Tag Archives: Brewers

29 May

top of the heap

The ride has been anything but smooth for Milwaukee, but the Brewers have reached Memorial Day — a traditional benchmark — in first place in the National League Central. They beat San Francisco 7-5 on Sunday to snap a three-game skid and move to 28-25, 1.5 games up on Pittsburgh in a weak division. Devin Williams and William Contreras — two of several Mississippi connections on the Milwaukee roster — were key figures in Sunday’s win. The remarkable Williams, a former Biloxi Shuckers star, got the last four outs for the save; he is 8-for-8 with an 0.54 ERA. Catcher Contreras, a former Mississippi Braves standout and a 2022 All-Star for Atlanta before being traded, contributed a two-run homer and an RBI single; he is batting .250 with five bombs and 16 RBIs. The Brewers have nine players from their opening day roster on the injured list, including ace Brandon Woodruff, the Mississippi State product, and promising rookie Garrett Mitchell, a Shuckers alum. The team has wobbled through a 10-15 May but still sits atop the division. “We keep grinding through it,” Williams told mlb.com. (Ex-State star Ethan Small was sent back to Triple-A after a rocky outing in his 2023 debut.) … For the record, there is a Mississippi thread running through all of the six teams currently in first place in the big leagues. In Tampa Bay, there is former M-Braves catcher Christian Bethancourt, a highly rated prospect when he passed through Pearl a decade ago. He has taken a winding path to Tampa. In Minnesota, ex-Southern Miss star Matt Wallner was recently recalled from the minors and might be sticking around, having gone 7-for-11 with a homer, four RBIs and two walks in his last four games. In Texas, MSU product Nathaniel Lowe continues to rake for the power-packed Rangers: .273, five homers, 29 RBIs. In Los Angeles (Chavez Ravine branch), there is a trio of former M-Braves: the irrepressible Freddie Freeman, Jason Heyward and Evan Phillips (an unsung bullpen piece who has seven saves and a 1.77 ERA). And in Atlanta, the bulk of the club is M-Braves alums: Ronald Acuna, Ozzie Albies, Max Fried, Michael Harris II, Charlie Morton, Austin Riley, Spencer Strider, et al. And Orlando Arcia was on the first Biloxi club back in 2015. DeSoto Central High grad Riley hit his 10th homer in Sunday’s win against Philadelphia and is batting .357 over his last seven games. P.S. Shout-out to Scott Berry and Southern Miss, which won the Sun Belt Conference Tournament championship on Sunday, getting big homers from Dustin Dickerson, Danny Lynch and Slade Wilks and lockdown relief work from Justin Storm. Denied an NCAA regional host bid despite their 41-17 record (and 19-2 finishing kick), the Golden Eagles await the announcement today of their regional destination. Baton Rouge? Tuscaloosa? Fayetteville? … East Central Community College was eliminated from the NJCAA Division II World Series after an 11-10 loss to Frederick (Md.) CC in Enid, Okla. The Warriors won both the MACCC title and the Region 23 crown en route to the World Series.

26 May

main attraction

Like so many of his Mississippi Braves teammates this season, Drew Lugbauer doesn’t hit much. But when the left-handed Lugbauer does get into one, it typically goes a long way. He hit his 10th home run of the season on Thursday night, a majestic blast into the Farm Bureau Grill beyond the right-field fence at Trustmark Park. It was the third homer in as many games on this homestand for the 6-foot-3, 220-pound former Michigan star who is nicknamed “Slugbauer.” He is, at present, the main attraction on a team that is last in the Southern League in runs and last in the South Division with an 18-23 record that includes a 6-2 loss to Pensacola on Thursday. Lugbauer, 26, is batting just .217, actually one of the better averages in Thursday’s lineup. Ten of his 26 hits this season have left the yard. He leads the SL in homers and is on pace to break the M-Braves’ single-season record of 28 homers that he set last year. (For the record, the Jackson Mets/Generals record at Smith-Wills Stadium is Darryl Strawberry’s 34 in 1982.) In his third season with the M-Braves, Lugbauer is also the career homer leader with 56. Many a fearsome slugger has passed through Pearl since 2005: Jeff Francoeur, Matt Esquivel, Kala Ka’aihue, Jason Heyward, Michael Rosamond, Ernesto Mejia, Evan Gattis, Dustin Peterson, Ronald Acuna, to name a few. Lugbauer has bragging rights over all of them. … Austin Riley, another of those former M-Braves sluggers, had quite the night for Atlanta on Thursday, hitting two monstrous homers in an 8-5 win against Philadelphia at Truist Park. Riley, a former DeSoto Central standout, is just the third player to hit two homers of 455 feet-plus in one game in the last nine years; the other two did it at Coors Field in Colorado. Riley has nine homers on the season for the first-place Braves. P.S. Surprising Baltimore (second-best record in MLB) just completed a 5-1 road trip through Toronto and New York (Yankee Stadium) and ex-Mississippi State star Adam Frazier went 10-for-27 with two homers, seven RBIs and six runs in the six games. Frazier is hitting .253 with six homers and 23 RBIs in his first season with the Orioles. … Shout-out to former M-Braves ace Julio Teheran, who threw five solid innings (but took a loss) for Milwaukee on Thursday in his first big league game since 2021. Teheran, part of a combo no-hitter for the M-Braves in 2010, has 78 career MLB wins. He ranks with the best of the many standout pitchers who have come through Pearl. … Southern Miss is 2-0 in the Sun Belt Conference Tournament after Danny Lynch delivered a walk-off win against Troy. Jackson State bowed out of the SWAC Tournament with a second straight one-run defeat.

16 May

staying the course

With four hits, including a home run on Monday night, plus two walks in his last three games, it looks like Austin Riley might be coming out of his lengthy slump. The former DeSoto Central High star’s seventh homer of the season, a deep blast to right-center at Globe Life Field, was one of five bombs Atlanta hit in a 12-0 win over Texas that snapped a four-game losing skid. It was Riley’s first homer since May 3, though he has had some hard-hit balls in the interim. He has 20 RBIs, ranking just fifth on the team. His average, which had dipped to .239 on on May 9, is now at .245. He is a .270 career hitter and batted .300 in 2021. Watching Riley play, you’d never guess he has been slumping. He never shows any sign of frustration or anger. His defense at third base is unaffected. He punches in every day, always with the same calm demeanor. Slumps, Riley said in a recent interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, are “part of the game. I think how you deal with it is what brings you out of the back end of it.” Maybe that’s what’s happening now. P.S. Former Meridian Community College standout Corey Dickerson was activated from injured list by Washington on Monday, though he did not play. Dickerson is eight hits shy of 1,000 for his big league career, which began in 2013. … Milwaukee transferred ex-Mississippi State star Brandon Woodruff (shoulder inflammation) to the 60-day IL, retroactive to April 8. That likely means it’ll be late June at the earliest before the Brewers get their horse back. Before landing on the IL, he was 1-0 with a 0.79 ERA in two starts. … The Brewers sent Hattiesburg High product Joe Gray Jr. back to High-Class A Wisconsin from Double-A Biloxi. Gray was 2-for-37 in his first taste of Double-A pitching … Mississippi State alum Jordan Westburg is ranked No. 52 in MLB Pipeline’s recently updated list of the Top 100 minor league prospects. Westburg, who was 74th in the February rankings, is batting .321 with 11 homers in Triple-A in Baltimore’s system. Biloxi High product Colt Keith cracked the Top 100 at No. 87. Keith is hitting .266 with five homers in Double-A in Detroit’s chain.

04 May

farm livin’

After four-plus seasons of grinding in the low minors, former Hattiesburg High star Joe Gray Jr. received a promotion to Double-A Biloxi on Tuesday. Gray, a second-round draft pick by Milwaukee five years ago, was batting .247 with a homer, 12 RBIs and five steals at High-Class A Wisconsin when the Brewers moved him. Two games into the big jump, he is still looking for his first hit, having started 0-for-9 with four strikeouts in a series at Montgomery. The 23-year-old outfielder, considered a 5-tool player in high school, has fallen off the Brewers’ prospect charts; he is a .212 career hitter though he has flashed some power and speed. It’s time to put it all together. … The Colorado Rockies, currently 11-20, look like a team that could use some help. Maybe they’ve got an eye on what Hunter Stovall is doing at Triple-A Albuquerque. The Mississippi State product is batting .381 in 17 games. He was on base six times in the Isotopes’ 22-4 win over Sugar Land on Wednesday, hitting his first home run of the season, scoring three runs and knocking in two. The middle infielder, 26, is in his fifth year of pro ball. … Jordan Westburg is clamoring for a call-up from Baltimore. The ex-State star went 3-for-5 with a homer and three RBIs for Triple-A Norfolk and is at .337 for the year with six bombs. He has played five different positions this season, though second base might be where he fits best. … Southern Miss alum Chuckie Robinson is batting .414 with three homers and 12 RBIs in 20 games at Triple-A Louisville. If or when Cincinnati needs a catcher, he looks ready for a second MLB stint. … Pitching exclusively out of the bullpen this season, former MSU ace Ethan Small has done solid work for Milwaukee’s Triple-A Nashville club. The lefty, the Brewers’ No. 13 prospect, tossed three scoreless innings Wednesday, trimming his ERA to 2.70 in nine appearances. His brief big league looks as a starter in 2022 didn’t go well, but he’ll get another shot in this new role. … Hoping to become the first Mississippi College alum to play in the majors since Harry Craft in 1942, Blaine Crim just keeps banging in the Texas system. Crim, a first baseman, went 2-for-5 for Triple-A Round Rock in a Wednesday doubleheader to boost his average to .300 with two homers and seven RBIs. He is a .304 career hitter over four minor league campaigns. P.S. Taylorsville native Billy Hamilton, the speedy MLB veteran, is back in The Show with the Chicago White Sox and in two appearances as a pinch runner, he has a run and a stolen base. The White Sox won both games.

18 Apr

the power of power

Hunter Renfroe is a good outfielder with a great arm. The former Mississippi State star also runs pretty well for a 230-pound dude. But never mind that. It’s his ability to hit dingers that grabs our attention. The Crystal Springs native hit his 161st big league homer on Monday, a three-run blast in the first inning that boosted the Los Angeles Angels to a 5-4 win over Boston on Patriots Day at Fenway Park. Renfroe has moved past Bill Melton and Frank White (both with 160) and into eighth place on the all-time homer list of Mississippi natives in the majors. (Dmitri Young, with 171, is next in Renfroe’s sights.) Renfroe was a power prodigy in high school, belting an MAIS record 20 bombs for Copiah Academy back in 2010. He went deep 16 times as a junior at State in 2013, earning All-America honors and then getting drafted in the first round by San Diego. He continued to rake in the minors, belting 77 homers over parts of four seasons before his first big league call-up in 2016. He got his first MLB bomb in his fourth game. In his five full seasons in the majors (not counting 2020), Renfroe has hit 26, 26, 33, 31 and 29 homers. Oddly enough, he has been traded three times since 2019. He’ll likely never be a .300 hitter, but he has improved in that area the previous two years, batting .259 for Boston in 2021 and .255 for Milwaukee last season. The Angels dealt three young pitchers to the Brewers to acquire Renfroe in November, hoping he can help power them into the postseason for the first time since 2014. With four homers in 16 games, he is off to a strong start.

24 Mar

whatever happened to …

Bryson Ware, the ex-Germantown High and Pearl River Community College slugger, is now mashing for Auburn. Batting third and playing third base on Thursday night, Ware went 2-for-6 with a home run, a double, two runs and three RBIs as the Tigers beat visiting Georgia 7-6 in 11 innings for their first SEC win. Ware’s two-run double in the ninth made it a 6-5 game, and the 6-foot-2, 211-pound senior then scored the tying run. Ware, who set a single-season homer record at Germantown, is batting .415 with 10 homers and 26 RBIs this season. His 10 homers are tied for fourth-best in the league — Mississippi State’s Hunter Hines also has 10 — and his .902 slugging percentage ranks third. P.S. Jared Shuster, a Southern League All-Star with the Mississippi Braves in 2022 and Atlanta’s No. 1 prospect, threw six impressive innings against the New York Mets on Thursday and may now be the front-runner for the fifth starter job. The left-hander has a 1.45 ERA in five spring games. With former M-Braves star Michael Soroka having been optioned to Triple-A, Shuster’s main competition for the starting job is fellow 2022 M-Braves alum Dylan Dodd, the Braves’ No. 10 prospect. … Atlanta’s minor league system is ranked No. 30 — last — in MLB Pipeline’s latest evaluation of prospect talent. The Braves have no players in the Top 100, though it’s hard to figure how Shuster didn’t make that list. He went 7-8 with a 2.78 ERA in Double-A last year and made the All-Star Futures Game. … Milwaukee’s system ranks 15th, led by a quartet of former Biloxi Shuckers outfielders: Jackson Chourio, Sal Frelick, Joey Wiemer and Garrett Mitchell, who is the likely opening day center fielder for the Brewers. … Nine M-Braves alums played for Atlanta in Thursday’s 2-2 tie vs. the Mets. One Shuckers product played: big league vet Orlando Arcia, who beat out Vaughn Grissom and Braden Shewmake for the starting shortstop job. Wonder how long that will last? … The M-Braves and New South Radio announced that all 138 M-Braves broadcasts will air on WIIN 780 AM and 102.1 FM The Box this season. Chris Harris and Jack Sadighian are back as the broadcasters.

12 Mar

odds and ends

Sal Frelick, who played for the Biloxi Shuckers in 2022, went 3-for-5 with two RBIs to help Italy upset The Netherlands in pool play today and reach the quarterfinals of the World Baseball Classic. Frelick, an outfielder, is one of Milwaukee’s top-rated prospects and likely will make his MLB debut in 2023. … Mississippi State product Jacob Robson went 4-for-4 with a walk, scored three times and drove in a run as Canada opened WBC play with an 18-8 win against Great Britain. Robson played independent ball last year and spent several seasons in Detroit’s system. He got some big league time in 2021. … Delta State swept a three-game series from Christian Brothers this weekend to improve to an eye-popping 77-4 all-time against its Gulf South Conference rival. … Surging Blue Mountain Christian suddenly dropped three straight at home against SSAC power Mobile to fall to 18-7, 3-3. The Toppers’ Josh Smith, the NAIA pitcher of the week, got roughed up for 10 hits, seven walks and five earned runs in the series opener. Mobile is 20-2, 6-0. … William Carey dropped two of three to Talladega in Hattiesburg in its SSAC opening series. The Crusaders, who had never lost to Talladega, are 16-6 overall. … After its controversial (see previous post) loss against New Orleans on Friday, Mississippi Valley State fell 35-3 to the Privateers on Saturday and 16-3 today. (Note: Valley’s Davon Mims was 1-for-8 with five strikeouts, presumably all legit, in Games 2 and 3.) … Mississippi State, 11-5 with five wins in a row, will play Nicholls State and Louisiana-Lafayette on Tuesday and Wednesday at MGM Park in Biloxi. … Former Ole Miss right-hander James McArthur was optioned to Triple-A by Philadelphia. The 2018 draftee has yet to make his big league debut. … There is a nice piece on former Jackson Mets standout Al Pedrique on milb.com. The new manager of the Double-A Reading Phillies has been playing, coaching or managing in pro ball since 1978. He spent parts of four seasons as the JaxMets’ shortstop in the early 1980s and played parts of three years in the majors. “What is beautiful about this game is you learn something every day,” Pedrique said.

15 Jan

totally random

Culley Rikard is among that passel of Mississippians whose big league career was brief and relatively obscure. The Oxford native and Olive Branch High alum played in 153 games over parts of three seasons, breaking in with Pittsburgh in 1941, a year noteworthy for DiMaggio’s 56 and Williams’ .406 but not so much for Rikard. He had just 20 at-bats. He got a few more ABs in 1942, spent three years in military service and returned to the majors with the Pirates in 1947, a year noteworthy for the debuts of Robinson and Doby but not really for Rikard. He batted .287 and scored 57 runs as the occasional leadoff batter for a really bad Pirates club. That was his final fling in the big leagues. But the tale of Culley Rikard would not be complete without recounting the incident of June 5, 1947, which mostly involves another player and takes up a significant portion of Rikard’s Wikipedia entry. Rikard hit a fly ball that was caught by Pete Reiser in center field at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn. Reiser, famous for crashing into walls, did so on this occasion, knocking himself unconscious and actually receiving last rites before recovering in a hospital. P.S. Kudos to Brandon Woodruff, the ex-Mississippi State standout who received a $10.8 million contract from Milwaukee as the sides avoided arbitration. Woodruff, who has become one of the National League’s best pitchers, went 13-4 with 3.05 ERA in 2022 and is 41-25 career for the Brewers.

08 Dec

change of address

Add Jake Mangum’s name to the list of former Mississippi State outfielders changing teams this off-season. Miami has acquired Mangum from the New York Mets to complete an earlier trade. The 26-year-old Jackson Prep alum is a .284 career hitter over three minor league seasons with 13 homers (in 807 at-bats) and 45 steals. A switch hitter with center-field skills, he hit .333 in Triple-A in 2022, missing some time with a back injury. “He’s got a lot of tools,” Marlins general manager Kim Ng told mlb.com. “(P)retty happy about it.” Mangum was eligible to be taken in Wednesday’s Rule 5 draft since he was not on the Mets’ 40-man roster but wasn’t selected. He isn’t on Miami’s 40-man either but likely will get a shot at making the big league team in spring training. P.S. In other news: Justyn-Henry Malloy and Jake Higginbotham, both of whom played for the Double-A Mississippi Braves in 2022, were dealt to Detroit on Wednesday for big league reliever Joe Jimenez. … Former Jackson Generals manager Rick Sweet was named the winner of Minor League Baseball’s Mike Coolbaugh Award, given “to an individual who has shown outstanding baseball work ethic, knowledge of the game and skill in mentoring young players on the field.” Sweet, the Gens’ skipper in 1991-92, managed Milwaukee’s Triple-A club in 2022. … Chuckie Robinson, the former Southern Miss star who made his MLB debut with Cincinnati in 2022, re-signed as a minor league free agent with the Reds. … MSU product Jonathan Holder, who hasn’t pitched in the majors since 2020, signed a minor league deal with the Los Angeles Angels. The injury-plagued right-hander pitched limited innings in the Chicago Cubs’ system the past two seasons. … Former Northeast Mississippi Community College standout Tyler Samaniego was named as the relief pitcher on Pittsburgh’s 2022 Organization All-Star team by milb.com. Other Organization All-Stars from Mississippi named thus far include Mangum (Mets), Blaze Jordan (Boston), Matt Wallner (Minnesota), Colt Keith (Detroit) and Jordan Westburg (Baltimore). … MLB, in association with the players association and Ken Griffey Jr., will hold the first HBCU Swingman Classic next summer as part of the All-Star Game festivities in Seattle. Fifty players from NCAA Division I HBCUs will be invited for what is described as an “All-Star experience.”

23 Nov

new angel in outfield

The Los Angeles Angels’ 2023 quest to end their eight-year playoff drought will include Hunter Renfroe, the ex-Mississippi State slugger whom they acquired in a trade Tuesday with Milwaukee. Renfroe, who hit 29 homers for the Brewers last season, joins an Angels lineup that features Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani, and he’ll be working with new hitting coach Marcus Thames, the former East Central Community College star. Renfroe, 30, is a .240 career hitter with 157 homers since his 2016 MLB debut and is regarded as an excellent right fielder. “He’s got the total package,” Angels GM Perry Minasian told mlb.com. “We felt like he was a really good fit for us.” The Brewers receive three young pitchers in the trade. The Angels will be Renfroe’s fifth team in five seasons. He has been on two postseason clubs: 2020 Tampa Bay and ’21 Boston. The Crystal Springs native was the 13th overall pick out of Starkville in 2013. P.S. Southern Miss product Matt Wallner, who made his big league debut in September, is pegged by mlb.com as Minnesota’s best rookie of the year candidate for 2023. The left-handed hitting outfielder batted .228 with two homers and 10 RBIs in 18 games for the Twins. He put on a power show last year, blasting 27 homers between Double-A and Triple-A and homering in the All-Star Futures Game and in his first MLB game. … USA Today ranks former Meridian Community College standout Corey Dickerson No. 87 among the 87 best available free agents this off-season. The veteran outfielder, 33, had an inconsistent year with St. Louis, hitting .267 with six homers and 36 RBIs and missing a chunk of time with injury. … Kirk McCarty, ex-USM star from Hattiesburg, was released by Cleveland after being designated for assignment earlier this month. McCarty, a left-hander, made his MLB debut with the Guardians this past season (see previous post).