. Beset by illness and injuries in his first two seasons and shelved by the pandemic in 2020, Milwaukee’s second-round pick from 2018 broke out in 2021, batting .252 with 20 homers, 90 RBIs and 23 steals at two levels of A-ball. He also got an Arizona Fall League assignment. “So long as I’m on the field, stuff is going to happen,” Gray told mlb.com in a very interesting interview that covers his childhood on a farm in Carson (outside of Hattiesburg), why he chose baseball over football and his difficult bout with pneumonia in 2018. Minor league roster decisions are a long way off, but there is a strong chance the 21-year-old Gray, the Brewers’ No. 9 prospect, will be in center field when the Shuckers open April 8 at Pensacola. The team’s first game at MGM Park is set for April 12 against the Mississippi Braves. P.S. Madison Central alum Spencer Turnbull is throwing again and is optimistic he’ll pitch for Detroit sometime in 2022, according to a Detroit News report. Turnbull had Tommy John surgery last summer. The right-hander, 29, went 4-2 with a 2.88 ERA and tossed a no-hitter on May 18 last year. … Former Loyd Star standout James Beard was named the best defensive prospect in the Chicago White Sox system by MLB Pipeline. The speedy Beard, a center fielder, was a fourth-round pick in 2019. His bat is still a work in progress; he hit .192 with five homers and nine steals at Low-A Kannapolis in 2021. Mississippi State and Jackson Prep alum Jake Mangum (see previous post) was pegged as the top defensive prospect in the New York Mets organization.

03 Mar

punched out

Swing and a miss. The enduring image from Wednesday night’s Mississippi State-Southern Miss clash at Trustmark Park in Pearl is of Bulldogs batters flailing at off-speed pitches from Golden Eagles right-hander Tanner Hall. Before a crowd of 6,387 mostly MSU fans, Hall struck out 13 over seven shutout innings as USM decked the defending national champs 7-1. Bulldogs fans, boisterous at the outset, had little to cheer about as the game went on and the night grew cold. Bulldogs batters were muzzled by Hall, a sophomore from Louisiana making his fourth appearance, second start, for the 6-2 Eagles. He threw 98 pitches, 72 for strikes. Appropriately, he whiffed the last batter he faced. Hall’s counterpart for State, Jackson Fristoe, lasted just three-plus, struck out none and was hit hard. The big blow was a two-run triple by Gabe Montenegro that put USM up 2-0 in the third inning. Reece Ewing followed with an RBI single. USM went up 6-0 in the fifth on a two-run double by Slade Wilks. All told, the opportunistic Eagles produced seven hits, seven walks and two sac bunts. The Bulldogs, a consensus top 10 team at the moment, are scuffling at 5-4. They’re hitting .260 as a team and have fanned 72 times. They managed seven hits Wednesday, but their only big knock was an eighth-inning RBI double off the bat of star catcher Logan Tanner. State will no doubt get it turned around at some point, but Wednesday night was a swing and a miss.