Correcting my comments on McKenzie, I have actually looked at the facts and discover that other than strikeouts, he's doing just as well as last year if not better.

His WHIP is slightly better: 1.006 compared to 1.049.
His ERA is much lower: 2.96 compared to 3.46
BB/9 innings is identical: 2.8
Hits/9 inning re better: 6.3 compared with 6.6
HR/9 innings is hardly different 1 compared with 0.9
K/ 9 innings are well down: 8.4 compared with 11.7

Indians Prospective @indiansPro

Akron RubberDucks RHP Triston McKenzie over his last 5 starts in (AA)
- 28.2(IP) 16H 8R 6ER 11BB 29SO 1.86 ERA
(He was shaky when first returned from injury, but has been dominate of late)

Lynchburg Hillcats RHP Zach Plesac over his last 5 starts:
- 30.2(IP) 27H 14R 8ER 5BB 28SO 2.35 ERA

Lake County Captains RHP Jean Carlos Mejia over his last 3 starts:
- 18(IP) 14H 4R 3ER 3BB 21SO 1.50 ERA

Mahoning Valley Scrappers RHP Luis Oviedo NYPL rankings:
1) ERA 0.92
1) FIP 1.94
1) xFIP 2.10
1) SO 50
1) SO% 33.8%
1) SO-BB% 28.4%
2) SO/9 11.5
2) WHIP 0.82
3) SO/BB 6.3
5) SwStr% 15.0%
5) AVG .173
6) BB/9 1.9
8) BB% 5.4%

AZL Indians (2) 19yr old catcher Yainer Diaz has been locked in during his 6 game hitting streak! His .416 season average is now 2nd in the league.
Streak: 16-24 9R 2(2B) 2(3B) 8RBI 1BB .667 AVG .680 OBP

Most (HR) by an #Indians player during an Arizona Rookie League season:
Bobby Bradley (2014) 8
Oscar Gonzalez (2016) 8
Henry Pujols (2017) 8 -
Billy Wilson (2018) 7 - 2nd half of season still left

Akron RubberDucks OF Tyler Krieger is currently riding a 19 game hitting streak:
28-78 12R 6(2B) 1(3B) 12RBI 1BB 3SB .359 AVG .375 OBP

Akron RubberDucks OF Ka'ai Tom showing some thump over his last 8 games:
11-29 7R 3(2B) 4HR 7RBI 3BB .379 AVG .424 OBP

Our Top 30 in action Wednesday: Supplemented by some of our higher draft picks of 2018

CLE AA Bradley, Bobby 1B 3 1 1 2 .213 2B (18), BB (41)
CLE AA Castro, Willi SS 4 0 1 1 .246 2B (20)
CLE AA Ice, Logan C 4 0 0 0 .275
CLE AA Krieger, Tyler CF 4 1 2 2 .257 2B (17) [note below: he actually has turned things around for awhile now]
CLE AA Mathias, Mark 2B 4 0 0 0 .220 [he continues to flop, however]
CLE AAA Allen, Greg CF 4 0 0 0 .297
CLE AAA Chang, Yu 2B 4 0 1 1 .258
CLE AAA Haase, Eric C 3 0 0 0 .241 BB (27)
CLE HiA Capel, Conner CF 4 0 1 0 .262 SB (13)
CLE HiA Clement, Ernie SS 5 1 2 0 .339
CLE HiA Collins, Gavin 3B 4 0 0 0 .243
CLE LoA Benson, Will RF 4 0 0 0 .166
CLE LoA Gonzalez, Oscar LF 5 0 2 0 .284
CLE LoA Jones, Nolan 3B 2 0 1 0 .280 2 BB (58)
CLE LoA Palacios, Richie 2B 5 0 0 0 .222 [worst game of his short professional career]
CLE SS Freeman, Tyler SS 3 1 1 0 .361
CLE AA McKenzie, Triston 5.1 3 1 1 3 5 2.96 W (5-2)
CLE LoA Sandlin, Nick 1.0 0 0 0 0 2 2.16

Krieger does things differently each month:

April 241/264/349 13K/ 3BB 2 HR
May 159/235/182 25K/9 BB 0 HR
June 293/410/476 12K/ 17 BB 3 HR
July 346/361/444 11k/ 1 BB 0 HR

In April he didn't walk, had a little power, didn't do anything do well.
In May he was awful. Struck out a ton, did walk a fair amount, no power
In June he walked a lot, pretty good power
In July he stopped walking, but hit for average with some extra base power.

Their innumerable great offensive lines going on the boards in the desert. here's a lineup from the two teams of stars:

catcher Yainer Diaz 416-451-571
catcher Bo Naylor 353-410-486
catcher Bryan Lavastida 288-442-356 11 walks
ss Brayan Rocchio 398-358-404
ss Marcos Gonzalez 351-429-432
3b Raynel Delgado 390-495-524 17 walks
3b Wilbis Santiago 310-337-417
of Ruben Cardenas 300-424-486 14 walks
of Miguel Jerez 220-330-512 6 homers 13 walks
of Cody Farhat 306-370-367
of Pablo Jiminez 278-286-630 4 homers
cf Billy Wilson 250-370-583 7 homers 8 steals 33K
rf Jo. Rodriguez 386-397-388 17 walks 5 steals
rf Jhan Torres 302-381-442
rf George Valera 333-400=556

Only a few of these guys are too old for the Arizona Leagu, led by Wilson so his homerun total deserves an asterisk, age 22, so is Santiago. Farhat is 21. Cardenas 20, Jerez 10, the rest are teenagers.
Which means Wilson is the same age as Bobby Bradley is NOW in AA for the second season. Which also reminds us that Bobby is still very young for his level.

Great choice last night NOT to go watch Oviedo and the Scrappers. He had by far his worst game of the season, allowing 6 runs, 4 earned in 3 innings. He did strike out 5. Teammates committed 4 errors. Tyler Freeman did bang out 3 hits included his 13th and 14th doubles. Freeman's 372 average and his doubles total both easily lead the NYPL. Second in on base pct. Teammate Jose Fermin is 3rd - helped by being 3rd also in walks.

Our Arizona teams swept another 2 games, winning 5-2 and 11-2

For AZ1:
Billy Wilson with his 8th homer and a walk [looked up his college stats, he hit all of 5 homers for Loyola Marymount this summer[.
RF Jhon Torres hit his 4th.
SS Gionti Turner with his 1st and a single, hitting 286
Rocchio doubled.

for the 2s:

Johnny Rod 4 singles ,up to 311.
C Bryan Lavastida 3 singles 313

Billy Wilson Scouting Report — OF, Loyola Marymount University
loyola marymount university baseball news 1 billy wilson scouting report
Prospect: Billy Wilson
Position: Outfielder
Organization: Loyola Marymount University
Height/Weight: 6’0″, 200 lbs.
Bats/Throws: L/R
Age/DOB: Senior (Four-Year)
Acquired/Hometown: Tolleson, AZ (Tolleson HS)

April 18, 2018 — Loyola Marymount (NCAA Division I, West Coast Conference) Lean but athletic; decent musculature with some natural strength, but certainly room left to build. Game centers on speed/defense so won’t need much strength to translate to power in-game. Ideal lead-off man; works counts, tracks pitches well, good contact skills, and a couple good two-strike battles in my looks that showed strong plate coverage and contact skills. Not a power guy from the left side, but barrel skills to do more than just be a slap hitter; well-rounded hitter who works well as a table-setter … Speed has the potential to be a game changer; 4.08 up the line from the LHH box in my look, recorded a stolen base off a 2.01 pop, plus a few very nice, long runs in the outfield to track down balls hit to gaps. Great jumps and first step reads in center field on balls off the bat. Always very well-positioned, too, though there may be a coaching/scouting credit there. Regardless, Billy Wilson has the potential to be an above-average defender in pro ball at ceiling and he may just have enough by way of barrel skills to hold his own with the bat, too.
Video Below, game video to supplement our Loyola Marymount University OF Billy Wilson scouting report. For a few thousand more prospect videos, click here and subscribe to our YouTube channel.

BA on Sunday games:

CLE AA Bradley, Bobby 1B 4 1 2 0 .219 I'd promote him to Columbus; he's been pretty solid since a terrible April, although he K's plenty
CLE AA Ice, Logan C 4 0 0 0 .234
CLE AA Krieger, Tyler DH 5 0 1 0 .265
CLE AA Mathias, Mark 2B 3 1 1 0 .221 BB (47)
CLE AAA Chang, Yu SS 3 2 2 2 .262 BB (34)
CLE AAA Haase, Eric C 6 0 0 0 .243
CLE HiA Capel, Conner LF 3 1 0 0 .259 2 SB (15)
CLE HiA Collins, Gavin 3B 4 0 1 0 .229 2B (15)
CLE LoA Benson, Will RF 2 1 0 0 .161 BB (64), CS (6) How Low Can He Go?
CLE LoA Gonzalez, Oscar PR-DH 0 0 0 0 .283
CLE LoA Jones, Nolan 3B 2 0 0 0 .276 2 BB (62)
CLE LoA Palacios, Richie 2B 4 0 1 0 .172
CLE MAJ Gonzalez, Erik 2B 1 0 0 0 .313
CLE R Gonzalez, Marcos SS 3 1 1 0 .356 2 errors led to 2 unearned runs;
CLE R Rodriguez, Johnathan RF 5 0 1 0 .295
CLE SS Freeman, Tyler 2B 5 1 2 1 .369 HR (1) leads the league in AVG and doubles
CLE AAA Merritt, Ryan 3.0 0 0 0 0 1 5.23 he's back
CLE HiA Morgan, Eli 6.1 9 4 4 0 4 3.22 L (6-4) he's struggling
CLE SS Scott, Adam 2.1 1 1 1 1 2 3.09 W (2-0)

Just caught up for last few days. Some random thoughts.

Paulson had yet another good outing the other day. 5.1 IP and 1 ER. This guy has come out of nowhere to have a darn fine year and get on radar.

F.Perez has been promoted from AZL2 to Mahoning Valley.

Civ mentioned Freeman leading league in a couple areas. He's actually at or near top in several areas.
1) AVG .372
1) Hits 51
1) 2B 14
2) wRC+ 171
2) .928 OPS
2) OBP .425
2) wOBA .434
2) Runs 26
3) SLG .504
4) RBI 23
4) SO% 9.2%
He had a couple more good games at plate this weekend. Just keeps hitting. Has a 12 game streak going right now.

Naylor had a couple more 2 hit games while I was away.

Yandy had a couple hits with a double the other day. Had a homer tonight.

Bradley with a couple homers while last few days.

Rocchio with 5 hits last few games.

Jean Carlos Mejia with 7 more shutout innings tonight, with 10 K. He's been dominating lately.
Last 4 starts ... 25(IP) 15H 4R 3ER 4BB 31SO 1.08 ERA

Indians minor-league analysis: Top tools report


By Michael Hattery 2h ago

This​​ is​ a stand-in​​ for the​ weekly​ “Trip​ Around the​ Farm”​ column,​ which​​ will return next​​ week​​ in its​​ regularly​​ scheduled​​ time slot.

One of the most fascinating pieces of minor-league coverage is identifying impact or plus tools and tracking their development. Further, identifying carrying or impact tools improves one’s ability to evaluate whether a prospect is hitting certain checkpoint goals and making progress.

Before diving into the tools themselves, it is important to discuss the inputs, nature and context of my tool rankings. My eye test is a portion of the input because I have seen almost everyone listed. However, it is limited in terms of efficacy and influence, which is why the predominant influence is from three categories:

conversations I have had with those inside the Indians’ organization
information I have received from external scouts
analytical inputs guided by research published by Chris Mitchell, formerly of FanGraphs
Like you’d find in a high school yearbook, I have highlighted superlatives or individual tools or skills in addition to the traditional five-tool allocation for position players.

Speed: Quentin Holmes

The 2017 second-round pick features elite speed as his primary carrying tool. Those who analyzed Holmes as a prep prospect had him as a 75 or 80 on the 20-80 scouting scale. The issue for Holmes is getting this tool into games both offensively and defensively. As Billy Hamilton has demonstrated, elite speed can only be so valuable if the hit tool is below average. Holmes needs significant refinement to make the speed tool actionable. Unfortunately, Holmes’ developmental timeline has been slowed due to an injury in his first Arizona League game in 2018.

Honorable mentions: Gabriel Mejia, Willi Castro, Ernie Clement

Raw power: Bobby Bradley

Bradley has consistently accessed above-average raw power by leaning on a pull-heavy approach. Bradley has spent the past year and a half diversifying his batted ball dispersion, using the opposite field increasingly to reduce strikeouts. Bradley wields raw power to the pull side but he is a three outcome guy: walk, strikeout or home run.

Honorable mentions: Eric Haase, Will Benson, Yu Chang

Hit tool: Yandy Díaz

This is a complex category, especially for the Indians system. First, a note: For the purposes of evaluating this tool, I have rolled in overall on-base ability. Obviously, Díaz has limitations and he has been picked apart more publicly than many. Díaz simply has exquisite discipline and above-average contact skills. The limitations are in the batted ball profile. An abundance of ground balls limits Díaz’s power tool significantly, but in terms of pure on-base ability, Díaz stands atop a system that does not have a particularly striking group of hit tools.

Honorable mentions: Bo (Noah) Naylor, Tyler Freeman, Nolan Jones, George Valera

Defense: Willi Castro

Castro is cut in the traditional mold of the shortstop, an athletic middle infielder with strong instincts and a light frame. Castro has above-average range and enough arm to handle all the throws demanded of a shortstop. Those connected to the organization in Akron have spoken very highly of Castro’s continual defensive development and skill. The issue for Castro is whether he can develop offensively to the point of raising him above utility infielder to starting-caliber shortstop.

Honorable mentions: Conner Capel, Luke Wakamatsu

Arm: Will Benson

Benson has an absolute hose for an arm and appears to have been sculpted by the gods to conform with the scouting ideal for a right fielder. Of course, the arm tool, like speed, is in many ways capped in impact as a secondary tool that is only influential if first-level tools allow the secondary tool to surface. Here, Benson has to slay his demons: strikeouts. There have been marginal gains, but the freakishly athletic right fielder has to break through his hit tool issues to allow outstanding additional tools to play up.

Honorable mention: Conner Capel

Fastball: Ethan Hankins

As soon as the Indians signed their 2018 first-round compensation pick, Hankins immediately had the best fastball in the system. Hankins’ fastball sits 94-97 when the right hander is healthy, and perhaps its best feature is the weight of the pitch. Hankins’ fastball is a heavy offering with impactful arm-side run. Further, Hankins demonstrates solid extension, wielding his 6-foot-6-inch frame to increase the perceived velocity of the offering.

Honorable mentions: Kieran Lovegrove, Sam Hentges, Henry Martinez, Luis Oviedo

Changeup: Eli Morgan

Morgan’s changeup may be the best singular secondary offering in the Indians system. The pitch has solid depth and is very deceptive. Having a weapon to take advantage of left-handed hitters is a dynamic advantage for Morgan. This pitch alone appears to establish a big-league reliever floor for Morgan with reverse splits. The key test he must pass to develop a rotational future is further development of his slider to use as a weapon against right-handed hitters and demonstrating an ability to add and hold velocity late into starts.

Honorable mentions: Zach Plesac, Aaron Civale, Luis Oviedo

Breaking ball: Triston McKenzie

McKenzie’s curveball is the best breaking ball in the system. Important when grading any offering is not only the shape and velocity of the offering but also a pitcher’s ability to command the offering inside and outside the strike zone. McKenzie’s curveball is a plus offering because it shows solid depth, and McKenzie has outstanding feel for manipulating the offering inside and outside the strike zone when he needs to.

Honorable mentions: Luis Oviedo (slider), Sam Hentges (curveball), Aaron Civale (slider), Henry Martinez (slider), Mitch Brown (curveball)

Command: Triston McKenzie

If Shane Bieber remained prospect eligible, the category would be named for him. Alas, McKenzie has an outstanding feel for pitching and demonstrates good command of his fastball and curveball combo. The next step for McKenzie is improving his comfort with his changeup and showing an ability to use it in varying counts against left-handed hitters.

Honorable mentions: Aaron Civale, Elijah Morgan

I like this quote:

but the freakishly athletic right fielder has to break through his hit tool issues to allow outstanding additional tools to play up.

Hit Tool Issues, mean he's batting .161. That's a rather formal obscure why of saying "the guy can't hit"

Dowdy, 25, was a 12th-round selection by Detroit in the 2015 MLB Draft and offers a layer of rotation depth for the Tribe's farm system. Between Double-A Erie and Triple-A Toledo this year, the right-hander was 8-8 with a 4.74 ERA, 92 strikeouts and 32 walks in 95 innings

He'll join Whitehouse and DeMasi as our swingmen between Akron and Columbus, apparently. Dowdy has been doing the same apparently across northern Ohio from Toledo to Akron; now he'll get to add a north-south route to his Ohio travels.

Mercado debuts at #14 on our Top 30 prospect list.

http://m.mlb.com/prospects/2018?list=cle

I can't imagine you care much for the MILB rankings; they stuff in the new signings well ahead of kids who have actually played.
Hankins 3. This posted before I was done' I finished with the next post and couldn't figure how to delete this one.