Tag Archives: MLB

14 May

three things

1 — William Carey University, 10th-ranked in NAIA, saw its season end on Tuesday with a 16-11 loss to Oklahoma Wesleyan in an elimination game in the Hattiesburg regional. A nine-run seventh inning doomed the Crusaders, who committed four errors and walked 11 batters in the game. Carey (38-14) was outscored 26-17 in its two losses. Oklahoma Wesleyan plays Indiana Southeast today with the winner then meeting British Columbia in the championship round.
2 — The Mississippi Mud Monsters finally got back on the field for the second game of their inaugural season, but the independent club fell to Gateway 8-5 at Trustmark Park. Newly activated Rodney Theopile, a 6-foot-6 Nicaragua native, pitched four strong innings before the bullpen faltered in a seven-run fifth. Kyle Booker, former DeSoto Central High star, went 3-for-4 with three RBIs for the Mud Monsters (1-1). Game 2 of the Gateway series is tonight in Pearl.
3 — Ryan Rolison, a 2018 first-round draftee, made his big league debut and Kendall Graveman, a veteran big leaguer who missed 2024 after arm surgery, made his season debut. Ole Miss alum Rolison, who has made 95 minor league appearances, got the last out for Colorado in a 4-1 loss at Texas. Graveman, ex-Mississippi State standout, pitched a scoreless inning for Arizona in a 10-6 loss at San Francisco.
P.S. In case you somehow missed it: Former Mississippi Braves star Ronald Acuna homered in his first rehab game for Atlanta’s Florida Complex League team. Former National League MVP Acuna has been out since last May because of a knee injury. On the undercard in that FCL game, Southern Miss product Dalton McIntyre went 1-for-3 with an RBI for the FCL Braves; he was a 19th-round pick last summer.

13 May

smooth move

The Chicago Cubs’ trade for Drew Pomeranz late last month is beginning to look like a very shrewd deal. The veteran left-hander out of Ole Miss has yet to allow a run in eight appearances out of the bullpen for the first-place Cubs, and on Monday night, the 6-foot-5 “Big Smooth” recorded his first MLB save in five years. The 36-year-old Pomeranz worked the ninth in a 5-2 win against Miami at Wrigley Field, allowing one hit and fanning two. “(S)ince we got Drew, he’s just been pounding the zone,” Chicago manager Craig Counsell told mlb.com. “That’s probably what you like best is, it’s just a lot of strikes.” Pomeranz has struck out eight and walked just two in 7 2/3 innings. More closing opportunities may be in his future. The Cubs traded with San Diego to acquire Pomeranz, who was pitching in the minors, and he debuted on April 25, his first MLB game since 2021. A former first-round pick (in 2010) who has been a World Series champ and an All-Star, he had been battling injury issues since that time. “I’m just happy to be here. Literally, it feels like the first time all over again,” Pomeranz said when he joined the Cubs. A starter early in his pro career, he has now appeared in 297 games with a 48-58 record, 10 saves and a 3.88 ERA. P.S. Mississippi State alum Kendall Graveman has been activated from the IL by Arizona; the veteran pitcher missed all of 2024 after arm surgery. … Ex-Mississippi College star Blaine Crim was returned to Triple-A Round Rock by Texas; he went 0-for-11 during his brief call-up. … Brandon Woodruff, former MSU standout from Wheeler, has been shut down on his rehab assignment because of an ankle injury. The erstwhile Milwaukee ace has been out since mid-2023 following an arm injury and surgery. … Four Mississippi products appear in MLB Pipeline’s refreshed Top 100 minor league prospects list: Konnor Griffin (Pittsburgh system) at No. 37, Braden Montgomery (White Sox) No. 38, Cooper Pratt (Milwaukee) No. 50 and Jurrangelo Cijntje (Seattle) No. 92.

06 May

prime nine

A host of former Mississippi Braves — remember the M-Braves? — showed out in The Show on Monday. For Atlanta, topping this list, A.J. Smith-Shawver threw seven no-hit innings — and eight one-hit innings, all told — to lead the Braves to a 4-0 win over Cincinnati. Hot-hitting Austin Riley contributed an RBI knock, giving him 25 on the year, and scored a run. … Freddie Freeman, now with the mighty Los Angeles Dodgers, hit career homer No. 350 — his seventh of the season — to spark a 7-4 win against Miami. Evan Phillips — 0.00 ERA in seven games — threw a scoreless inning in relief for L.A. … For the sizzling Chicago Cubs, Dansby Swanson went 3-for-4 with two doubles, two RBIs and two runs in a 9-2 win over San Francisco. … For the rising (Sacramento) A’s, Shea Langeliers — a 2021 Double-A champ — belted his seventh homer and drove in two runs in a big 7-6 win against Seattle. … Drew Waters — Southern League player of the year in 2019 — went 1-for-3 with an RBI for Kansas City in a 3-0 victory vs. the White Sox. … For Milwaukee, catcher William Contreras went 1-for-4 with an RBI in a 5-1 win over Houston. … In Pittsburgh’s 6-3 loss to St. Louis, Joey Wentz threw two scoreless innings in relief for the Pirates.

05 May

frozen ropes

Belhaven University gets a second crack at the Collegiate Conference of the South championship today when the Blazers play Huntingdon (Ala.) at Maryville, Tenn. The Blazers (31-12) were unbeaten in the tournament and riding an eight-game win streak before the Hawks took them down 2-1 Sunday night. NCAA Division III Belhaven last won a conference title in 2011 when the program was in the NAIA Southern States Athletic Conference. Hill Denson was the coach. The Blazers won five titles in the NAIA-level GCAC under Denson between 2004-10. … Mississippi College eliminated Delta State 9-3 in a losers bracket game in the GSC Tournament as Jordan Evans doubled, homered, drove in two runs and scored three. MC meets Valdosta State next in Oxford, Ala. … William Carey lost to Loyola (La.) 9-7 in the SSAC Tournament title game, but the Crusaders will move on to an NAIA Opening Round tourney starting May 12 in Hattiesburg. … Capping Super Bulldog Weekend with a 6-1 win Sunday for a sweep of Kentucky, Mississippi State moved to 4-0 under interim coach Justin Parker. MSU pitchers yielded just 15 runs over the four games against Memphis and the Wildcats under their (former) pitching coach. Next up for State: Ole Miss at Dudy Noble Field. Won’t that be fun? … Ole Miss salvaged a win in the series finale at Oklahoma, climbing to 13-11 in the SEC but falling to No. 18 in the new Baseball America poll. … Southern Miss, 35-13 with a nine-game win streak, swept Arkansas State in a three-game Sun Belt set in Hattiesburg, getting its fifth walk-off win on Friday on a Matthew Russo home run. … Jackson State has won 10 in a row, including a home sweep of Mississippi Valley State; the Tigers are 27-17, 14-10 SWAC. … In MLB, DeSoto Central High alum Austin Riley hit two homers totaling 842 feet to power Atlanta past the Los Angeles Dodgers 4-3 on ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball. Riley, with 161 career homers, now ranks ninth among Mississippians on the career list. (Technically, he was born in a Memphis hospital, but he grew up in Southaven.) … Colt Keith, ex-Biloxi High star, homered for the third time in five games — and third time all year — to help Detroit beat the Angels 13-1. … Kansas City set a franchise record with seven homers in a wild win over Baltimore; former MSU standout Hunter Renfroe (192 career bombs) was not among the Royals who went yard and has yet to homer this season in 75 at-bats. … Ole Miss product Nick Fortes came off the injured list Sunday for Miami and went 1-for-3 as the starting catcher.

03 May

blast from past

The Meridian Brakemen, a long defunct and largely forgotten independent team, were referenced today on the FS1 Game of the Week. Color analyst Tom Verducci mentioned that Boston starting pitcher Hunter Dobbins modeled his pitching motion after his father, Lance, who had pitched for the Brakemen and the Ohio Valley Redcoats during a brief pro career. The Meridian Brakemen franchise operated for two seasons, 1996 and ’97, in the Big South League, a small loop that also included the Greenville Bluesmen and the Tupelo Tornado. Dobbins pitched in Meridian — at Meridian Community College’s home field, which the Brakemen dubbed The Railyard — during both seasons, where his teammates included current East Central Community College coach Neal Holliman. Verducci and Kevin Kugler both wondered aloud about where the nickname Brakemen originated, speculating it had something to do with trains. Partly true. In fact, it derived from the nickname of Meridian native and country music legend Jimmie Rodgers, who was known as “The Singing Brakeman.” P.S. Ex-Madison Central star Spencer Turnbull reportedly has signed with Toronto as a free agent. The veteran right-hander, 32, put up a 2.65 ERA in 54 1/3 innings for Philadelphia in 2024 and has a career ERA of 4.26 in 78 appearances, mostly as a starter. He would no doubt need some minor league work before joining the Blue Jays’ active roster.

01 May

debut alert

Gunnar Hoglund, a 2021 first-round pick out of Ole Miss, is getting the call to the big leagues by the A’s, according to various reports. The 25-year-old right-hander could be in line to start Friday’s game at Miami. Hoglund threw five scoreless innings for Triple-A Las Vegas on Sunday; he is 1-2 with a 2.43 ERA over six starts in the Pacific Coast League. Between Double-A and Triple-A in 2024, Hoglund posted a 9-7 record, 3.44 ERA. Drafted 19th overall by Toronto four years ago, and coming off Tommy John surgery, Hoglund was traded in the spring of 2022 to Oakland in the Matt Chapman deal. … When he plays, Hoglund will be the third Mississippi product to make his MLB debut in 2025, following Jake Mangum and Doug Nikhazy, and the 20th overall to get in an MLB game this season.

01 May

names to know

JoJo Parker (No. 14), J.B. Middleton (31), Landon Harmon (47), Talon Haley (84), Pico Kohn (102) and Mason Morris (116): All are ranked among MLB Pipeline’s new Top 150 MLB draft prospects for 2025. Parker (Purvis), Harmon (East Union) and Haley (Lewisburg) are high school players; Middleton pitches at Southern Miss, Kohn at Mississippi State and Morris at Ole Miss.
Brent Rooker: The ex-Mississippi State All-American hit his eighth homer to spark a six-run ninth as the A’s, 16-15 with six wins in eight games, beat Texas 7-1 in the major leagues on Wednesday.
Colt Keith: The former Biloxi High star, battling a sophomore slump in MLB, hit his first homer of the season and scored twice for Detroit in a 7-4 victory at Houston; Keith, a .260 hitter in 2024, is batting .181.
Brandon Johnson: The Ole Miss alum, a fourth-year pro, notched his fourth save for Double-A Northwest Arkansas (Kansas City chain) and now has a 1.42 ERA over 10 appearances.
Konnor Griffin: The ex-Jackson Prep standout, Pittsburgh’s No. 2 prospect, belted his fifth homer for Low-Class A Bradenton and is batting .265 over 20 games as a pro rookie.
Ti’Quan Forbes: The Columbia High product, the state’s Mr. Baseball in 2014, has signed with the independent Mississippi Mud Monsters; Forbes, 28, an infielder, was a second-round draft pick by Texas 11 years ago and reached the Triple-A level in affiliated ball.
Austin Canale: The Belhaven freshman shortstop drove in five runs on a four-hit day as 2-seed Belhaven beat Huntingdon 16-1 on Wednesday in the first round of the CCS Tournament at Maryville, Tenn.
Eli Collins: The senior outfielder went 2-for-4 with three RBIs and two runs to lead William Carey to a 15-5 win against Tennessee Southern in the first day of pool play in the SSAC Tournament.
Mason Nichols: The Ole Miss senior pitcher has been named the 2024-25 SEC Male H. Boyd McWhorter Scholar-Athlete of the Year by the conference office. Nichols, a Jackson Prep grad, is a biological sciences major and is 3-1 with a 5.40 ERA this season.

29 Apr

still grinding

Scroll through the list of the Mexican League’s current pitching leaders and you’ll run across the name Chris Ellis. Yes, it’s that Chris Ellis. The former Ole Miss star, who was drafted by the Los Angeles Angels 11 years ago, pitched for the Double-A Mississippi Braves nine years ago and appeared in 10 major league games between 2019 and ’22, is still wearing a uniform, still trying to get batters out for the Sultanes de Monterrey. The Mexican League is one of the many pro leagues not directly affiliated with Major League Baseball. Foreign leagues and independent leagues afford players who’ve been cast off by MLB clubs the opportunity to keep playing the game they love. Those leagues may also afford them the opportunity, potentially, to get back on the MLB track. Ellis, 32, has pitched in winter ball and indy ball since he last worked for a big league organization. He has pitched well this season for Monterrey; he is tied for the league lead with four saves in five appearances. Maybe an MLB scout will notice. Billy Hamilton, the former Taylorsville High star, is also playing in Mexico. At 34, he is tied for the league lead with seven steals and is hitting .281 in nine games for Jalisco. Hamilton played parts of 11 years in the majors, the last in 2023. He has spent the last two years in Mexico, playing winter ball there, as well. Clearly, he’s not ready to hang ’em up. Also still out there grinding is Cody Reed, the former Northwest Mississippi Community College standout from Horn Lake. The 32-year-old lefty, who pitched in 65 MLB games from 2016-21, is on the roster of Gary SouthShore RailCats of the independent American Association. Their season starts next week. Reed was in the Tampa Bay system in 2022, missed all of 2023 with injury and played in Mexico last summer, putting up a 4.12 ERA in 26 games for Tabasco. He may still have something left in the tank at 32. Demarcus Evans, a Petal High product, has been in pro ball since 2015 but is only 28 and has barely pitched the last two years since leaving the Texas Rangers’ system as a minor league free agent. A flame-throwing righty, Evans had a 4.75 ERA in 29 games with the Rangers in 2020-21 and a career ERA of 2.76 in the minors. He is on the roster of the American Association’s Cleburne club. … A large number of Mississippi-connected players are playing indy ball, including the likes of Davis Bradshaw, Brayland Skinner and Kyle Booker with the Mississippi Mud Monsters, the new Frontier League team that opens next week. Tyreque Reed, Regi Grace, Brett Sanchez and Banks Tolley are also on FL rosters. There’s Bobby Bradley, Errol Robinson and LeDarious Clark in the Atlantic League. Joe Gray Jr., J.C. Keys and Hayden Dunhurst are in the American Association. No doubt many of them are still yearning for The Show. P.S. Ex-Big leaguer Kirk McCarty, Southern Miss alum from Hattiesburg, had re-signed to play for CTBC Brothers in the Chinese Professional Baseball League but was released earlier this month. He previously played in Korea.

29 Apr

fasten your seatbelt

What was already going to be a fascinating week for Magnolia State teams got a lot more interesting on Monday, when Mississippi State decided to make “a change in baseball leadership.” Suddenly, Chris Lemonis was out as head coach. Justin Parker will make his debut as the interim coach tonight when the Bulldogs host Memphis at Dudy Noble Field in Starkville. Lemonis, who had a 232-135 record, won a national title in 2021, but the team’s results since then, especially in the SEC, have been decidedly mediocre. Ranked in the preseason, MSU takes a 25-19 record (7-14 SEC) into tonight’s game. … Also today, Jones College will host East Central Community College in a doubleheader that will decide the second seed in the MACCC playoffs. Both are ranked in the top 10 nationally in NJCAA Division II. Postseason positioning is on the line in several other MACCC games today. No. 2-ranked Pearl River already has claimed the regular season championship and will host a sub-regional starting May 5. … Jackson State completed a series sweep of Alcorn State on Monday, outscoring the struggling Braves 30-7 in the three games at Lorman. JSU, on a six-game win streak, is 23-17, 11-10 SWAC, and will host New Orleans on Wednesday and Mississippi Valley State next weekend. … In the SSAC Tournament opening round on Wednesday at Jackson, Tenn., No. 1 seed William Carey plays Tennessee Southern and No. 5 Blue Mountain Christian meets Middle Georgia. The Mississippi schools are in the same four-team pool. … Belhaven, seeded second in the CCS Tournament at Maryville, Tenn., plays Huntingdon (Ala.) on Wednesday in the first round. … Rust College will take on Wiley (Texas) on Wednesday in the quarterfinal round of the HBCUAC Tournament in North Little Rock, Ark. … Delta State is the top seed and Mississippi College No. 4 in the GSC Tournament that begins Friday at Oxford, Ala. DSU meets Montevallo (Ala.) and MC gets West Alabama in first round games. … NCAA Division III rivals Millsaps and MUW, whose conference tournaments start next week, will tangle today at Twenty Field in Jackson. Millsaps, as the top seed, will host the SAA Tournament starting on May 8. MUW’s seeding in the SLIAC tourney has not been set. P.S. With Baltimore having paced ex-State standout Jordan Westburg (hamstring) on the injured list, there are now 11 Mississippians on the major league IL and 11 on active rosters. (Cleveland sent Ole Miss alum Doug Nikhazy back to the minors after his inauspicious debut.)

27 Apr

around the horn

Actors have their “Oscar scenes.” Austin Riley might have had his “Gold Glove moment” on Saturday night. The former DeSoto Central High star and current Atlanta third baseman threw out an Arizona runner at first base, with the tying run charging home from third, to end the Braves’ 8-7, 10-inning win over the Diamondbacks. If you saw it, your jaw dropped. Riley fielded Randall Grichuk’s grounder behind the bag near the foul line and launched a two-hopper to first baseman Matt Olson, who made a clean scoop. The umpire clearly blew the call, but it was corrected on review. Braves win. The play that ended the game essentially upstaged the record-tying four-homer effort by Arizona’s Eugenio Suarez. Riley, a two-time All-Star in his seventh MLB campaign, has yet to win a Gold Glove. Those who watch him regularly have to wonder why. He has handled 65 chances this year with 49 assists and just two errors. He has a .965 career fielding percentage, tied with Clete Boyer for 33rd all-time. But apparently, Riley doesn’t rate high in the new-fangled metrics. “You can take those defensive metrics and put it you know where. I judge defense with my eyes,” Braves manager Brian Snitker once said of Riley. Matt Chapman won the National League Gold Glove at third last year, Ke’Bryan Hayes in 2023, breaking Nolan Arenado’s long stranglehold on the award. Maybe it’s Riley’s time. … Doug Nikhazy’s MLB debut was not one to remember. The Ole Miss product gave up six runs (including a steal of home) on five hits and six walks in three innings, taking the loss for Cleveland against Boston. … The A’s have placed right-hander J.T. Ginn on the injured list with elbow soreness. The ex-Mississippi State star joins nine — nine! — other Mississippians on the current MLB injured list. … Former Jackson Prep standout Konnor Griffin had his first three-hit game as a pro on Saturday for Low-Class A Bradenton in Pittsburgh’s chain. He hit his fourth homer, swiped his 11th bag and raised his average to .243. … Hail to the college champs: Delta State, William Carey, Millsaps and Pearl River Community College have won their conference regular season titles. Now it’s on to tournament play.