Cleveland Sports Forum

Francisco Mejia is back and still hitting for Akron RubberDucks: Cleveland Indians Minor Leagues

By Elton Alexander, The Plain Dealer

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Welcome back, Francisco Mejia. One of the top players in the Cleveland Indians minor league system, Mejia has returned to the Class AA Akron RubberDucks showing no ill effects from an early season groin injury, seemingly without missing a hit.

Mejia has been back for 10 games and here are the catcher's numbers after sitting out Thursday night -- he's 15-for-36, hitting .416 in that stretch. Inside those figures are four multi-hit games and a pair of homers.

For the season, Mejia is hitting .331, which is in line with his breakout 2016 season. Last year Mejia hit .342 at Class A Lake County and Class A Lynchburg, including a combined 50-game hitting streak between both teams.

Solid debut: Mathew Reed Esparza, 22, in his first start since getting called up from Lynchburg, delivered a solid effort for the Ducks to snap a four-game losing streak. The righthander went eight innings in a 4-2 victory with 10 strikeouts and no walks while giving up just one run.

Counting Lynchburg, Esparza is now 4-3 with a 2.95 ERA, 50 strikeouts vs. 11 walks in 55 innings pitched.

Rough patch: Starting pitcher Nick Pasquale (3-4, 4.82) had a second straight tough outing. The righthander only lasted 3.2 innings, allowing five runs on five hits and three walks to Altoona.

This came after a seven-run, nine-hit effort in five innings against Bowie. Prior to those two games, Pasquale had allowed more than three runs in a game only once in eight previous starts.

All or nothing: Shortstop Yu-Cheng Chang, 21, continues to either produce big or produce almost nothing at the plate. He is hitting just .210 with just 34 hits in 46 games.

Yet the Taiwan product has 22 extra-base hits out of the 34, including 10 home runs, nine doubles and three triples. He has scored 24 runs and produced 28 RBI.

He also has 56 strikeouts. However, Chang is showing signs of making more contact as he is currently on a three-game hitting streak with five hits in 10 at-bats, six RBI, one homer, one triple and two doubles.

Ducks update: The Ducks continue to run hot and cold. They recently had a five-game winning streak balanced by a four-game losing streak. ... They stand 23-26 in the Eastern League Western Division, five games behind the first-place Altoona Curve. ... Akron is home to Reading this weekend at Canal Park before heading out on a six-game trip.

We once again are shut out on the Hot Prospects List, since we haven't had many hot prospects other than Mejia, who's been on this list earlier this spring. At least a question was answered this week. [I've not wasted my time asking about Pannone the past two or three weeks.]

Elliot (Youngstown OH): How about Julian Merryweather's 8 shutout inning AAA debut [8K, 0 BB, 4 H]? He seems to have taken a serious step up in 2017.

Kyle Glaser: I had never heard of Julian Merryweather until I covered him in last year's Cal-Carolina League All-Star Game and he started and came out pumping 97. He's a big dude with a live arm and excellent control. His breakout was last year more than this year, but he has solidified the notion that he is a big league caliber arm no doubt.

Wow, I went a perfect two for two this week:

Elliot (Youngstown): Yu-Chiang Chang managed a 591 slugging avg for the week; he's all extra base hits, 10 doubles, 10 homers, 2 triples and only 12 singles. Do you like what you see?

Kyle Glaser: It was a very good week for Chang, but even with it he is hitting .210 with a .301 on-base percentage and a 30 percent strikeout rate at Double-A. It's not like he hit or got on base all that well at LoA or HiA either. He's a middle infielder with some usable pop so you can't completely cross him off, but he needs to make a lot more contact before you can seriously envision him in an Indians uniform helping out at the big league level

Not just is Aiken inconsistent and walking too many his velocity is way way off:


Brady Aiken Struggles To Regain Velocity

Indians Organization Report


May 22, 2017 By Jim Ingraham

The Indians knew they were going to have to be patient when they selected lefthander Brady Aiken with the 17th overall pick in the 2015 draft.
Two years later, they remain patient because results had not materialized. Aiken’s search for the velocity and electric stuff he showed as a San Diego high school senior in 2014, when he was selected No. 1 overall by the Astros, continued this year at low Class A Lake County.

Aiken’s backstory is well known, from the impasse in negotiations with Houston to Tommy John surgery in March 2015 while attending the post-graduate program at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla., to being selected in the first round by Cleveland three months after surgery.
Through 80.1 pro innings, Aiken had run up a 5.27 ERA. He went 1-6, 4.50 through seven starts in the Midwest League this year, while averaging 7.4 walks per nine innings.

Coming out of high school, Aiken’s fastball topped out at 97 mph, but at Lake County that fastball failed to climb out of the 80s.
“We’re not concerned about his velocity,” [really??] said Matt Blake, the assistant director of player development for pitchers. “He’s obviously not where he was (pre-surgery), but it takes time. Everybody’s different.”

The 20-year-old Aiken’s makeup continues to draw rave reviews from the Indians, and that makeup was being tested. “It’s frustrating. It would be for anyone,” Blake said. “But he’s very level-headed. He’s handled the pressure of who he is very well.”

In the meantime, Aiken is a marquee name without marquee stats, which can produce a pressure all its own. “We just want to see Brady become more efficient with his strike-throwing and pitch counts,” Blake said. “He’s a great teammate and a hard worker. There’s still a lot of promise there.”

— Jim Ingraham is a columnist at the Elyria Chronicle-Telegram/Medina Gazette.

Clip show beat Syracuse 11-5. ... Yandy 2-3 with walk. ... Wilson made his debut and went 0-2 with walk.

Akron beat Reading 4-3. ... Lugo with an odd line. 5 IP, 7 H, 3 ER, 4 BB, 2 K. ... Frankie 0-2 with 2 walks. ... Bradley 0-4 with 2 K.

Hillcats lost to Nationals 3-0. ... McKenzie deserved better. 7 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 1 BB, 5 K. ... Castro 1-3 and stolen base. ... Loopstok 1-3. ... Marabell 1-4.

Captain, my Captains. They lose again, 5-2. They are now 18-35. ... Miniard 6 IP, 4 H, 3 ER, 2 BB, 7 K. ... Chu 0-4.

Tomorrows starters

Columbus - Morimando
Akron - Whitehouse
Lynchburg - Chiang
Lake County - Aiken

Indians Prospective‏ @indiansPro
Akron #RubberDucks transactions
RHP Cole Sulser assigned from (AAA) Columbus

Lonnie Chisenhall (concussion) cleared to return to games. Will start in right field Saturday for Class AA Akron.

Well the Arizona and Dominican League rosters are becoming clearer.

One thing different you need to know this year ... there are some teams with split rosters.

Some smaller market teams that were not able to spend big money on big time kids spent there money spread out among several players, too many for one team. So they are getting together and having a split squad.

The Indians, due to major shake up going on in organization last year, did not make any big spending signings and spread their money among several players. And they and the Brewers are going to be sharing a squad in the DSL this year.

Having said that, DSL rosters are set, and the AZL roster is getting closer ...

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Indians Prospective‏ @indiansPro
#Indians 2016 (DSL) Dominican Summer League players invited to play in 2017 (AZL) Arizona Rookie League
Current (players subject to change) .

DSL Indians Roster

Managers & Coaches (click column headers to sort)

# Name Pos Bat Thw Ht Wt DOB Status
Freddy Tiburico Hitting Coach 0 Active
Jesus Sanchez Pitching Coach L L 5' 10" 165 10-11-1974 Active
Jose Mejia Manager R R 6' 1" 160 07-28-1970 Active
Carlos Jan Pitching Coach L L 5' 11" 165 11-03-1979 Active

Pitchers (click column headers to sort)

# Name Pos Bat Thw Ht Wt DOB Status MLB 40-man
53 Orlando Cedeno P R R 6' 2" 195 09-16-1997 Active No
50 Ignacio Feliz P R R 6' 1" 180 10-23-1999 Active No
51 Hector Figueroa P R R 6' 3" 190 11-30-1994 Active No
59 Luis C. Garcia P R R 6' 3" 180 04-26-1997 Active No
39 Luis D. Garcia P R R 6' 2" 180 06-23-2000 Active No
41 Mike Garcia P R R 6' 4" 183 08-11-2000 Active No
52 Diarlin Jimenez P R R 6' 5" 180 03-18-2000 Active No
58 Wuilson Meza P R R 5' 11" 170 10-05-1998 Active No
9 Jose Oca P R R 6' 0" 150 02-28-1999 Active No
43 Juan Paredes P R R 6' 3" 200 09-25-1998 Active No
34 Leomar Pereda P R R 6' 1" 160 09-27-1997 Active No
29 Eric Perez P R R 6' 6" 190 07-27-1997 Active No
47 Christophers Santana P R R 6' 2" 195 02-26-1998 Active No
48 Luigence Thomas P R R 6' 3" 160 10-12-1994 Active No
32 Yeffersson Yannuzzi P L L 6' 2" 175 10-04-1996 Active No

Catchers (click column headers to sort)

# Name Pos Bat Thw Ht Wt DOB Status MLB 40-man
11 Christopher De Jesus C R R 5' 11" 170 09-24-1996 Active No
8 Yainer Diaz C R R 6' 0" 195 09-21-1998 Active No
17 Roger Marmol C R R 5' 11" 190 10-05-1999 Active No

Infielders (click column headers to sort)

# Name Pos Bat Thw Ht Wt DOB Status MLB 40-man
7 Nehemias Celesten 3B R R 6' 1" 195 02-03-2000 Active No
20 Jeikol Contreras 3B L R 6' 0" 175 04-14-2000 Active No
37 Henderson De Oleo 1B R R 6' 4" 210 02-11-1998 Active No
12 Marcos Gonzalez SS R R 5' 11" 165 10-12-1999 Active No
33 Jonathan Lopez SS S R 6' 2" 175 08-13-1999 Active No
1 Jean Montero 2B R R 5' 11" 175 02-26-1999 Active No
2 Wilbis Santiago 2B L R 6' 0" 180 01-20-1996 Active No
40 Tahnaj Thomas 3B R R 6' 4" 190 06-16-1999 Active No

Outfielders (click column headers to sort)

# Name Pos Bat Thw Ht Wt DOB Status MLB 40-man
24 Pablo Jimenez LF R R 6' 2" 175 02-06-1999 Active No
15 Franklin Mateo RF R R 6' 2" 180 05-24-1998 Active No
35 Jhon Torres OF R R 6' 4" 199 03-29-2000 Active No
6 Carlos Ventura LF L R 6' 0" 180 02-22-1998 Active No

.

DSL Indians/Brewers Roster

Managers & Coaches (click column headers to sort)

# Name Pos Bat Thw Ht Wt DOB Status
Jesus Tavarez Hitting Coach S R 6' 0" 170 03-26-1971 Active
Jesus Hernandez Pitching Coach R R 6' 0" 185 09-20-1986 Active
Carlos Fermin Manager R R 5' 9" 140 07-12-1973 Active

Pitchers (click column headers to sort)

# Name Pos Bat Thw Ht Wt DOB Status MLB 40-man
53 Daniel Acosta P R R 6' 1" 185 02-27-1997 Active No
30 Jose Alberro P L L 6' 1" 168 02-02-1998 Active No
52 Luis Cordero P L L 6' 3" 170 04-22-1999 Active No
29 Wilmy De Jesus P R R 6' 0" 170 02-26-2000 Active No
39 Joaquin De La Cruz P R R 6' 2" 195 10-13-1995 Active No
56 Daritzon Feliz P L L 6' 2" 175 08-19-1999 Active No
57 Henry Garcia P R R 6' 5" 195 03-29-1997 Active No
51 Juan Gomez P L R 6' 3" 185 05-01-1997 Active No
55 Adoni Kery P R R 6' 0" 170 02-18-1996 Active No
35 Henry Medina P R R 6' 0" 175 09-05-1997 Active No
21 Antonio Perez P R R 6' 2" 200 10-19-1997 Active No
41 Jefry Tamares P R R 6' 2" 190 07-31-1997 Active No
38 Jahir Varela P L L 5' 10" 175 02-07-1998 Active No
33 Ricardo Velasquez P R R 6' 2" 175 08-09-1999 Active No

Catchers (click column headers to sort)

# Name Pos Bat Thw Ht Wt DOB Status MLB 40-man
11 Ismael Rosado C R R 5' 11" 185 12-14-1996 Active No
7 Bryan Torres C L R 5' 11" 165 07-02-1997 Active No

Infielders (click column headers to sort)

# Name Pos Bat Thw Ht Wt DOB Status MLB 40-man
1 Luis Avila SS R R 5' 11" 150 03-05-1999 Active No
16 Rafael Brito SS R R 6' 2" 180 10-25-1998 Active No
5 Javier Castillo 3B R R 5' 11" 160 04-04-1998 Active No
13 Makesiondon Kelkboom SS R R 5' 11" 152 07-12-2000 Active No
28 Jesus Maestre IF R R 5' 10" 155 02-04-2000 Active No
30 Gaspar Palacio SS S R 5' 8" 155 03-02-2000 Active No
3 Edwin Sano 2B S R 5' 9" 160 12-12-1998 Active No

Outfielders (click column headers to sort)

# Name Pos Bat Thw Ht Wt DOB Status MLB 40-man
25 Julio Cabrera OF L L 6' 0" 190 11-21-1997 Active No
10 Cristopher Cespedes RF R R 6' 3" 200 05-18-1998 Active No
27 Luis De La Rosa RF R R 6' 4" 170 08-31-1998 Active No
15 Bryan Dimas OF S R 6' 1" 165 02-04-2000 Active No
2 Yorki Franco RF L R 6' 2" 180 10-26-1998 Active No
37 Melvin Mendez RF R R 6' 4" 195 10-07-1997 Active No
9 Jose Pena LF L L 6' 3" 175 10-21-1998 Active No
49 Derian Perez OF L L 6' 3" 175 06-08-2000 Active No

.

Now if you are wondering which players on that last roster is with the Indians you can go to this link ... http://www.milb.com/roster/index.jsp?cid=617&sid=milb ... click on a players name, and there it will say whether he is with Indians or Brewers organization.

Clippers beat Syracuse 3-2 to edge closer to .500 at 26-29. ... Armstrong blew the save by allowing the tying run in 9th, but got the win when Colabello hit a solo home run for the win in the 10th. ... Morimando pitched well. 7 IP, 6 H, 1 ER, 2 BB, 5 K. ... Mike Papi 0-3 with 2 walks. ... Yandy day off.

Akron loses 3-1 to Reading to drop to 24-27 on the year. ... Whitehouse had a solid night. 5 IP, 4 H, 2 ER, 0 BB, 8 K. ... Mitch Brown got lit up for 3 earned runs in an inning. ... Krieger 0-5. ... Chisenhall 1-3 with a walk. ... Bradley 0-1. ... Frankie 2-3 with 2 walks and rbi.

Lynchburg loses 3-1 to Potomac but are still 30-23 on the year. ... Chiang 7 IP, 6 H, 2 ER, 0 BB, 3 K. ... Castro 0-4.

Li-Jen Chu hits a grand slam in the bottom of the 8th to lead Lake County to a win over South Bend 5-3, and improves to 19-35 on the year. Oh brother. Chu is a 23 year old catcher from Taiwan who is hitting .283 with 7 homers now on the year, and really been the only young man worth following on the Captains offensive offense recently. ... Aiken still showing signs of learning to pitch without his good stuff. 6 IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 3 BB, 2 K.

Tomorrows starters
Col - Merryweather
Akr - Pannone
Lynchburg is playing a double header tomorrow starting at 1 PM EDT. Hartson is pitching one game. The often used TBD the other.
LC - Hillman

+Place SS Luke Wakamatsu (sore back) & C Logan Ice (wrist) on DL in LC

+Activate SS Alexis Pantoja & OF Jose Medina from DL in LC

Jose Fermin on the DSL roster got a good writeup from BA in their Prospect Guide. Related? I don't know.

Back to the absurdly normal for Thomas Pannone, as of last look he'd gone 5 2/3 shutout innings, 4 hits, no walks, 4 strikeouts.

Bradley with his 8th homer today, first in at least a couple weeks. Hit 5 in April, 2 in May, but spent May lifting his average, cutting down his strikeouts and boosting his walks.

2 hits for Conner Capel for the Captains, he's been very hot in the past couple weeks. Stats for his last 10 games:

14 hits in 34 at bats. 412/522/882.

Hillman was OK today, 3 runs in 6 innings. He's gone from really atrocious to almost ok.
His first 5 starts: 17 innings, 20 runs, ERA 10.59
Since then: 25 2/3 innings, 15 runs, ERA 5.26

As we watch Aiken and Hillman and Plutko struggle, while Merryweather and Pannone and Esparza shine I wonder how our pitching prospects might rank now?

obviously McKenzie is far and away the top. He's only 19 and excelling in High A. ERA 2.65 WHIP 0.954. K/IP 11.1

Preseason hitters dominated the top prospect rankings and the only other pitcher among the top 13 as rated by BA was LHP Brady Aiken. Age 20 in his full season back from TJ surgery, so he has plenty of time to regroup, but we've read lately about his fastball in the upper 80s. Hardly a top prospect based on his current development. 4.11 ERA isn't that bad but 1.768 WHIP is and 4.8 K/IP is terrible.

Then the other pitchers rated among the top 30 were:

14: Hillman, another 20 year old lefty with potential, but not much performance. FB last year started the year 90-92 and then dropped off. What is it this year? Before today he was 7.38 ERA. 1.64 WHIP. 7.4 K/IP.

16: Plutko RH, age 25. AAA: 6.60 ERA 1.567 WHIP 6.7 K/IP. Another Grade F.

17: Tim Cooney LH, age 26, on AAA after spending all of last season on Cards' DL. Not quite on the ascent.

19: Shawn Morimando LH age 24. Small but hard thrower. Started the AAA season as bad as Plutko and Hillman but he was OK in May. For the season 4.81 ERA. 1.539 WHIP. 6.4 K. For May/June: 3.88 ERA 7.4 K/BB. which are OKish, but not the 8 homers allowed in 42 May-June innings.

I don't have time for all the stats now, but the rest of the pitchers in the top 30 include more impressive performers than the previous bunch of what dear old Frank lovingly called "stiffs"

20. Aaron Civale age 21 next week RHP just promoted to Lynchburg
21: Shane Bieber age 21 last week RHP beat him to Lynchburg by a couple weeks
22: Ryan Merritt age 25 LH, AAA. Did we hear how the wedding went?
23: Julian Merryweather age 25 RH Outstanding debut in AAA last week. Reports say he throws 97 MPH. Sounds like the No. 2 pitcher to me.
26: Rob Kaminsky LH. On the DL.
28: Micah Miniard age 21 RH. 6-7. Lake County. BA dubbed him our Breakout prospect. Not excelling.
BA dubbed as our "sleeper" Matt Esparza. We've been moving pitchers up much faster than usual. He's just made the ascent to Akron.

Not on BA's Top 30 were Luis Lugo and Pannone and on their long list both were projected as relievers

The greatest show on Earth, the Clip Show, (Since Ringling Bros Circus closed it's show) can not be slowed down by man nor beast, but it can by Mother Nature. Columbus was postponed today due to weather.

Akron lost to Reading 4-3, but was not the fault of Pannone who once again, as Civ mentioned, pitched extremely well. 6.2 IP, 4 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 5 K. ... Chisenhall was 0-4 but hit a ball very hard to CF while i checked in. ... Krieger 0-4. ... F.Mejia 0-3. ... Bradley 2-3 with a walk and a caught stealing. He hit his 8th homer and it was a bomb. 447 feet and an exit velocity of 112 MPH. ... Chang 2-4 with double and stolen base.

Lynchburg won game 1 of their double header 5-3 in 7 innings. ... Hartson was decent and has been doing well this year. 5.2 IP, 3 H, 3 ER, 2 BB, 6 K. ... Loopstok 1-4 with double. ... Marabell 1-3 a 2 run homer. ... Castro 0-3.

Lynchburg wins game two 3-2. Game was supposed to be 7 inning game but tied at 2. Went into 8th where Sam Haggerty got a base hit to knock in winning run. Unfortunately that is about all I know though cause their web site and Gamecast froze up in 2nd inning. I didn't recognize the name of the starting pitcher anyway, but if I see anything worth mentioning I'll update later. edit, update, found a box score. Loopstok was 2-3 with a homer and a walk. Castro 1-4.

Lake County lose (gasp, oh the shock!) 5-3 to South Bend. ... Hillman didn't do bad. 6 IP, 6 H, 2 ER, 3 BB, 2 K. ... Chu 0-3.