Archive for John Ruettiger

Minor League Recap: April 9-April 19

Posted in Minor Leagues, Offense, Pitching, Prospects with tags , , , , , , , , , , , on April 21, 2015 by oriolesprovingground

Minor league baseball is back, and with it is the return of the Orioles Proving Ground Minor League recap. Similar to previous years, the recaps will run weekly (for the most part) throughout the minor league season. I’ve said it before, but to reiterate, this exercise is not meant to be a scouting one, as these observations are based on the stat line for the week in question and nothing else. I’m not a scout and I don’t get to enough minor league games to draw a scouting conclusion on the players at hand. Having said that, I will occasionally add a scouting thought to some players based on what I have read or heard about a player’s major league expectations (if they exist).

Here we go.

Weekly Summary

Norfolk (AAA): 7-4 (W-L), 55 RS, 36 RA

Bowie (AA): 5-6, 42 RS, 54 RA

Frederick (High-A): 7-4, 44 RS, 43 RA Continue reading →

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Minor League Recap: August 18-August 24

Posted in Minor Leagues, Offense, Pitching, Prospects with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 29, 2014 by oriolesprovingground

I apologize for this version of the weekly minor league update being late, but I was busy…like REALLY busy. The minor league season is coming to an end next week (which may or may not be good news), so there will only be one more installment of the weekly minor league recap after this one.

What was the big story last week? Of course it was the Manny Machado knee injury and the revelation that Machado would miss the rest of the season because of it. The injury is in the opposite knee from the one he injured last year, and isn’t considered to be as serious, as Machado is expected to be 100% ready to go by the start of spring training. The other positive aspect to this development was reported by Tim Brown of Yahoo Sports.

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Minor League Recap: August 4-August 10

Posted in Minor Leagues, Offense, Pitching, Prospects with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 13, 2014 by oriolesprovingground

We’re going to keep this Minor League Recap short and sweet, just like they used to be. For most of this season (leaving out the 6 weeks I took off from actually doing a recap), I’ve included a little blurb on every single player I’ve mentioned. It’s gotten to the point where some of it has just become nonsense, and as I admitted in last week’s installment, sometimes I simply just can’t think of anything instructive to say.

The Baltimore minor league affiliates had a week to forget. I think it’s safe to say that the hot streak of Norfolk Tides, which had cooled 2 weeks ago, is officially over as they only came away with one victory last week. Bowie was the only team that came away with AT LEAST a .500 record, but even that doesn’t look quite as good since they were outscored by 6 runs. None of these 3 teams are mathematically eliminated from the playoffs, but I would not hold out hope for a postseason appearance.

Weekly Summary

Norfolk (AAA): 1-5 (W-L), 16 RS, 30 RA

Bowie (AA): 3-3, 21 RS, 27 RA

Frederick (High-A): 2-4, 21 RS, 33 RA Continue reading →

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Minor League Recap: May 5-May 11

Posted in Minor Leagues, Offense, Pitching, Prospects with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 14, 2014 by oriolesprovingground

We’re trying out a new “Transactions” feature as part of the weekly minor league recap this week. It’s basically a list of transactions involving the Norfolk, Bowie, and Frederick affiliates that occurred over the week and is located at the bottom of the recap. It’s pretty self-explanatory actually, so I probably didn’t even need to write the words in that last sentence. Anyway, I thought it might be a useful addition seeing as there are typically a lot of minor league moves in any one week. As I noted in my piece about minor league host families last year, the Orioles made over 90 transactions in about a months time in 2013. Hopefully this feature will help keep track of where everyone is playing for the moment.

Weekly Summary

Norfolk (AAA): 3-4 (W-L), 42 RS, 46 RA

Bowie (AA): 3-4, 35 RS, 46 RA

Frederick (High-A): 3-4, 18 RS, 25 RA

The Good:

Hitters

Norfolk (AAA): 2B Ivan De Jesus – 10/29 (H/AB), 2 2B’s, 1 3B, 6 BB’s, 6 SO’s

If it seems like a second baseman is winning this “award” every week, it’s basically because they are. According to their website, the Tides currently have 6 second basemen on the active roster (obviously, they’re not all playing second base on a regular basis). This week it was De Jesus’ turn to have a strong week. There were a lot of decent offensive lines for Norfolk this week (they averaged 6 runs a game), but De Jesus had the best combination of hitting, power, and patience out of the entire group. Continue reading →

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