2024 Portland Sea Dogs (AA)

Heating up in the bullpen · Apr 20, 2024

JM3 said:
View: https://twitter.com/SoxProspects/status/1780968692227989834

A couple years ago Matthew Lugo was a Sox Prospects Top 30 prospect. Stalled last year at Portland and SP dropped him out of their Top 60. He's mashing so far this spring, and still just 22 (well, 23 on May 9). Development is not necessarily linear.
Anybody know what's going on with M Lugo this year? I hope the answer isn't chemical.
I saw him play once in 2022; looked like he had a gap-to-gap line drive swing. Reminded me of Santiago Espinal.
Would love to see him push his way back into prospect status, if only as solid trade bait.

Montana Fan · Apr 21, 2024

JM3, am going to the Yard Goats-SeaDogs game Friday night. Any idea who will be throwing for the Dogs? Anyone I should keep an eye on for the Goats?

Montana Fan · Apr 21, 2024

JM3, you are one of the best sources on the whole site. Thank you for the details!! Looking forward to the game more now.

TheYellowDart5 · Apr 23, 2024

Lugo is Rule 5 eligible in December, so he pretty much has to show out this season in order to keep his career going with the org (or to get himself selected by a new one).

byAndrewParker · Apr 23, 2024

JM3 said:
He has another year after that until he's a Minor League Free Agent, & he would have to crush the rest of the season to end up on people's radars for R5 or 40-man protection (which would of course be the best case scenario), so I think it's likely he's here at least 1 more year after this one.

Here's the full list of Rule 5 eligible guys this off season:

https://www.soxprospects.com/rule5.htm

The only guys who really stick out to me that are more than likely to be taken if not added to roster are:

Dobbins
Fitts
Yorke
Zeferjahn

byAndrewParker · Apr 23, 2024

JM3 said:
I just realized 5 of the 7 players on this list have last names ending in the letter "o".

I also made a huge mistake and didn’t include Guerrero in my list. Feel like he’s a no brainer to be added to 40 man by end of the year.

Yelling At Clouds · Apr 29, 2024

If K-rate really does stabilize at 60 PA, then Yorke has made some dramatic improvements. Maybe to be expected since he’s been at AA a while, but still, it might be time for him to start familiarizing himself with the Worcester area…

nvalvo · Apr 29, 2024

Yelling At Clouds said:
If K-rate really does stabilize at 60 PA, then Yorke has made some dramatic improvements. Maybe to be expected since he’s been at AA a while, but still, it might be time for him to start familiarizing himself with the Worcester area…

Right? Ian Cundall had us all terrified about his in-zone swing and miss, but he seems to have tightened that up over the offseason. It's really great to see.

Still kind of positionless, but a guy who can hit is a guy who can hit.

edit: good point about the reshuffle of the org's second basemen, JM3.

Merkle's Boner · Apr 29, 2024

JM3 said:
Side note - Yorke may lack positional versatility, but he's a pretty good 2B (6 errors in 98 games last year, Eastern League all defense team).

So he may be redundant if he's not as good as Grissom, who also lacks positional versatility. But if he turns out to be better than Grissom he's not redundant - Grissom is. Still a lot of unknowns on both at this point, though.

Yorke is also trying to learn LF. He's played 5 games so far this year with an OF assist & no errors. Haven't seen any reports on how he looks out there, but he's a fairly athletic guy (18 steals in 23 attempts last season), & his main defensive limitation is lack of arm strength.

So there is a world where one of them is the 2B & the other is the backup 2B/Refsnyder replacement.

I believe Atlanta was looking into Grissom in LF before acquiring Kelenic.

Redundancy in your minor league system isn’t the worst thing, so long as you correctly identify the better player and turn the other into something the team needs. I’m of the belief that Yorke, Meidroth, and maybe Blaze will spend their ML career somewhere else.

Montana Fan · Apr 29, 2024

Was at Friday’s game and all of Blaze, Yorke, Marcelo, Anthony and Dobbins looked good. Hard hit balls by all and shots over the fence by Blaze and Yorke. None of them looked overmatched in the least. Teel DH’d and didn’t look very good at the plate.

Dobbins looked steady/consistent and reached 96.

Yard Goats won on an 8th inning 2 run dinger. It was cold at the game and the players chowed down on Chipotle post game.

Sandy Leon Trotsky · May 7, 2024

JM3 said:
View: https://twitter.com/RedSoxPlayerDev/status/1787539891544330725

He's still listed as a SS on Sox Prospects. It wasn't too long ago IIRC when he was in their top ten lists. I know he had a down season but he's really hitting the snot out of everything. What's your take on him now? Slightly old for AA, but not too much, right?

The Gray Eagle · May 10, 2024

Speier in the Glob has a nice article on ATM:
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2024/05/09/sports/red-sox-prospects-mayer-anthony-teel/

PORTLAND, Maine — “What’s a duck boat?”
Earlier this year, Red Sox prospect Marcelo Mayer interrupted a conversation with assistant director of player development Chris Stasio and teammates Roman Anthony and Kyle Teel for clarification. The group was discussing the documentary “Four Days In October” and the remarkable experiences of championship teams in Boston.
But when Stasio mentioned the rides on duck boats through the city, Mayer and Anthony were perplexed. (Teel, who’d been on a Duck Tour during a family trip to Boston as a child, was not.)
As the players heard from Stasio about the parade of champions on amphibious vehicles, they became captivated.

They want to do a Duck Boat ride together. But only after they win it all in Boston:

But Mayer, Teel, and Anthony are resolute that they will not go on such a trip until they have earned one as World Series winners with the Red Sox. They regularly discuss their hopes of doing so.

They’re all in Double A, with plenty of development in front of them before they’re even ready for the big leagues. Nonetheless, it is telling that the top three prospects in the Red Sox system are forging an identity built around team success.

“They want to win together. They want to do this together,” said Stasio. “I think that’s real. They’re not focused on poking their head in the big leagues or being an All-Star, accomplishing individual goals. Their goal is to win in Boston as a group and have a special experience with our group.”

“The city of Boston wants championships more than anything. We want them just as bad, maybe even more,” said Mayer. “We talk about it every single day — trying to win championships in Boston, bring championships to the city, bring joy to the fans.
“We see it as a challenge. Obviously if you want to win World Series, you’re going to have to deal with a lot of pressure. So in a way it’s good that we have it now, because it’s not going to go away.”

I love this winning attitude. I sure wish that someday soon their plan comes true.

Big Papi's Mango Salsa · May 16, 2024

@JM3 or others - have we gotten any reports (first hand or otherwise, and admittedly they may be anecdotal) on how Mayer is looking vs same handed pitching?

He had no real split in 2022 (both pre shoulder injury, but also in the lower minors), and if anything was better against same handed pitching.

Last year he didn't really have a split (he was around .705OPS vs LHP and .746 vs RHP).

This year he's been atrocious against LHP (.495OPS, he's had roughly 1/3 of his plate appearances against same handed pitching).

Obviously we're talking small sample sizes, and the weather in Portland has I'm sure been garbage. So I'm more curious about what anyone is noticing / seeing in his approach there and how the at bats actually are looking since any discussion of stats will have a lot more bearing later on in the summer with a larger sample size for sure.

The Gray Eagle · May 17, 2024

Penrod article in the Glob:
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2024/05/16/sports/zach-penrod-red-sox-prospect/
Nice headline-- "Lefthander Zach Penrod is the best Red Sox pitching prospect you never heard of."
Oh really? Anyone reading this forum definitely has heard of him!

Multiple scouts have emerged from Portland this year raving about the lefthander.
“Oh my gosh, did he ever [impress],” one said earlier this year. “He’s the most impressive arm on that staff by a long shot.”
Such an assessment is wild, given that less than a year ago the 26-year-old Penrod was pitching for the Missoula PaddleHeads of the independent Pioneer League and contemplating the end of his baseball career.

I hadn't realized that he was an OF in college and hadn't pitched much. He struggled in 11 IP in the minors, then needed TJ surgery, then missed 2020 with the pandemic, then got dropped by the Rangers, which is how he ended up pitching for the PaddleHeads.

“I liked to tell people I’d been learning to pitch for five years and just kind of trying to put it together,” Penrod said. “I was able to find a secondary pitch and that allowed me to, instead of just being up there throwing, I was actually pitching and learning hitters.”

Now in Portland, Penrod has taken further steps. Through five starts, he has a 2.25 ERA with a 35 percent strikeout rate and, perhaps more importantly, a vastly improved 9 percent walk rate. He’s getting swings and misses with his fastball (which is averaging 94-95 and has topped out at 97), changeup, and slider — currently with better feel for the change but better grades on the slider.

Paddlehead Penrod has come a long way to become a really interesting pitcher. I hope he gets promoted to AAA soon.

The Gray Eagle · May 21, 2024

Doubleheader at Hadlock tonight. In game 1 the Sea Dogs came back from 5-0 to tie it but gave up 3 in the top of the last inning and lost 8-5.
Game 2 CJ “Skip to My” Liu hit 97 mph with his first pitch and has thrown 2 scoreless to start. Portland puts up 3 in the bottom of the second.

The Gray Eagle · May 21, 2024

Liu losing a little fastball velocity in the third. And grunting audibly on some pitches. But getting swings and misses with the breaking ball.

The Gray Eagle · May 21, 2024

Liu done after 3. The Kwiat Man in and throws a 1-2-3 4th.

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