A look at how the current top 30 prospects did today. If a player is in the majors for an extended time, or loses his prospect eligibility, he will be removed from this list. Everyone below him will be shifted up a spot, and a new player will be added to the bottom of the list. If a player is out for the season, he will be removed and everyone below him will move up a spot. Removing these guys doesn’t mean they have lost prospect status. It is just an attempt to get more active prospects on the list. Rankings are from the 2017 Mid-Season Update, and links on each name go to their Pirates Prospects player pages.
1. Mitch Keller, RHP, Altoona – [insert_php]
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2. Austin Meadows, CF, Indianapolis – [insert_php]
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3. Shane Baz, RHP, GCL Pirates – [insert_php]
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4. Cole Tucker, SS, Altoona – [insert_php]
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5. Kevin Newman, SS, Indianapolis – [insert_php]
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6. Ke’Bryan Hayes, 3B, Bradenton -[insert_php]
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7. Will Craig, 1B, Bradenton – [insert_php]
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8. Elias Diaz, C, Pirates – [insert_php]
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9. Taylor Hearn, LHP, Bradenton – [insert_php]
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10. Gage Hinsz, RHP, Bradenton – [insert_php]
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11. Calvin Mitchell, OF, GCL Pirates – [insert_php]
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12. Braeden Ogle, LHP, Bristol – [insert_php]
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13. Edgar Santana, RHP, Indianapolis – [insert_php]
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14. Kevin Kramer, 2B, Altoona -[insert_php]
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15. Steven Brault, LHP, Pirates– [insert_php]
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16. Clay Holmes, RHP, Indianapolis – [insert_php]
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17. Jordan Luplow, LF, Pirates – [insert_php]
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18. Luis Escobar, RHP, West Virginia – [insert_php]
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19. Max Kranick, RHP, Bristol – [insert_php]
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20. Steven Jennings, RHP, GCL Pirates – [insert_php]
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21. Adrian Valerio, SS, West Virginia – [insert_php]
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22. Nick Kingham, RHP, Indianapolis – [insert_php]
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23. Conner Uselton, OF, GCL Pirates – Disabled List
24. Max Moroff, INF, Pirates – [insert_php]
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25. Dovydas Neverauskas, RHP, Pirates – [insert_php]
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26. Eric Wood, 3B, Indianapolis – [insert_php]
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27. Eduardo Vera, RHP, West Virginia – [insert_php]
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28. Logan Hill, LF, Altoona – [insert_php]
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29. Tyler Eppler, RHP, Indianapolis -[insert_php]
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30. Lolo Sanchez, CF, GCL Pirates – [insert_php]
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Indianapolis lost 2-0 to Durham to go down 2-0 in the best-of-five series. Tyler Glasnow started and exorcised some of those playoff demons from his past. He has had some of his worst minor league starts during his few playoff games, but this night was a strong performance, allowing one run over six innings on a solo homer. He allowed just one other hit, walked two batters and picked up nine strikeouts.
Glasnow gave up a solo homer to straight away center field to begin the second inning, then the next batter singled. After that point, he faced 19 more batters in the game. Two reached on walks, two reached on infield errors and eight struck out.
Three Indianapolis relievers combined to allow another run in the seventh inning. Dan Runzler walked a batter before being removed. Brandon Cumpton came in to face one batter and hit him on the first pitch. Jack Leathersich replaced him and served up a single, which scored the runner from second base.
Indianapolis had ten base runners on the night, but they couldn’t mount any type of rally. Edwin Espinal doubled in the eighth inning for the team’s only extra-base hit. They had seven other hits, a walk and a hit batter, but they were killed by double plays. They loaded the bases with one out in the third inning before Edwin Espinal grounded into an inning-ending double play. Kevin Newman grounded into double plays in the fifth and seventh innings, while Jacob Stallings ended the sixth inning with a double play. In fact, the only inning in which Indianapolis didn’t have at least one runner was the ninth inning when closer Diego Castillo struck out the side in order.
The Indians now need to win all three games at home to advance to the next round. They will send Nick Kingham to the mound in the must win contest tomorrow night.
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BOWIE, MD – Mitch Keller faced the minimum 27 batters in a complete game, one-hit shutout as Altoona won the opener of their playoff series with Bowie, 2-0. Keller gave up one hit and two walks, and one other batter reached on an error, but all were wiped off the bases. Keller didn’t blow the opposition away as he has at times, striking out only four, but that helped him get through the eighth inning on just 81 pitches. In the end he threw 90, 59 for strikes.
Keller started off throwing his fastball around 94-96, but by the third inning he was regularly getting up to at least 97-98. His command was a little shaky at times early, but as the game wore on he seldom went very far into the count. He had just four three-ball counts, two within the game’s first four hitters and two within the last four. Keller didn’t throw a large number of curves, but the pitch was increasingly effective later in the game. He used it at times to get ahead in the count, rather than waiting until there were two strikes. His change remains his least effective pitch; it sits in the low-90s and doesn’t have a lot of sink, but hitters still weren’t able to make hard contact against it.
The four runners against Keller reached in the 2nd, 4th, 6th and 9th. Keller followed a leadoff walk in the 2nd with a strikeout and a 6-4-3 double play. Probably the closest thing to a tough moment came in the 4th, when the first two batters hit the ball on the nose. The first lined a single to center and the next batter hit a drive to deep left. Elvis Escobar, though, ran the drive down and made a strong, accurate throw to first that beat the runner back to the bag. In the 6th, a one-out error was canceled out when Jin-De Jhang easily caught the runner stealing.
Keller showed no signs of wearing down until he went 3-1 on the last batter in the 8th. He seemingly caught a break when the batter popped the 3-1 pitch high up in foul ground, but first baseman Jerrick Suiter muffed it. (Suiter had several nice plays in the game, including an impressive scoop on an errant throw by third baseman Wyatt Mathisen on the first batter in the 8th.) Keller reacted by throwing an upper-90s fastball at the knees on the next pitch for a called third strike.
In the 9th, Keller clearly tired. His velocity was down and he walked the first batter on four pitches, none near the strike zone. He rallied to get the next batter to hit a one-hopper to Mathisen that turned into an easy double play. The third batter in the inning, and 27th of the game, lined the first pitch he saw to Escobar.
On offense, the Curve had numerous chances thanks to nine hits and five walks, but struggled to take advantage of them. They got runners to third with one out in the 2nd and 3rd innings, but couldn’t score. Finally, in the 5th, two batters after Cole Tucker’s second double of the game (Tucker finished 3-for-5), Jordan George lined an RBI single to left. In the 7th, Casey Hughston, who had walked, came around to score on a single by Mitchell Tolman, who was also 3-for-5 in the game. The Curve got a nice contribution from Hughston and Tolman, both of whom were promoted from Bradenton just a few days ago. This was despite three strikeouts by Hughston and an error by Tolman. Hughston, who played center, made a long, running catch on a drive to the track far over toward left.
Altoona faces Bowie again on Friday at 7:05pm, with Alex McRae on the mound. – Wilbur Miller.
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Bradenton finished their season with a 70-62 record.
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West Virginia finished their season with a 69-67 record.
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Morgantown had their final game rained out.
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Bristol finished their season with a 17-49 record.
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The GCL Pirates finished their season with a 26-34 record.
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The DSL Pirates finished with a 36-34 record.
