Author Archives: Mike Christensen

16 Aug

slamming the door

Former Southern Miss standout Ryan Och shared in a bit of history with the San Antonio Missions on Thursday. The left-hander, in his fourth season in the San Diego system, got the last four outs (on 11 pitches) in a three-man no-hitter, the 16th in San Antonio’s long minor league history. Och has a 3.10 ERA in 12 appearances for the Double-A Missions and a 4.02 with two saves overall in 2024. He was a key bullpen arm for USM in 2021, posting an 8-0 record with a 1.27 ERA and a ton of strikeouts for a 40-21 team that reached the title game of the Oxford Regional. San Diego drafted Och in the seventh round that summer. In 59 career pro games, he has a 3.77 ERA and 141 strikeouts in 88 1/3 innings. … In Thursday’s game, an 8-0 win for the Missions against Amarillo, Ole Miss alum Kevin Graham went 0-for-3 (three strikeouts) for the Sod Poodles, an Arizona affiliate. (He didn’t face Och.) Graham, who played on UM’s 2022 national title team, is batting .222 in his first Double-A campaign.

14 Aug

checking the charts

There are lofty expectations for three recent Mississippi high school players of the year. In MLB Pipeline’s new Top 100 minor league prospects list released on Tuesday, Konnor Griffin (Jackson Prep) is ranked No. 55, Braden Montgomery (Madison Central) No. 59 and Cooper Pratt (Magnolia Heights) No. 62. Griffin, drafted ninth overall by Pittsburgh last month, is rated the Pirates’ No. 2 prospect, despite not having played a pro game. He was the national prep player of the year for 2024. Montgomery, drafted 12th overall in July out of Texas A&M by Boston, is already No. 4 in the Red Sox’s system; he hasn’t yet been assigned to a team either as he recovers from an ankle injury. Pratt was drafted last year and is now Milwaukee’s No. 2 prospect; he is batting .287 with four homers, 39 RBIs and 27 steals over two levels of Class A ball. … Roughly two dozen players with Mississippi ties appear in the Top 30 rankings of individual MLB clubs. Of note: Southern Miss alum Hurston Waldrep, who already has some big league time in his second pro season, is Atlanta’s No. 3. … Dakota Jordan, former Jackson Academy star drafted out of Mississippi State in July, checks in at No. 5 in San Francisco’s chain. … Jurrangelo Cijntje, the switch-pitcher drafted 15th overall out of MSU, is rated Seattle’s No. 7. … Former Jackson Prep standout Will Warren, who has made two appearances with the New York Yankees this season, is the No. 5 prospect in that system. P.S. USM product Matthew Etzel, Tampa Bay’s No. 25 prospect, hit his first two homers for Montgomery in Tuesday’s 18-5 blowout of Pensacola in the Double-A Southern League. Etzel is batting .278 with eight homers and 42 steals overall in 2024, having been traded by Baltimore to the Rays last month. … East Union High’s Landon Harmon, the Class 2A Mr. Baseball this past season, is slated to participate in today’s MLB-sponsored High School All-America Game at Petco Park. … Mike Cubbage, former major league infielder who managed the 1986 Jackson Mets to a division title in the Texas League, has died at age 74.

13 Aug

what might have been

There were no box scores in the newspapers on this date 30 years ago. The MLB players’ strike started on Aug. 12, 1994, and the season never resumed. No playoffs. No World Series. Zip. Perhaps no team was more devastated by the strike and its fallout than the Montreal Expos, a club loaded with talent — including former Ole Miss star Jeff Fassero – that had the best record (74-40) in MLB. Left-hander Fassero, in his fourth big league season, was 8-6 with a 2.99 ERA when the season was halted. He was part of a staff that included Pedro Martinez, Ken Hill and John Wetteland. The lineup featured Larry Walker, Marquis Grissom, Moises Alou and Cliff Floyd. Felipe Alou was the manager. They were good. Their fans were left to wonder what might have been for a club that only once had made the postseason since its birth in 1969. Some say the lost season was the beginning of the end for the Expos in Montreal, where they never drew well. Ownership began to purge the roster in 1995. Fassero left after the ’96 season. The franchise shifted to Washington in 2005. Fassero pitched 16 years all told in the majors, winning 121 games and striking out 1,643 batters. A fine career. He pitched for three teams that made the postseason, though it’s safe to say none were as talented as the ’94 Expos. P.S. Will Wagner, son of former Jackson Generals standout Billy Wagner, went 3-for-4 in his big league debut Monday for Toronto.

12 Aug

short hops

Baseball is a non-contact sport, except when a 97-mph fastball hits you in the face. Blaze Jordan, the ex-DeSoto Central High star, took one just below his right eye on Friday in a game for Double-A Portland. “Baseball is rough sometimes,” Jordan said on X (Twitter). “Be back soon!” He went on the seven-day injured list with a nasty black eye. The 21-year-old Boston prospect is batting .253 with seven home runs and 51 RBIs in his first full year at the Class AA level. … Austin Riley, another DeSoto Central alum, blasted his 18th homer of the year – and fourth in August – but it was wasted in Atlanta’s “Nightmare on Blake Street,” a 9-8 loss Sunday at Colorado in which the Rockies scored seven times in the eighth inning. … One day after getting roughed up by Atlanta, former Mississippi State standout Dakota Hudson landed on Colorado’s IL with elbow inflammation. Hudson, who has a 6.17 ERA with the Rockies, was making his first big league appearance since July 3. He had been at Triple-A. … MSU alum Christian MacLeod made his Triple-A debut in the Minnesota system on Sunday, yielding four earned runs in five innings in a loss against Columbus. The 2021 draftee has pitched at three levels in 2024 and has a 3.26 overall ERA. … South Panola product Emaarion Boyd put up a four-hit game on Sunday for High-A Jersey Shore, scored twice and swiped his 20th bag of the season for the Philadelphia affiliate. Boyd, 20, the Phillies’ No. 18 prospect (per MLB Pipeline), is batting .241 for the year with 41 runs and 31 RBIs in 78 games. He has 84 steals in three pro seasons. … There is a new vibe at Alcorn State, where Carlton Hardy, a highly successful college coach, has taken the reins as the Braves’ head man. Hardy spent the last 18 years at Savannah State, where he won a couple of conference coach of the year awards and led the Tigers to a 31-17 record in 2024. The former Grambling State player takes over an Alcorn program that hasn’t had a winning season since 2009. The previous coach, Reggie Williams, went 16-122 in three years.

11 Aug

rising to challenge

Tim Elko is fitting in just fine at the Triple-A level. The former Ole Miss standout belted a pair of home runs for Charlotte on Saturday and now has five in 11 games. He is batting .311 and slugging .667 with eight RBIs and 10 runs for the Knights. If the parent Chicago White Sox – who are awful and fairly desperate for offensive punch – decide to hold open auditions down the stretch, they might give Elko a call. He isn’t on the 40-man roster and isn’t a Top 30 prospect, but he has handled every test in pro ball so far. A 10th-round pick in 2022, the 25-year-old first baseman/DH has posted a .288 career average with 47 homers in the minors. He has 14 bombs between Double-A and Triple-A this season. The 6-foot-3, 250-pound Elko left Oxford in 2022 after blasting a school-record 24 homers during the Rebels’ amazing run to the national championship. They erected a statue of Elko outside Swayze Field that confirms his status as one of the most popular players ever to suit up for UM. P.S. Ex-Mississippi State star Brent Rooker hit his 29th homer for Oakland on Saturday, the only run of the game in the A’s win against Toronto. If he weren’t stuck with the lowly A’s, Rooker (.290, 82 RBIs, .951 OPS) would likely get strong American League MVP consideration. … Biloxi Shuckers alum Devin Williams, who came off the injured list on July 28, notched his first save of the season, punching out the side in Milwaukee’s 1-0 win over Cincinnati. Williams has a 2.25 ERA with eight K’s in four games for the first-place Brewers. He had 36 saves in 2023.

10 Aug

statement homer

If you can only watch one game today, make it Cleveland at Minnesota. The Twins have cut the first-place Guardians lead to 1.5 games in the American League Central after sweeping a twinbill at Target Field on Friday. Former Southern Miss star Matt Wallner’s three-run homer — reputedly a “called shot” — powered the Twins’ 6-3 win in Game 2. Twins infielder Royce Lewis told reporters postgame that Wallner had said “Imma get him” as he went to the plate in the fifth inning to face Alex Cobb. He launched a 3-0 fastball into the right-field seats to give Minnesota the lead. “I don’t know what I meant by that, but I just felt good about the at-bat,” Wallner said in an mlb.com story. The native of nearby Forest Lake, Minn., got a curtain call from the Minnesota fans. The homer was his sixth since being recalled from Triple-A on July 7. The lefty slugger, USM’s all-time home run leader, figures to be in the lineup tonight against Guardians starter Gavin Williams. Cleveland has lost seven straight, while the Twins have won seven of 10. P.S. Ex-Ocean Springs High standout Garrett Crochet appears to be flaming out after his brilliant start to 2024. The big left-hander, an All-Star last month, surrendered seven runs in 2 1/3 innings on Friday and took the loss for the Chicago White Sox against the Cubs. The Cubs hit four homers off Crochet, who had allowed just 12 in his previous 23 games. His ERA swelled to 3.65. … Former Mississippi State shortstop David Mershon went 1-for-4 in each of his first two pro games for Double-A Rocket City in the Los Angeles Angels’ system. He was an 18th-round draft pick last month.

08 Aug

whatever happened to …

Ethan Small, former SEC pitcher of the year at Mississippi State and a first-round draft pick in 2019, is currently on a rehab assignment in San Francisco’s minor league system. The 27-year-old left-hander pitched relatively well in his first three outings for Triple-A Sacramento but got whacked on Tuesday, surrendering four runs while getting just one out. His ERA over eight rehab appearances all told is 9.00. After going 10-2 with a 1.93 ERA in Starkville in 2019, Small was the 28th overall pick by Milwaukee in that year’s draft. Despite some success in the minors, he made just four big league appearances with the Brewers — 8.71 ERA in 10 1/3 innings — before they traded him to San Francisco this February. The Giants put him on their 40-man roster but also put him on the 60-day injured list with an oblique strain. He made his first rehab appearance on July 16 in rookie ball. It seems unlikely that he’ll have an impact with the Giants this season.

07 Aug

surfing the wire

Several Mississippi products were on the move in the minors the past couple days, including 2024 MLB draftees Cam Schuelke, Cole Tolbert and Colby Holcombe being assigned to Class A clubs in their respective organizations. Schuelke, the submarine-style right-hander from Mississippi State, was assigned to Low-A Lynchburg by Cleveland after going in the 19th round of last month’s draft. Schuelke was 5-3 with two saves and a 4.21 ERA in 32 games at State this season. Tolbert, who had a 7.71 ERA in six appearances at Ole Miss, was sent to Low-A Salem by Boston, which drafted him in the 18th round. Tolbert, from Laurel, was on Pearl River Community College’s national title team in 2022. Holcombe, an MSU and Northeast Mississippi CC alum, was placed at Low-A Dunedin by Toronto, which took him in the ninth round. MSU product Eric Cerantola, a fourth-year pro, was promoted to Triple-A Omaha by Kansas City; he had a 2.78 ERA in 24 games in Double-A. Former Bulldogs standout K.C. Hunt moved from High-A Wisconsin to Double-A Biloxi in the Milwaukee chain; he was 7-1 with a 1.95 ERA at two levels of A-ball this season. Ex-MSU star Cade Smith, 6-6 with a 3.47 ERA in Low-A ball, was promoted to High-A Hudson Valley by the New York Yankees. And Landon Tompkins, a Northwest Rankin and Hinds CC product, moved up to High-A Greensboro in the Pittsburgh system; he had a 3.86 ERA and seven saves at Low-A Bradenton.

05 Aug

patience, patience …

Two months into this season, Kansas City Royals fans had to be wondering if their team had made a mistake in signing Hunter Renfroe as a free agent in the off-season. The ex-Mississippi State star from Crystal Springs was batting .178 with four home runs on May 31. But a little patience on the part of Royals management appears to have paid off. Renfroe hit .333 in June, .297 in July and is currently riding a 10-game hit streak that has raised his average to .246. He has 11 homers, 44 RBIs and 36 runs and has been a good complementary piece in a KC lineup that features Bobby Witt Jr. and Salvador Perez. Renfroe is also an excellent right fielder, with six assists and one error in 92 games. On Sunday at Detroit, the nine-year MLB veteran singled to lead off the ninth inning and came around to score on M.J. Melendez’s clutch three-run homer as the Royals won 3-2, their seventh win in 10 games. They are 63-50 and currently hold the third wild card in the American League. Renfroe, who entered this season with 177 career homers, signed with the Royals for $6.5 million; he has played for seven different teams the past seven years. He was a first-round draft pick by San Diego in 2013 after an All-America career at State. P.S. Southern Miss alum Landon Harper extended his streak of scoreless innings to 25 1/3 for the Mississippi Braves, who nonetheless lost — again — to Tennessee on Sunday at Trustmark Park. Harper, a third-year pro from Meridian, has a 0.95 ERA in 14 games for the Double-A M-Braves. He has fanned 25 and walked just two in 28 1/3 innings. … Brody Breithaupt, a former Lafayette High standout, delivered a two-run walk-off single in the bottom of the seventh to give the North Delta Dealers a 10-9 win over the HillCountry Generals in the Cotton States League championship game in New Albany.

04 Aug

that sinking feeling

Garrett Crochet, the All-Star from Ocean Springs, took the mound for the Chicago White Sox on Saturday and pitched well over his four innings, allowing just a single run. The good start did not matter. The hapless ChiSox lost for the 19th straight time, 6-2 at Minnesota. Chicago (27-86) hasn’t won since July 10. Crochet (6-8, 3.19 ERA, after a no-decision Saturday) hasn’t won since June 7. Converted from reliever to starter this spring, the left-hander is having his innings limited. He hasn’t thrown more than four in his last five starts. He is at 118 1/3 innings in 23 starts on the season. Saturday’s start was his first since the trade deadline, when the constraints he placed on his availability the rest of the way likely kept him from being dealt to a contender. So he is stuck with one of the worst teams in history, a team that is threatening the 1961 Philadelphia Phillies’ record for consecutive losses (23). The White Sox rank last in MLB in runs, batting and OPS and are 19th in homers and walks. (Though he hasn’t had much to work with this year, hitting coach Marcus Thames, the ex-East Central Community College slugger, probably won’t be back in 2025.) P.S. On a more positive note: Cheers for the late Red Barber, the Columbus native who was formally inducted into the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame on Saturday. Barber, the legendary voice of the old Brooklyn Dodgers (among others from 1934-66), is in the National Baseball Hall of Fame as one of the first recipients of the Ford C. Frick Award. … Biloxi High product Colt Keith of the Detroit Tigers was named the American League’s rookie of the month for July. He hit .322 (.404 on-base percentage) with seven homers and 17 RBIs. … The North Delta Dealers and HillCountry Generals will meet today for the Cotton States League title at Legion Field in New Albany. Avery Benson, an MUW alum, homered and drove in three runs and Sam Roy (Holmes CC) delivered the walk-off knock as the Dealers beat Tallahatchie 8-7 on Saturday. Benji Webb (Blue Mountain Christian) pitched a complete game, fanning 12 over the seven innings, and Joseph Rollins (Eupora High) drove in three runs for the Generals in a 5-2 win against Tupelo. … Davis Bradshaw, former McLaurin High and Meridian CC star, was released by Miami. In six pro seasons, he had a .303 career average with five homers in 379 games, only 45 above A-ball.