Bryce Eldridge did WHAT?!?!?

SF Giants Minor Lines, August 21, 2024

Photo Credit: Eugene Emeralds

It was set up to be a big day for James Tibbs III, who was making his High-A debut, but a couple of Tibbs’ teammates stole the spotlight away from this year’s first round pick. The Ems’ starting pitcher had the night of his young career, and Tibbs’ fellow first rounder pushed the boundaries of age, force, time, and space with a brain-melting display of power!

We’ll get to all of that below the jump, but before heading to the Lines, there’s an annual story that I’ve been neglecting of late: the Baseball America Tools Issue came out this month, and it’s one of the things I look forward to every summer. Each year, BA surveys all of the managers of every minor league on which players in their circuit have the best tools in a variety of categories. It’s subjective, of course, and there’s always some degree of “hey, I’ve heard of that guy!” involved. But it’s one of the very few times when we get to see how the Giants’ prospects stack up against their peers in the discreet building blocks of major league success.

As you might imagine, the Giants didn’t exactly dominate the lists this year, but they weren’t without mention — and some very worthy, but possibly overlooked skills were rewarded. So let’s check out some of the very finest tools in the Giants’ system, as voted by the managers:

Triple-A

• Best Infield Arm: Casey Schmitt

• Best Changeup: Carson Whisenhunt

Double-A

• Best Defensive 2b: Jimmy Glowenke

High-A

• Fastest Baserunner: Jonah Cox

Low-A

• Best Baserunner: Jonah Cox

• Best Defensive 1b: Bryce Eldridge

• Best Changeup: Dylan Carmouche

Most of these are probably not surprising — I’ve mentioned before that Carmouche’s changeup is a 50-grade pitch. But I was especially gratified to see Glowenke singled out. He’s gone through a tough year at the plate this season, but his work in the field has been so strong that I do believe he should be in the running for a minor league Gold Glove. The kid from Texas can really pick it and sling it, as he showed again last night.

By the way, Glowenke isn’t the only standout with the glove on the Richmond club this year. I was talking about this with team communications director, Trey Wilson, recently, and I’m ready to bust out my national campaign: John Michael Bertrand is absolutely the best fielding pitcher in the minor leagues, of this I have no doubt! Let’s get some hardware again this year, people!

HITTER of the NIGHT: Bryce Eldridge (Eug), 1 for 3, HR (17), BB, 3 RBI, K
PITCHER of the NIGHT: Cesar Perdomo (Eug), 5.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 10 K

And with that, let’s head to the Lines. It was a pretty good night around the farm —an inversion of Tuesday night, when almost nobody hit, and only San Jose was able to sneak out a win in extras. Last night, San Jose lost in extras, while everybody else won, and there were some notable hitting displays, including an absolutely mind-boggling home run, as we’ll see in a moment…