Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
May 24th, 2022 Scoreboard
- Triple A Oklahoma City 14, Reno 7
- Double A Tulsa, Springfield PPD
- High A Great Lakes 4, South Bend 6
- Low A Rancho Cucamonga 10, Visalia 4
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Michael Busch re-took the system lead in homers:
Busch went 1/2, drawing his first two walks at the Triple A level, reaching via an HBP, along with scoring four runs and knocking in a pair. This puts his slash line after seven games with Oklahoma City at .269/.367/.615. Five of Busch’s first seven hits with OKC have gone for extra bases, and his average exit velo in his first week at the level was a blistering 94.5 mph. Thus far, he hasn’t been fazed by the promotion a bit.
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Speaking of exit velos (along with some stats), for a guy who has received some doubts about his future power projection, Miguel Vargas is opening some eyes:
For context, a max exit velo of 112.7 mph would place him in the 90th percentile at the major league level. For a guy who may have the best hit tool in the system, along with fantastic control of the strike zone, this amount of raw power at such a young age makes for an exciting and rare offensive toolkit. Continuing to work on leveraging it into game power, along with further development defensively, is about all that’s left for him to do at Triple A.
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Cole Percival, as Vin would say, did his best to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear, entering the game with a 3-0 deficit, two runners on, and nobody out:
Percival, whom the Dodgers signed as an undrafted free agent back in 2020 out of UC Riverside, has a fastball that’s mostly 93-94, but will touch 96, and as you can see in the vid, he’ll show a solid average curve and changeup at times.
Really long-levered, the 6’5 Percival seems to have room for a bit more mass, possibly helping to add a tick or two of velo.
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Braydon Fisher is settling in with Great Lakes as well:
For Fisher, whom the Dodgers picked in the 4th round of the 2018 draft, walks had been a bit of an issue in his first handful of appearance for the Loons, but in his past five appearances he has reined things in, walking just two over 7.0 innings, while striking out 12.
Though the the club drafted Fisher nearly four years ago, he is still just 21, and is 2.1 years younger than average for the High A Midwest League. Additionally, Fisher had Tommy John surgery back in May of 2019, and as we saw with Michael Grove, fully coming into your command and stuff after that procedure isn’t always a direct, immediate proposition. He’s pitching effectively against older competition, and missing bats. There are several positive indicators, and we’ll see where it goes from here.
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It has been up and down for Jerming Rosario with Rancho Cucamonga, with the lows being lot of walks, crooked numbers, and cookies when he’s battling with runners on, and the highs coming in the form of 5.0 no-hit innings, with nary a walk.
Last night, in a promising outing, Rosario pitched effectively despite some traffic. He tossed 4.0 innings, allowing six hits, four of which were on ground balls, allowed one run (earned), and struck out seven vs just one walk. Though video for the outing isn’t available, on paper, it’s encouraging, since going into this contest, hitters were slashing .421/.551/.632 against him with men on base.
Rosario has yet to string together two consecutive effective outings this season, so it will be interesting to see if he can get some consistency and momentum going.
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Lastly, more interesting stuff about the ABS system, from Oklahoma City pxp Alex Freedman:
Via statcast, while this pitch is technically a strike:
It’s also the kind of pitch that is never called a strike. From a player development standpoint, getting rewarded for missing by a plate width might not be the best thing going. Clubs will certainly continue to have their own standards for effectiveness, growth, and hurdles for promotion, regardless of what the stat sheet looks like.
