Welcome to the Braves Farm Report! Every Monday we take a look back at the previous week in the Braves minor league system, recapping the week’s action, spotlighting top performers, analyzing rosters and transactions, and sometimes answering questions or doing deep dives into Braves prospects.
We’d like to wish everyone a happy 50th anniversary of Henry Aaron‘s historic 715th home run to break the all-time record held up to that point by the great Babe Ruth. Long before Aaron took that momentous swing, he was an 18-year-old prospect playing far from his home for the class-C Eau Claire (WI) Bears. Aaron would hit .336/.401/.493 that season while playing shortstop. Overall Aaron would hit .353/.400/.553 in only two minor league seasons before getting an opportunity in spring training in 1954 when veteran outfielder Bobby Thompson broke his ankle and Aaron was tasked with replacing him in the outfield. Aaron would finish fourth in Rookie-of-the-Year voting; the following year he would make his first of 25 consecutive All-Star appearances.
M-Braves Roster Revealed
This season will be the final one for the Braves’ double-A franchise in Pearl, Mississippi as the team’s owners Diamond Baseball Holdings have announced that the M-Braves will be moving to Columbus, Georgia. The move will bring all four of Atlanta’s full-season minor league teams into the state of Georgia (or at least in the case of the low-A Augusta Greenjackets a few hundred yards over the state line).
The roster includes many players that should be familiar to Mississippi fans. Nineteen players on this year’s opening day roster were on the final active roster from 2023, including some like infielder Cade Bunnell and outfielder Justin Dean who are on their third season at the level. That said, the team does have two very notable prospects in 2024 1st-round pick RHP Hurston Waldrep and top Braves position-player prospect Nacho Alvarez Jr.
Infield
SS Nacho Alvarez Jr.
IF Cade Bunnell
2B/SS Cal Conley
1B Bryson Horne
2B/3B/SS Keshawn Ogans
2B/3B/SS Yolbert Sanchez
1B/C Javier Valdes
Alvarez will start nearly every day at shortstop and likely hit second in the order. Alvarez has a .408 minor league career on-base percentage and should lead the charge for the M-Braves offense. The rest of the infield will likely be in flux with holdover Cal Conley likely taking most of the playing time at second base. Horne, Bunnell, and Valdes will split time at first, with Bunnell, Ogans, and Sanchez manning third base.
Outfield
OF Justin Dean
OF/2B Cody Milligan
OF Brandon Parker
OF/2B/3B Geraldo Quintero
OF Jesse Franklin V*
Cody Milligan returns to centerfield and the lead-off spot where he has thrived the last two seasons. This will be Dean’s fourth season with Mississippi with the Lenoir-Rhyne University product owning a .234/.350/.348 career double-AA batting line in 234 games at the level. Left field will likely be split between the speedy Geraldo Quintero and the more powerful Brandon Parker. Quintero can also moonlight in the infield, and Milligan also has experience at second base.
Power prospect Jesse Franklin V will start the season on the 60-day IL with his third major injury after a broken clavicle suffered in college and a torn UCL in 2022.
Catcher
The catching corps should be a strength of the team with prospect Drake Baldwin and former Kennesaw State University star Tyler Tolve splitting the duties. When not behind the plate, Baldwin will likely serve as the team’s designated hitter to keep his power bat in the line-up on a team that does not have a lot of power.
Starting Pitching
LHP Luis De Avila
RHP Ian Mejia
RHP J.J. Niekro
LHP Drew Parrish
RHP Hurston Waldrep
Waldrep will get the lion’s share of attention early on and there will be continuous interest in when he may be promoted, with many prognosticators believing he will be with the big league club before the end of the season. The rest of the rotation isn’t nearly as glamorous, though left-hander Luis De Avila had a nice season for the M-Braves last year and got a late-season bump to Gwinnett.
Relief Pitching
RHP Parker Dunshee
RHP Domingo Gonzalez
RHP Patrick Halligan
LHP Hayden Harris
RHP Jonathan Hughes
RHP Jorge Juan
RHP Zach Logue
LHP Jake McSteen
RHP Trey Riley
RHP Peyton Williams
RHP Austin Smith*
This looks to be a strong group. Logue and Dunshee have major-league experience and will likely the first to go to Gwinnett if the need arises. Gonzalez, Halligan, Harris, McSteen, Riley, and Williams are all returning to the level; left-hander Hayden Harris is a potential stand-out among this group. Flowery Branch, GA native Jonathan Hughes is coming off a strong season with high-A Rome and was a standout as a fence-jumper in spring training. Jorge Juan was a minor league free agent signing from the Oakland organization who has shown a fastball with some real zip on it. Finally Austin Smith will look to return from an injury that wiped out most of his 2023 season after a strong performance in the Arizona Fall League.
Weekly Round-Up
AUGUSTA:
The Greenjackets hosted the Columbia Fireflies in home opener weekend, taking the first two contests before dropping the finale on Sunday. Augusta hits the road this week, taking the 3-hour bus ride up to Kannapolis.
Nineteen-year-old Garrett Baumann took the ball in the season opener and the 2024 4th-rounder and mixed a mid-90s fastball, slider, and change-up to hold Columbia to an unearned run for 4 innings. The unearned run came after Firefly outfielder Erick Peña reached when he hit a Baumann slider at Drew Compton at first and the play wasn’t made. He advanced to 2nd base on a grounder, then on a fly ball by DH Jhonny Perdomo, Peña tagged up to go the 3rd. Right fielder Isiah Drake apparently lost track of the outs as he casually flipped the ball and Peña ended up scoring from 2nd on what was scored as a sacrifice fly.
Baumann was followed by left-hander Adam Shoemaker who tossed an encouraging 4 scoreless innings in relief, striking out 6 and avoiding the walk problems that plagued him in 2023. Augusta scored two runs, the first on a bases-loaded walk by outfield Jace Grady in the 3rd inning and the second on a fly ball by Drake that scored second baseman Leiker Figueroa when the catcher failed to field the throw in cleanly to make the score 2-1 Augusta, which would turn out to be the final score.
Game two saw the pro debut of 2022 7th-rounder Adam Maier, who missed last season recovering from a sprained UCL followed by an oblique injury. The Fireflies got after Maier quickly, getting a single and a double off the wall with the first two batters to get a quick run. Maier balked the runner to third, who then came home on an RBI groundout. After that inauspicious beginning however Maier settled in and kept Columbia off the board, getting through 4 innings. The teams would finish regulation innings tied at 4, but second baseman Cam Magee would bring home extra-inning runner Alexander Martinez on a single in the 10th to walk off the game.
Left-hander Mitch Farris had a tough first start on Sunday, getting tagged for 3 runs on 5 hits and a couple of walks in 3.2 innings while the offense could only muster up 2 hits, dropping the series finale 4-1.
ROME:
Opening weekend couldn’t have gone much better on the field for the newly re-branded Rome Emperors as they swept the prospect-rich Hickory Crawdads at home, allowing only 1 run to the Rangers high-A team over the course of the weekend in the process. The Birds will try to keep the good times rolling this week, hosting the Hudson Valley Renegades for six games starting on Tuesday.
Friday starter Owen Murphy got the weekend off on the right foot, firing 6.2 innings of shutout ball and striking out 8 batters against only 2 hits and 1 walk to lead Rome to a 4-0 win. Righty Drue Hackenberg followed on Saturday with 6 innings, giving up only 3 hits and a run on a rare sacrifice double play, with outfielder Bryson Worrell throwing out a runner attempting to advance to third base just behind a runner scoring. The Emperors won that game 4-1.
Rome completed the weekend sweep with a 3-0 win, righties Spencer Schwellenbach (6 IP), Landon Harper (2 IP), and Ryan Bourassa (1 IP, save) combing on a 3 hitter with no walks and six strikeouts. For the series outfielder Kevin Kilpatrick went 5-for-11 with 4 runs scored, 3 stolen bases, and 1 new penguin-themed celebration created when after an RBI hit on Friday he called time and did a penguin waddle on the second base bag to the delight of the crowd.
MISSISSIPPI:
The Mississippi Braves opened their 2024 season in Pensacola for a truncated three-game series versus the Blue Wahoos. After losing Friday and Saturday in tightly contested games, they were blown out on Sunday to send the M-Braves back to Trustmark Park with an 0-3 start. Mississippi will open up their final season at Trustmark Park on Tuesday night for a series against their intrastate rival Biloxi Shuckers.
Starting pitching did not give the M-Braves much of a chance to win this week as Ian Mejia (1.2 IP, 4 H, 4 ER, 2 BB, 1 K, 1 HR) and Luis De Avila (4 IP, 6 H, 4 ER, 3 BB, 3 K) had poor starts in the first two days of the series but that did not compare to the struggles of Hurston Waldrep, who had an awful start on Sunday that was compounded by being hit on the heel of his glove/hand by a 110 mph comebacker. Waldrep was in constant trouble and gave up eleven hits and seven runs over 2.2 innings (and 79 pitches) along with a walk, four strikeouts, and a home run allowed. He even allowed four stolen bases during his brief stint on the mound. Several relievers had scoreless outings during the series but was highlighted by Zach Logue’s 3.2 scoreless innings on Saturday and Jake McSteen’s 2.1 shutout innings on Sunday.
Mississippi did score thirteen runs over the three games, which was sparked by players like outfielder Justin Dean, who was 2-for-6 with three runs scored and three stolen bases. Outfielder Cody Milligan was 3-for-11 with a double, two walks, a stolen base, and four runs scored. Shortstop Nacho Alvarez hit safely in all three games and was 5-for-12 with a double, two walks, a stolen base, and two RBI while catcher Drake Baldwin was 5-for-14 with four RBI.
GWINNETT:
The Gwinnett Stripers opened their 2024 home schedule this week against the Louisville Bats. After dropping two of the first three games of the series, the Stripers took the final three for a series win and improving their record to 6-3 on the young season. Gwinnett now hits the road for a long trip to Omaha to take on the Storm Chasers.
Starting pitching had its moments throughout the week as Allan Winans, Huascar Ynoa, and Darius put together good outings. Winans started the week on Tuesday with 5.2 innings of two-run baseball (both from solo home runs), Ynoa tossed four scoreless innings and threw 45 pitches in his first game action since April 18th of 2022, while Vines tallied seven innings while giving up just two hits and two runs (both solo home runs) while striking out seven and generating 23 swings and misses. The starters did not fare as well in the second half of the week as AJ Smith-Shawver did not escape the first inning on Friday as he gave up two hits, three walks, and three runs while retiring just two batters. Bryce Elder struggled on Saturday as he gave up three runs in four innings and allowing nine baserunners. Brian Moran wrapped up the week on Sunday with a solid effort in an emergency start as Allan Winans was called up to Atlanta. Moran gave up just one run over three innings at the head of a bullpen game.
Gwinnett’s relievers had a very good week with Grant Holmes leading the way with three scoreless outings covering 3.1 innings with just one hit allowed and five strikeouts while registering a win and a save. Ray Kerr had three scoreless innings over two innings with six strikeouts and a save. Ken Giles had a pair of perfect one-inning outings with two strikeouts while Daysbel Hernandez and Jackson Stephens each had a scoreless outing. Brooks Wilson made his first appearance of the season on Sunday, finishing off the bullpen game with 2.1 innings of scoreless ball with three strikeouts.
Gwinnett’s offense averaged nearly six runs a game with several significant contributors. Shortstop Luke Waddell hit safely in all five of his games with three extra-base hits and four RBI (.368/.455/.632). Outfielder Eli White had a solid week, going 5-for-18 with two doubles and four stolen bases (.278/.409/.389). Major-league veteran Leury Garcia had three multi-hit games while scoring seven runs during a 7-for-18 week (.389/.450/.444). Infielder Alejo Lopez hit safely all four of his games while going 6-for-14 with three stolen bases (.429/.529/.467).
POSITION PLAYER of the WEEK:
PITCHER of the WEEK:
Transaction Round-Up
- 4/2/2024: RHP Jackson Stephens signed to a minor league contract and assigned to AAA Gwinnett; LHP Zach Logue assigned to AA Mississippi from AAA Gwinnett
It looked like Stephens was going to have a spot in the Atlanta bullpen on Opening Day, but the last minute pick-up of Jesse Chavez dashed those hopes. Stephens would figure to be a quick promotion back to the big leagues if there is an opportunity.
- 4/2/2024: C Sandy León signed to a minor league contract and assigned to AAA Gwinnett
The injury to Sean Murphy had a cascading effect. Chadwick Tromp was selected to back up Travis d’Arnaud in Atlanta, which left an opening for Designated Veteran Catcher in Gwinnett. Enter León, a 12-year big league vet, mostly known for his 5 year stint as half of Boston’s catcher combo from 2015-2019. He picked up his second World Series ring last year thanks to appearing in 21 games for the Texas Rangers.
- 4/2/2024: C Jose Marcano signed to a minor league contract and assigned to FCL Braves
Presumably they need someone else to catch in extended spring training. The 19-year-old Marcano spent the prior three seasons with the Mets in the Dominican Summer League.
- 4/5/2024: RHPs Anthony Garcia, Justin Militello, and Isaac Gallagos placed on 7-day IL for A Augusta; RHP Blake Burkhalter placed on 7-day IL for A+ Rome; RHP Austin Smith placed on 7-day IL for AA Mississippi
Garcia, Militello, and Burkhalter all missed the 2023 seasons completely, but their 7-day IL application here indicates the team thinks they could be back before June.
- 4/7/2024: RHP Spencer Strider placed on 15-day IL for MLB Atlanta (sprained right UCL); RHP Allan Winans recalled to MLB Atlanta from AAA Gwinnett
Strider came out of Friday’s start against Arizona with elbow soreness and the team immediately ordered an MRI for the following day. It showed UCL damage, and while the team and fans wait for confirmation that Strider will likely be in a procedure and a lengthy time on the IL, Winans was called up to be an emergency long-reliever. If he’s not used in that capacity he may make what would have been Strider’s next start on Wednesday or they could go with another Gwinnett starter though Bryce Elder started on Saturday and would be the least likely.
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