Friday's top prospect performers

August 14th, 2021

Here's a look at Friday’s top Minor League performers from each team's Top 30 Prospects list:

Tigers: Riley Greene, OF (MLB No. 13), Double-A Erie
Greene smacked his 15th home run of the season in a 4-for-5 performance. It’s Greene’s third home run in as many games and his fifth in the past 10 contests. The Tigers’ No. 2 prospect has tallied at least one RBI in each of his past seven games and with two RBIs on Friday, he’s driven in 14 batters in a 10-game span. Over that 10-game stretch, he’s brought his average up 23 points to .297, thanks to a scorching .409/.447/.841 slash line that includes five multi-hit efforts.

Yankees: Jasson Dominguez, OF (MLB No. 21), Low-A Tampa
Beck Way, RHP (No. 18), Low-A Tampa

After beginning his time in Tampa with a nine-game hitting streak, Dominguez cooled off a bit but showed on Friday he is always a threat for a multi-hit game. The Martian went 3-for-3 at the top of the Tarpons’ lineup, smoking his fourth double of the year and adding an RBI on a sacrifice fly. The switch-hitter has recorded hits in 15 of his first 20 contests at Low-A, and his three knocks set a career best. There is still a lot of swing and miss in Dominguez’s game with a 23.3 percent K-rate but since his promotion to Tampa on July 13, the Yankees top prospect has remained productive with a .266/.326/.418 slash line and a .744 OPS.

Way picked up his third win for Tampa and took a no-hitter into the sixth inning in a scoreless start for the Tarpons. The righty tossed six innings and allowed one hit, no walks, plunked two and struck out five. It was Way’s second straight start of six innings and no earned runs allowed. The 2020 Draftee has started 12 games for the Tarpons, and has been stretched out as the season carries on. In 41 1/3 innings thrown, Way has struck out 47 batters while allowing 26 walks with a 3.05 ERA.

Pirates: Nick Gonzales, 2B (MLB No. 26), High-A Greensboro
Quinn Priester, RHP (MLB No. 34), High-A Greensboro

Pittsburgh’s top two prospects carried Greensboro to a 4-1 win on Friday night.

Less than a week removed from his first multi-homer game and grand slam, Gonzales recorded his second-career four-hit game, knocking his third triple of the year along with three singles and a run scored. The Pirates' top pick in the 2020 Draft has been on a tear over his past five games, going 11-for-21 with two doubles, a triple, two home runs and three walks. On the year, the New Mexico State product is slashing .285/.363/.500 through his first 53 professional games. Gonzales missed six weeks due to a fractured pinky in his right hand and started slow in his return with his average reaching a season low .214 mark on July 15, but has begun to heat up again in August.

Priester turned in the best start of his young career for Greensboro, tossing an immaculate inning and seven scoreless frames, scattering six hits and two walks while striking out a career-high 10. Pittsburgh’s top pick in the 2019 Draft has been consistently good throughout the year and is improving as the season goes on, posting a 3.18 ERA in May, a 3.43 ERA in June, a 2.63 ERA in July and so far, a 1.50 mark in August. Add it all up, and the righty owns a 2.80 ERA in 74 innings with 68 strikeouts.

Marlins: Edward Cabrera, RHP (MLB No. 48), Triple-A Jacksonville
Jake Eder, LHP (No. 21), Double-A Pensacola
Cabrera dominated Charlotte’s lineup to the tune of six innings of one-run ball, allowing two hits and four walks while striking out 12 in Jacksonville’s 3-1 victory in Game 1 of its doubleheader. The flamethrowing right-hander earned his first Triple-A win this year. Cabrera has now made five starts at both Double-A and Triple-A and has been equally dominant at both levels, with a 2.77 ERA in 26 innings for Pensacola and a 3.20 ERA in 25 1/3 innings for Jacksonville. The 23-year-old has seen an uptick in his strikeout and walk totals at Triple-A, with a 14.92 K/9 and a 6.44 BB/9.

Eder’s ERA continues to drop as the lefty progresses throughout the season. With 3 2/3 scoreless inning for Pensacola in Friday’s win, the Vanderbilt product lowered his ERA to 1.77. The left-hander has been a force in the Blue Wahoos’ rotation all year, tossing 71 1/3 innings over 15 starts in his first professional season. He's also struck out 99 batters and walked just 27. Eder has kept the ball in the yard too, allowing just three long balls all season. He has recorded six starts of five or more innings and no runs allowed and is a near lock to rise in the Marlins top-30 list with Pipeline’s midseason reranking.

Indians: George Valera, OF (MLB No. 86), High-A Lake County
Valera powered Lake County to a win with two homers, his 14th and 15th of the season, including a walk-off blast in Game 1 of the Captains' doubleheader. Hitting out of the two-hole, the slugging outfielder finished the day 2-for-3 with three RBIs, two runs scored and a walk. When Valera connects on a ball, it typically leaves the yard. He has only hit one double this year, adding four triples to go with 15 long balls. The native New Yorker is slashing .253/.411/.563 with a .974 OPS, flashing elite plate discipline with a walk rate of 18.75 percent.

Phillies: Bryson Stott, SS (MLB No. 98), Double-A Reading
Jamari Baylor, SS (No. 16), FCL Phillies

Stott tallied his second two-homer game of the year, hitting a solo shot in his first and last at-bats of the evening in Reading’s 9-3 loss. The dingers were his sixth and seventh of the season at Double-A, bringing his 2021 total to 12. After hitting just .230 in July, Stott has heated up in August, slashing .350/.381/.625 with four RBIs.

Baylor made his return from the 60-day injured list in emphatic fashion. The middle infielder smacked two homers in a game for the first time in his career in the FCL Phillies' win, driving in three runs and adding a walk to his final line. Baylor has missed time with a hamstring injury in the past, but has been a productive hitter when healthy. He recorded his first career home run on July 15 and carries a 1.044 OPS in the first 18 games of his pro career.

Athletics: Austin Beck, OF (No. 16), High-A Lansing
Beck went 3-for-4, finishing a triply shy of the cycle while driving in three of Lansing’s seven runs in its victory over Dayton. The home run, a two-run shot in the fifth, tied Beck’s career high mark of eight, which he set in 2019. Beck has been on a multi-hit tear lately -- he’s tallied five multi-hit efforts in his past 10 games, and three of those have been three-hit games. In that span, he’s brought his average up 16 points to .223 and he’s driven in 31 runs through 49 games across two levels this season.

Braves: Victor Vodnik, RHP (No. 13), Double-A Mississippi
Vodnik tossed five innings of no-hit ball as Mississippi blanked Biloxi 4-0. The 21-year-old set a season high with nine strikeouts and allowed one runner to reach on a walk. Vodnik has had his ups and downs this season, carrying a 5.35 ERA and giving up seven earned runs in his start on Aug. 1, but has flashed dominance with three starts of four or more innings and no runs allowed. In 11 starts and 33 2/3 innings this season, Vodnik has set down 41 batters via the strikeout and walked 22.

Brewers: Sal Frelick, OF, Low-A Carolina
Frelick, the 15th overall pick of the 2021 Draft, hit his first professional home run and drove in four runs on a 3-for-6 night. Through four games for Carolina, the Boston College product has tallied multi-hit efforts three times after going 0-for-5 in his Low-A debut. The four RBIs are, of course, a career high for Frelick, and he’s already driven in a total of eight in eight professional games. Across two levels, he’s collected 15 hits (including two doubles and a triple), scored eight runs, walked three times and stolen three bases.

Giants: Luis Matos, OF (No. 7), Low-A San Jose
Matos belted two home runs in a game for the first time this season and the second time in his career as he turned in a 3-for-4, four-RBI performance. It’s the 19-year-old’s fourth multi-hit game in a row and his ninth in the past 12 games. Matos already has set a career-high in homers with 11, eclipsing his previous mark of seven he set in 2019. The Venezualen has lit it up in Low-A, slashing .330/.366/.509 with 68 RBIs (tied for first in all of Low-A), 24 doubles and 18 stolen bases through 79 games.

Orioles: Rylan Bannon, 2B/3B (No. 20), Triple-A Norfolk
Bannon has been swinging quite the hot bat lately. Just two days removed from his first multi-homer game of the season, he repeated the feat with two more long balls in Norfolk’s 7-4 win -- a solo shot to extend his team’s lead to 2-0 and a two-run dinger to give the Tides a three-run lead in the seventh. That’s five homers in the past three games for the 25-year-old, who homered in Thursday’s game as well. He added two walks to his all-around day at the plate after also drawing two walks Thursday.

Padres: Daniel Montesino, OF (No. 25), DSL Padres
Montesino, a 2020-21 international signee, has been on fire through the first two weeks of August and kept his hot month rolling with another big performance. The 17-year-old slugger smacked his second homer of the season and cleared the bases on a three-run triple all in the sixth inning of the DSL Padres dominant 22-7 win. The lefty finished the day 2-for-4 with four RBIs, two runs scored and a walk. Montesino, who projects to be a power-hitting corner outfielder, manned first base Friday. Through seven games this month, he is slashing .417/.531/.833 for a 1.364 OPS with 12 RBIs.

Rangers: A.J. Alexy, RHP (No. 24), Triple-A Round Rock
Avery Weems, LHP (No. 29), High-A Hickory

In his second Triple-A start, Alexy fanned a season-high nine batters across five scoreless innings, giving up just two hits and walking two. He struck out four of the first six batters he faced before allowing a single to start the third and he worked out of a two-out, two-on jam by striking out Gavin Lux on four pitches. He capped his outing with his ninth strikeout, giving the 2016 Draft pick a 1.80 ERA and a .175 BAA through 60 innings across two levels.

Weems fell an out short of a quality start, tossing 5 2/3 scoreless innings of four-hit ball in Game 2 of a doubleheader. Hickory provided plenty of run support to get Weems his third win of the season and Weems returned the favor by shutting down the Rome offense. The 24-year-old struck out two batters in the opening frame and fanned at least one batter in each inning pitched. He finished with 9 strikeouts, tying his season high and giving him a sparkling 88-to-13 strikeout-to-walk ratio this year.

Rockies: Julio Carreras, INF (No. 14), Low-A Fresno
Carreras hustled two triples and added a home run in a 3-for-6, four-RBI day in Fresno’s 14-3 win. It’s his fifth multi-hit effort in the past 10 games and the third time in his career that he’s tallied two triples in a game. Both of his triples brought home a run and in between the three-baggers he smacked a two-run homer, giving him a career-high of seven. Through 70 games this season, the 21-year-old is batting .249 with 14 doubles, five triples and 35 RBIs, just three short of his career mark of 38, which he set in 2019.