Tag Archives: Marlins

17 Jul

remember that guy …

Drew Waters had a season for the ages in 2019 with the Mississippi Braves, winning the Southern League batting title and taking MVP honors. Only four Jackson area Double-A players have earned an MVP award, the others being Darryl Strawberry, Gregg Jefferies and Roberto Petagine, all in the Texas League era. A true five-tool player and switch-hitter, Waters batted .319 with five homers, 41 RBIs, 63 runs, 35 doubles, nine triples and 13 stolen bases in 2019. Then he sort of faded away. Squeezed out in the talent-thick Atlanta system, the outfielder was traded to Kansas City in July of last year. Now in his second big league stint with the Royals, Waters is starting to make some noise. He went 2-for-4 Sunday with a 465-foot homer, a triple and two RBIs to help the awful Royals (27-67) beat first-place Tampa Bay 8-4 at Kauffman Stadium. Waters started the 2023 season on the injured list and scuffled when he first returned. But he has hit .319 over his last 15 games to boost his average to .252. He has four homers and 14 RBIs in 40 games. He might be a smart pick to click down the stretch. P.S. Cristian Pache, another former M-Braves standout, has had his resurgent season with Philadelphia interrupted by elbow surgery to have a screw removed. He previously had knee surgery this year. A onetime top Atlanta prospect, Pache is batting .327 in 32 games for the Phillies, his third MLB team. … Jake Mangum, former Mississippi State and Jackson Prep star still seeking his first big league call-up, is batting .333 in July and .293 overall at Triple-A Jacksonville in Miami’s chain. He hit his third homer on Sunday and now has 32 RBIs plus nine steals on the year. … Ole Miss alum Tim Elko belted his second homer and first grand slam at High-Class A Winston-Salem in the Chicago White Sox’s system and is batting .294 in 13 games at this new level. He hit .297 with 17 homers at Low-A Kannapolis. … The White Sox have signed former Ole Miss star Jacob Gonzalez, their first-round draft pick, for a $3.9 million bonus.

04 Jul

eye on …

Hunter Hines essentially has taken the Cape Cod League by storm. The Mississippi State star leads the elite college summer league with eight home runs, five more than the next-closest total, and 26 RBIs, 11 more than the next-highest number. Through 20 games for the Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox, the lefty-hitting outfielder, who goes 6 feet 4, 220 pounds, is batting .289 with 14 runs. Facing some of the top college arms in the country, Hines has picked up right where he left off at State. He hit .297 with 22 homers and 61 RBIs, made All-SEC and was a Ferriss Trophy finalist as a sophomore in 2023. As a freshman, he hit .300 with 16 bombs and 52 RBIs. “From his first BP (batting practice) until now, he’s been the best hitter in our program,” State coach Chris Lemonis said at the Ferriss Trophy ceremony. Hines was a highly touted recruit coming out of Madison Central High in 2021, overshadowed a bit by teammate Braden Montgomery, who took Gatorade player of the year honors. Hines comes by his talent naturally, of course. His father, Richey, was a tremendous hitter at Mississippi College, where he still holds school records for career homers and RBIs. P.S. A raw box score doesn’t always tell the story. Hunter Renfroe went 2-for-5 for the Los Angeles Angels on Monday, boosting his average to .248. But the ex-MSU standout most certainly didn’t feel good about his game. The Angels stranded 14 runners in a 10-3 loss to San Diego. Renfroe personally left eight runners on base, twice striking out in early run-scoring situations. As a team, the Angels are batting just .246 with runners in scoring position, one of the worst averages in baseball. … Kudos to Ole Miss product Nick Fortes, whose clutch hit delivered the go-ahead run in the seventh inning of Miami’s 5-4 win against St. Louis. The second-place Marlins managed to stay within 9 games of red-hot Atlanta, which has won nine in a row, in the National League East.

19 Jun

punching ’em out

There was no joy in Seattle for Lance Lynn and the Chicago White Sox on Sunday, but a record-tying effort deserves some bit of fanfare. Ole Miss alum Lynn struck out 16 batters, matching a franchise mark set in 1954. “My stuff was good,” Lynn told mlb.com, “but we lost. It doesn’t matter how many you strike out if you don’t win the game.” The White Sox’s 5-1 loss dropped their record to 31-42. Lynn is 4-8 with a 6.51 ERA. But Sunday’s outing was one of his best in a tough year. He threw 114 pitches over seven innings, allowed four hits, two walks and three runs. Lynn has 1,817 career punchouts, third-most — for the time being — among Mississippians in MLB history. Now in his 12th big league season, the burly right-hander struck out 246 batters in 2019, most by a Mississippian in a single season. On the career chart, Weir’s Roy Oswalt finished with 1,852 and Meridian Community College alum Cliff Lee got 1,824. Ex-Ole Miss star Jeff Fassero had 1,104, Greenwood native and Mississippi State product Paul Maholm 984 and Leakesville native Wilmer “Vinegar Bend” Mizell 918. Baseball Reference credits Negro Leagues star and Hall of Famer Bill Foster, an Alcorn State alumnus who grew up in Rodney, with 922; he likely had more than that. P.S. Former Ole Miss standout Nick Fortes went 2-for-3 with an RBI and a run as Miami beat Washington to climb 10 games over .500 for the first time in 12 years. The Marlins are 41-31, 5 games back of Atlanta in the National League East. Fortes is batting .243 with four homers and 15 RBIs in 47 games as Miami’s catcher; the team reportedly likes his work behind the plate.

03 Jun

old-school artist

Power is all the rage in baseball. Check the box scores. Who hit one out? Blaze Jordan, Joe Gray Jr. and Colt Keith, all products of Mississippi high schools, blasted home runs in the minors on Friday, as did former Mississippi State star Hunter Stovall. Cheers all around. The art of hitting a single, of just putting a ball in play that results in a base knock, doesn’t have the wow factor. It’s kind of a shame. Here’s a tip of the cap to a guy who seems to have mastered that old-school art. Davis Bradshaw, former McLaurin High and Meridian Community College standout, hit a single on Friday for High-A Beloit in the Miami organization. It was his 33rd single among his 37 hits; he has no homers. The lefty-hitting Bradshaw is batting .398; he was at .415 in mid-May. He was out for a couple of weeks last month, so he doesn’t have enough at-bats to qualify for the Midwest League leaderboard, but he would be second in hitting in all of the minors if he did. Bradshaw has struck out just 16 times and walked eight in 93 at-bats over 29 games. Drafted out of MCC back in 2018, Bradshaw, now 25, carries a .307 career average — but has only two home runs. The lack of power is no doubt holding him back. He is not a rated prospect. He got a look in Double-A last year and hit .286 but was back in A-ball to start 2023. And he went right back to banging out singles, keeping that old-school art alive. P.S. Southern Miss and Auburn might have anticipated meeting on Day 2 of regional play, but they surely didn’t expect the clash to come in the losers bracket. The top two seeds in the Auburn Regional were upset by Samford and Penn. That’s baseball. BTW, Josh Rodriguez, who hit that massive 10th-inning homer for Samford on Friday, was a first-team All-MACCC pick at Hinds Community College last year. … Props to East Union (Class 2A) and Purvis (4A) for winning MHSAA state titles Friday at Trustmark Park in Pearl. Amory plays St. Stanislaus for the 3A crown and Saltillo battles East Central for the 5A title today.

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.”

26 Sep

party time

There was another celebration in MLB on Sunday — the fifth in a seven-day stretch — when Cleveland clinched the American League Central with a 10-4 win at Texas. Former Southern Miss standout Kirk McCarty, one of the record 16 rookies to suit up for Guardians in their title run, threw two scoreless innings in relief, trimming his ERA to 4.28 over 11 appearances. Fellow rookie Konnor Pilkington, the Mississippi State product, wasn’t on the active roster Sunday but also contributed this season, as did ex-USM standout Nick Sandlin, a second-year player who was in uniform and in the clubhouse for the after-party. … MSU alum Kendall Graveman took the loss against Detroit for the Chicago White Sox, whose sixth straight defeat officially eliminated them from the AL Central race. The ChiSox, the preseason favorite in the division, are still in the wild card chase but barely. … Seattle, an AL wild card contender, blew a nine-run lead and lost to Kansas City 13-12. Ex-State star Adam Frazier went 1-for-2 with an RBI for the Mariners but was on the bench when the Royals scored 11 runs in the sixth inning. … Milwaukee, bidding for a National League playoff berth, saw its five-game win streak snapped in a 2-1 loss to Cincinnati. Former MSU standout Hunter Renfroe’s 28th homer accounted for the Brewers’ lone run. He homered and drove in five runs all told in a 10-2 win on Saturday. … Don Mattingly is out as Miami manager after this season, which means former East Central Community College star Marcus Thames, the Marlins’ first-year hitting coach, probably will be out, as well. Miami has scuffled with the bats this season. P.S. Last week was filled with memorable events in addition to the postseason clinchings, and Mississippians were front-and-center for several. When the New York Yankees’ Aaron Judge hit his 60th homer on Tuesday, Hattiesburg native Charlie Hayes — an ex-Yankee — was in the house after a first-pitch ceremony with his son Ke’Bryan Hayes, Pittsburgh’s third baseman. Ex-MSU star Buck Showalter, the Mets manager, sarcastically called for the ball when his club suffered its MLB-record 106th hit batsman on Wednesday. When Albert Pujols hit home runs No. 699 and 700 for St. Louis on Friday, Mississippi college products Dakota Hudson, Chris Stratton and Corey Dickerson, fellow Cardinals, had front-row seats at Dodger Stadium.

22 Aug

just a little drama

A pair of Mississippi natives went toe-to-toe at Wrigley Field on Sunday in a veritable must-win game for the visiting Milwaukee Brewers. The Brewers did win, but, much to their chagrin, so did St. Louis, which got a clutch performance from another Magnolia State product in its seventh straight victory. Just another day of drama in the National League Central. Chicago Cubs left-hander Justin Steele, the pride of Lucedale, outpitched Milwaukee starter Brandon Woodruff of Wheeler, but the Brewers rallied late against the Cubs’ leaky bullpen for a 5-2 win, avoiding a series sweep. Steele allowed just two hits with nine strikeouts in six scoreless innings; the George County High alum has a 3.25 ERA in 23 starts for a Cubs team that has long been out of contention. Mississippi State product Woodruff, making his 19th start, threw 105 pitches over 5 2/3 innings. Two of his pitches left the yard — homers by Ian Happ and Seiya Suzuki. The Brewers’ rally from that 2-0 hole kept them within 5 games of the surging Cardinals in the division. Milwaukee led St. Louis by 3 games on Aug. 1, when the controversial trade of closer Josh Hader went down. They are 7-11 since. “We can get on a roll here and we can look back at this and talk about it like we always do and say this is a stretch where we got through it and started playing good baseball,” Woodruff said in an mlb.com article. “We’ll see what happens.” Playing at Arizona on Sunday, the Cardinals fell behind 4-3 in the third inning as starter Jose Quintana struggled. Enter Tupelo native and ex-MSU standout Chris Stratton, who stopped the Diamondbacks cold for 2 2/3 innings, paving the way for the Cardinals to rally late for a 6-4 win. Stratton, a trade acquisition from Pittsburgh, has a 4.32 ERA in 8 1/3 relief innings for the Cardinals. Milwaukee and St. Louis will have to wage their battle remotely for a while; they don’t go head-to-head again until Sept. 13-14 at Busch Stadium. P.S. MSU product Nathaniel Lowe hit his 18th homer — a 424-footer — for Texas in a win at Minnesota on Sunday. He is batting .386 over his last 15 games, .295 on the year. … McLaurin High alum Davis Bradshaw, back on his home turf with Double-A Pensacola (see previous post), went 6-for-13 in the rain-plagued series against the Mississippi Braves at Trustmark Park in Pearl. Bradshaw is batting .310 in 14 games since being promoted to Miami’s Double-A club.

16 Aug

a homecoming

Davis Bradshaw’s 11th Double-A game may have a little different feel. A homecoming feel. The outfielder, in Pearl with the Pensacola Blue Wahoos to take on the Mississippi Braves, played high school ball just a few miles down the road at McLaurin. Now 24 and in his fourth pro season, Bradshaw isn’t on Miami’s list of Top 30 prospects. But make no mistake, the 6-foot-3, 175-pound lefty hitter can put bat on ball. Bradshaw hit a ridiculous .756 as a senior at McLaurin in 2017. He hit .442 in his one season at Meridian Community College. Drafted in the 11th round by Miami in 2018, he hit .354 in rookie ball that year. He was leading the High-Class A Midwest League in batting at .310 when he was promoted to Pensacola earlier this month. He is off to a modest start with the bat for the Blue Wahoos — .241 (7-for-29) — but has a .405 on-base average and nine runs in his 10 games. What Bradshaw lacks is power: two career homers. He hit eight bombs at MCC in 2018, so maybe that tool is in there somewhere. … The M-Braves and Blue Wahoos both stand 20-19, in a three-way tie for second in the Southern League South, 5 games back of Montgomery. Their six-game series runs tonight through Sunday at Trustmark Park.

14 Aug

rise and shine

Christian Johnson, a former Clinton High star who has been plugging away in the low minors since 2019, hit his first career home run on Saturday night for the Low-Class A Charleston RiverDogs, then belted his second in his next at-bat. Johnson, now 21, was drafted in the 19th round by Tampa Bay in ’19 and had played in rookie ball for three seasons before getting a brief call-up to Charleston in July. He went back to the Florida Complex League after two games (1-for-7), then returned to the RiverDogs on Aug. 4. He is 4-for-17 since. Johnson’s career average is just .177, but maybe Saturday’s performance will be a spark. … A trio of Mississippi State products took star turns in the big leagues on Saturday. Hunter Renfroe smacked his first triple since 2019, driving in the go-ahead run and then scoring an insurance run in the 10th inning of Milwaukee’s 3-2 win at St. Louis in the National League Central showdown. The Brewers are just a half-game behind the Cardinals entering today’s series finale. Renfroe, batting .246, has 44 RBIs. At Texas, Nathaniel Lowe went 2-for-3 with a walk and a run as the Rangers, playing a spoiler role, beat wild card-chaser Seattle 7-4 in an American League West clash. Lowe, a .284 hitter this year, has a 19-game on-base streak during which he is batting .357. And at Kansas City, while the hapless Royals were getting crushed by the Los Angeles Dodgers 13-3, Brent Rooker got his first two hits of 2022 in his first game for KC. He also drove in a run and threw out a runner at the plate from left field. Rooker, a .211 career hitter in 68 MLB games, was 0-for-7 for San Diego this year before being traded at the deadline. P.S. Ex-Taylorsville High star and big league vet Billy Hamilton chose free agency rather than accept an assignment to the minors by Miami. He has played for seven different big league clubs since 2013 and swiped 321 bases, most ever by a Mississippi native. He also has 401 minor league bags.

13 Aug

worth noting

Though prospects Michael Harris II, Vaughn Grissom, C.J. Alexander, Jared Shuster and Darius Vines, among others, have been plucked from their roster, the Mississippi Braves are still kicking. Atlanta’s Double-A club beat Tennessee 16-14 on the road Friday night and is 20-17, second place in the Southern League South in the second half. Recent arrival Javier Valdes, a catcher, is batting .353 with two homers and six RBIs in four games. Cade Bunnell, who has moved to shortstop to replace Grissom, is batting .400 with two homers and 10 RBIs in 14 games for the M-Braves. Outfielder Justyn-Henry Malloy, in 25 games since arriving from A-ball, is hitting .289 with three homers and 16 RBIs. And first baseman Drew Lugbauer, on the roster all season, leads the SL with 23 homers. If the pitching can hold up, this club appears to have the firepower to make a run at the second-half title and a playoff berth. … Overshadowed by the exploits of Harris and Grissom with Atlanta, Joey Meneses, another former M-Braves star, has had quite a debut in The Show himself. Playing for Washington, Meneses is batting .370 with four homers in eight games since being called up. The 30-year-old Mexico native, who played in Pearl in 2016-17, logged more than 3,000 at-bats over 11 years in the minors, hitting .281. “I feel like, up here, you have a little bit more energy and more motivation, obviously,” he told the Washington Post regarding his hot start. … Southern Miss product Chuckie Robinson had a great seat — the Cincinnati bench — for Thursday night’s Field of Dreams Game in Dyersville, Iowa. Called up for the first time in his pro career, he did not get in the game and is now back with Triple-A Louisville. Hopefully, that won’t be his only major league experience. … Former Taylorsville High star Billy Hamilton was outrighted to Triple-A Jacksonville by Miami on Friday. Used primarily as a pinch runner, the veteran Hamilton scored nine runs and stole seven bases in 20 games but had just one hit in 13 at-bats. … Ex-South Panola standout Emaarion Boyd, one of two prep players drafted out of the state in July, is 2-for-5 with two walks and a caught stealing in two games for Philadelphia’s Florida Complex League team. The 11th-round pick was considered one of the fastest players in the 2022 draft.