I still can’t embed tweets in my posts (and I suppose never will be able to again), which is super annoying and really rough on my workflow (and, even worse I suspect, the quality of your experience). Nonetheless, I’ll keep trying my little workaround to bring you great stuff like this video tweeted out by the Giants official prospect account of Vaun Brown belting a homer and double on Tuesday, and hope that the powers that be don’t take offense. Now the question is: which is the homer, and which is the double?
I mentioned in yesterday’s post that Baseball America’s Ben Badler had posted reviews for the top international signings earlier this week. That was the prelude to his annual roundup of every team’s class — always a highlight of my baseball year. He dropped his Giants’ writeup yesterday, which, in addition to the top three players, mentioned a few sleepers in this year’s class. Carlos Gutierrez, from Mexico, was one of the top performers on Team Mexico’s 18U in the World Cup qualifier round, hitting .414/.485/.517 in 29 PA for the national team last November. Senior International Scouting Director Joe Salermo called him a plus athlete with a real chance to hit when I spoke to Salermo in January. Dominican Carlos Concepción, on the other hand, is a pure corner bat (likely profiling in LF) who has a chance to develop into real right-handed power. Finally, the sleeper in this year’s class is the Cuban-born shortstop Anthony Tandrón, who signed a few weeks after the rest of the players (though Salermo anticipated bringing him in when we spoke on signing day) for $100,000. Tandrón, who has been living in Mexico for several years, has really impressed Giants’ coaches with his loose, easy swing, and an instinctual awareness for the game.
It sounds like the Giants are pretty excited about the entire class and anticipate having a real chance to develop some hitters out of this group. The DSL season is only about three weeks away, so it’s a good time to try to start getting our minds around the rosters and separating the Carloses in our mental rolodexes!
Let’s get to action from a strange and eventful Thursday night — a night where every single affiliate had a lead …. but not every single affiliate held it.
PS: the one that did, however, REALLY held on to it!
HITTER of the NIGHT: Andy Thomas (Rich), 4 for 4, HR (2), 2 R, 1 RBI
PITCHER of the NIGHT: Kyle Harrison (Sac), 3.2 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 8 K
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