Minor League round up, September 26

Sep 27, 2022 - 9:52 PM

Only one team and a few games remain before the San Francisco Giants Minor League Baseball season is over. Let’s get into Monday’s action.

Link to the 2022 McCovey Chronicles Community Prospect List (CPL)

All listed positions are the positions played in that game.

AAA Sacramento (63-83)

Sacramento River Cats lost to the Las Vegas Aviators (A’s) 8-3
Box score

It’s always great when the players in the Minors who you really want to see have good days have good days. And that was the case on Monday, as the 2 offensive stars were the players whose names are circled right now.

All of the team’s runs came on a 3-run blast by right fielder Heliot Ramos (No. 4 CPL), who also singled.

Ramos hasn’t hit for as much power as the Giants had hoped for this year, but it’s pretty clear that when he hits a ball hard, he hits a ball hard. And we’ll take all the good news and progress that we can with Ramos, so here you go: over his last 12 games with Sacramento he’s hitting 13-48 with 3 home runs, 3 doubles, and 2 walks.

The other star was third baseman Casey Schmitt (No. 24 CPL), who was playing in his 2nd game with Sacramento after AA Richmond’s season ended. Schmitt showed out, hitting 3-4 with a double.

He also showed off the glove that has him viewed as the top defensive prospect in the organization.

You’ll be hard pressed to find a player who had a better year than Schmitt, who started the year as a glove-first player in High-A, had a 132 wRC+ there, got promoted to AA where he had a 144 wRC+, and seems to be fitting in just fine in AAA. If he keeps this up, he’ll be making his Major League debut in 2023.

While those were the stars of the game, the next-best offensive performance also came from a great source: second baseman Will Wilson (No. 18 CPL), who hit 1-3 with a walk.

Wilson was wiping away a highly forgettable 2021 with a lovely first half of the season, and had just gotten promoted to AAA when he suffered an injury on June 22. He didn’t return until a rookie ball rehab assignment starting on August 9, and made it back to A-ball after his 60-day IL stint ended, re-joining AA Richmond on August 24 due to a positional logjam in Sacramento.

Good to see him get a few more at bats in AAA before the season ends. He’ll surely start 2023 there.

The pitching was much less noteworthy, but RHP Cole Waites struck out a batter in a perfect inning in his 1st game since getting optioned. In 7 games and 8 innings with Sacramento, Waites has allowed just 3 hits, 3 walks, and 0 runs, while striking out 11 batters. He looked good in his brief time with the Giants, and should play a role in next year’s bullpen.

Another bad performance by RHP Zack Littell, who gave up 3 runs in an inning of work. Littell has struggled in the Majors this year (5.08 ERA, 4.65 FIP), struggled in the Minors this year (6.75 ERA, 5.73 FIP), talked back to Gabe Kapler on the pitcher’s mound when getting pulled from a game, and will be out of options at season’s end. It’s not crazy to think he might have made his final appearance for the organization.

Home runs

AAA Heliot Ramos (11)