2015 Monday Morning Mets Minors Players of the Week

Image from this offseason Baseball Essential piece on Kevin McGowan

June 8-14, 2015

            Keeping track of the hottest minor leaguers in the Mets farm system.

Hitter of the Week: Dominic Smith has been drawing a lot of attention for his big numbers recently, but Jonathan Johnson has put up the same OPS as Smith for about 2 weeks longer, and was slightly better than him this week – he also just missed hitting for the cycle.

Starting Pitcher of the Week: Kevin McGowan was easily the best multi-start pitching, and he was very good over those two starts, or else I would’ve gone with Fulmer’s high swinging strike-rate start.

Relief Pitcher of the Week: Matthew Koch was huge over two long relief appearances for Binghamton, continuing his great stretch since being moved to the B-Mets pen.

Team of the Week: The upper levels posted the same record this past week, but Binghamton gets the nod for sweeping the first place team from their division.

Previous weeks: 4/9-19, 4/20-26, 4/27-5/3, 5/4-10, 5/11-17, 5/18-24, 5/25-31, 6/1-7

Las Vegas 51s 35-29

5-1 record

Pitchers

Matthew Bowman – 6 IP, 7 H, 2 BB, 95 Pitches (57 Strikes), 11 GO: 2 FO; Bowman only induced one swinging strike in his start

Darin Gorski – 6 IP, 7 H, R, 5 SO, 98 Pitches (66 Strikes), 7 GO: 1 FO; Gorski keeps Las Vegas in it most of the time, allowing 2 ER or less in 8 of his 12 starts

Tyler Pill – 7 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 6 BB, 4 SO, HR, 100 Pitches (58 Strikes), 8 GO: 5 FO; He’s allowed 3 ER on 10 hits and 9 walks, with 8 strikeouts over 13 IP in his last 2 home starts (6/6, 6/12), but still has a 7.92 ERA/.998 OPS at home vs. a 4.33 ERA/.667 OPS on the road

Jon Velasquez – 3.2 IP, H, BB, 4 SO, .245 OPS, 13 BF; His overall PCL numbers are going to look bad for awhile thanks to 6 ER allowed on 6/7, but that’s 10 of 13 scoreless appearances for Las Vegas, with 0 ER (2 R) charged in one of those other 3 appearances

Batters

Brandon Allen – 5-17, .294/368/.588, R, 2 2B, HR, 4 RBI, 2 BB, 4 SO; Allen bounced back from a cold week with a big series against Reno

Jayce Boyd – 3-11, .273/.467/.364, 4 R, 2B, RBI, 4 BB, SO; Boyd only has two extra base hits so far in Las Vegas, but he’s been doing a nice job keeping the average and OBP up over the past 10 days

Alex Castellanos – 7-19, .368/.429/.579, 3 R, 4 2B, 2 RBI, BB, HBP, SB, 7 SO, 2 GIDP; After a cold second half of May, AC is back!

Brooks Conrad – 5-15, .333/.500/.600, 4 R, 2B, HR, 5 RBI, 4 BB, HBP, 2 SO; Still surprised he’s playing 1B for Las Vegas (Brock Peterson, come on down?), but he’s been hitting well in June

Johnny Monell – 7-23, .389/.522/.500, 3 R, 2 2B, 5 RBI, 5 BB, 2 SO, CS; Extended his hit-streak to 10 games with another solid week, and looking too good for the PCL

Matt Reynolds – 9-23, .391/.400/.478, 6 R, 2 2B, 2 RBI, BB, SF, SB, 3 SO, GIDP; He has a hit in 11 of 12 games, with 6 extra base hits and a 12.7 K%: 7.3 BB% over 55 PA

T.J. Rivera – 8-16, .500/.529/.625, 4 R, 2 2B, 4 RBI, BB; After a long 0-fer led to a few days off, Rivera came back with a huge series against Reno

Dan Rohlfing – 5-6, .833/.833/1.333, R, HR, 3 RBI, SO; Has a hit in the 3 games he’s played in since returning, but two of those appearances are as a pinch-hitter

Travis Taijeron – 3-16, .188/.348/.625, 4 R, 2B, 2 HR, 6 RBI, 4 BB, HBP, 2 SF, 3 SO, GIDP; Hits stopped falling for Taijeron at an elite rate, but he’s still proving productive, and he’s only struck out 6 times in 45 June PA, with 7 walks and 5 XBH (1 2B, 4 HR)

Wilfredo Tovar – 8-24, .333/.429/.375, 7 R, 2B, 3 RBI, 4 BB, 5 SB, 2 SO, GIDP; He really sparked the 51s from the top of the lineup this week, and his stolen base frenzy shouldn’t go unnoticed

Binghamton Mets 32-30

5-1 record

Pitchers

Luis Cessa – 6 IP, 3 H, BB, 2 SO, 80 Pitches (53 Strikes), 10 GO: 5 FO; Another great start from Cessa, he has a 0.46 ERA over his last 3 starts: 19.2 IP, 10 H, (HR, 2 2B), .398 OPS, 21.4 K%: 2.9 BB%

Michael Fulmer – 4 IP, 2 H, 5 SO, 46 Pitches (31 Strikes), 4 GO: 2 FO; Mother Nature shortened this start, which is a shame, because he already had 10 swinging strikes (21.7 swinging strike%)

Robert Gsellman – 6 IP, 6 H, R, BB, 4 SO, 82 Pitches (54 Strikes), 8 GO: 3 FO; Might’ve been allowed to finish the 7-inning affair if the B-Mets had a bigger lead, but it was his best start in AA so far

Rainy Lara – 7 IP, 5 H, R, 2 BB, 4 SO, HBP, 91 Pitches (56 Strikes), 6 GO: 5 FO; Broke a streak of 3-straight poor starts that produced a 7.24 ERA over 13.2 IP

Matt Koch – 5 IP, 4 H, R, BB, 3 SO, HBP, .522 OPS; Koch has a 0.73 ERA as a reliever since May 2^nd, with a 15.1 K%: 1.1 BB%, and a .236/.250/.247 slash allowed in 24.2 IP

Batters

Michael Conforto – 5-19, .263/.440/.474. 7 R, 2B, HR, 3 RBI, 6 BB, SB, 7 SO; Conforto didn’t have too many hits this week, but it seem like he had a big hit in every game

Josh Rodriguez – 6-19, .316/.409/.789, 4 R, 2 2B, 2 3B, HR, 12 RBI, 3 BB, 2 SO; Seems like he could at least be allowed to mash like this against slightly more advanced pitching in AAA

St. Lucie Mets 32-31

4-3 record

Pitchers

Miller Diaz – 6 IP, 5 H, 3 R, BB, 7 SO, 7 GO: 4 FO; Diaz walked 5 batters in each of his last two outings, and this was only the second time all year he has allowed less than 2 walks (he allowed 1 walk in 6 IP on 4/21), but he’s yet to allow more than 3 ER in a start

Kevin McGowan – 1.29 ERA, 14 IP, 7 H, 4 R (2 ER), 2 BB, 11 SO, HR, .451 OPS, 21 GO: 7 FO; McGowan has put together some very strong starts for St. Lucie over the past month, and he had his longest out since 6/3/2014 on Sunday

Logan Taylor – 6.2 IP, 6 H, 2 R (1 ER), 2 BB, 4 SO, 10 GO: 5 FO; Taylor is rolling, with a 0.92 ERA over his last 3 starts: 19.2 IP, 15 H, 8 BB, 9 SO, HBP, .539 OPS

Robert Whalen – 7.1 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 3 BB, 5 SO, 9 GO: 5 FO; Whalen pitched into the 8^th for just the second time of 2015, but his walk rate has been up over his past 4 starts (12.2% over his last 22 IP)

Akeel Morris – 2.45 ERA, 3.2 IP, 2 H, R, BB, 7 SO, .368 OPS, 14 BF; His promotion to the majors seems like a big jump to me – I think he has the stuff to get major league hitters out soon enough, but I’d prefer he get experience against more advanced hitters.

Batters

Matt Oberste – 7-16, .438/.550/.563, 4 R, 2 2B, 2 RBI, HBP, 5 SO; He’s a streaky hitter, but 1/3 of his hits have gone for extra bases this year (11 2B, 2 3B, 3 HR for a .139 ISO)

Dominic Smith – 14-28, .500/.500/.679, 4 R, 2 2B, HR, 8 RBI, 5 SO, GIDO; His walk rate has been poor all year, but Smith has been spraying the ball all over the park this past month

Savannah Sand Gnats 34-29

4-2 record

Pitchers

Casey Delgado – 7 IP, 6 H, 3 R, 5 SO, HR, HBP, 7 GO: 4 FO; That’s a 2.65 ERA/.602 OPS allowed over the first 3 appearances (2 starts, 17 IP) in the minors for Casey Delgado, who talked with MMO after his signing

Ricky Knapp – 6.2 IP, 6 H, 3 R (2 ER), 6 SO, HR, HBP; Knapp lowered his ERA to 1.69 since returning to Savannah in mid-May, with a .569 OPS allowed over 26.2 IP, and a 26.2 K%: 2.8 BB%

Casey Meisner – 7 IP, 6 H, R, BB, 6 SO, HR, 4 GO: 9 FO; That’s 7 of 10 starts with 1 ER or less from Meisner, who just turned 20 on May 22, but is clearly not being challenged in the SAL

Corey Oswalt – 7 IP, 6 H, 3 R, 2 BB, 4 SO, 9 GO: 3 FO; Oswalt finished 7 IP for the first time this year, but has been a little too hittable in his introduction to full-season ball (83 H allowed in 60.2 IP)

Batters

Patrick Biondi – 6-14, .429/.467/.643, 2 R, 2B, 3 B, RBI, BB, 2 SB, 2 SO, GIDP; Biondi has had 5 multi-hit games over the past two weeks, with 2 2B, 2 3B, and 5 SB during that stretch

Luis Guillorme – 8-25, .320/.346/.400, 3 R, 2 2B, 4 RBI, BB, SH, 4 SO, 3 GIDP, CS; Guillorme has been extremely consistent this year, with only one stretch of 2 games with no hits (4/26-28)

Jonathan Johnson – 8-21, .381/.552/.667, 6 R, 2B, 3B, HR, RBI, 5 BB, 3 HBP, 2 SB, 4 SO, GIDP; The 26-year old SAL All Star has a .365/.461/.516 slash with 12 XBH (7 2B, 3 3B, 2 HR), 8 SB, and a 10.4 K%: 12.3 BB% in 154 PA since 4/30 #PROMOAT

Vicente Lupo – 6-13, .462/.471/.462, 2 R, 2 RBI, 2 BB, 2 SF, 3 SO; Really glad his move off the roster was a temporary roster crunch move, as he’s shown improvements lately, going 15-45 with 4 2B, a HR and ‘only’ a 27% K-rate over his last 14 G, during which time he’s had all 6 of his multi-hit games

John Mora – 7-20, .350/.409/.750, 4 R, 2 2B, 3 3B, 3 RBI, 2 BB, 2 SO; Big week from the well-rounded outfielder, who has a .146 ISO and 118 wRC+ in his first 232 PA of full-season ball

Exactly one month from now, we'll get our first good look at #Pluto. Learn more: http://t.co/xyH7Nyz75s pic.twitter.com/EyXpcBHRly

— Nature News&Comment (@NatureNews) June 14, 2015