If you haven't visited the multimedia site for Akron recently you should go check it out when you have a few minutes to kill. There are a ton of great videos from recent games. Frankie Mejia hitting a triple and homering from both sides of the plate. Bobby Bradley grand slam. Tyler Krieger inside the park homer, and him making a great defensive play. A lot more...

http://www.milb.com/multimedia/vpp.jsp?sid=t402

Uncle Dennis wrote:These are my seats in for the Charlotte Knights, I believe the best minor league stadium

Looks beautiful! Enjoy!

Checked in on the farm during rain delay. Lots of good stuff. More pitchers thriving with promotions. Everyone winning again. Lots of homers.

Clippers beat the Braves 8-2. Whitehouse has a nice start in his first AAA start. 5.1 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 2 BB, 3 K. ... Tyler Naquin hit a grand slam. Nice opposite field line drive. ... Papi 1-3 with a walk.

Akron beats Portland 8-3. ... Tanner Tully does pretty well in his first AA game. Errors cost him a few unearned runs but not bad. 6 IP, 6 H, 0 ER, 2 BB, 1 K. ... Mejia 2-4 with a walk. Does this kid ever not hit. Damn. ... Bradley continues to win me over. 3-5 with 2 doubles, a homer, and 3 RBI. ... Krieger 1-2 with a walk and a CS. ... Chang 1-4.

Lynchburg beats the Keys 12-5 in a Home Run Derby. Literally half the lineup homered. 6 in all for the Cats. And Aaron Civale had another solid start. 7 IP, 6 H, 3 ER, 0 BB, 8 K. ... Loopstok 2-4 with a homer and 2 walks. ... Castro was 0-6 with 3 K's. Weird that on a night everyone was hitting he was the only one that didn't. ... Jod Carter, a guy who I liked but has disappointed me this year, was 2-2 with 2 homers and 3 walks. Showing why I used to think he had promise.

And the Captains beat the Cubs 5-3. ... Ben Krauth was his marvelous self. 4 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 3 BB, 6 K. He even picked off two base runners. There is literally nothing he can not do. ... Junior Soto, who we never talk about, was 3-3 with 3 homers. ... Chu 1-1 with a double. ... Ice was 1-4 with a homer.

Lynchburg Player of the Week

Aaron Civale, RHP

Last Week: 1 GS, 1-0, 8 IP, 1 R/ER, 2 H, 0 BB, 4 K, 0 HR, 1.13 ERA

Season to Date (Lake County and Lynchburg):
13 GS, 4-5, 75.1 IP, 41 R, 33 ER, 74 H, 8 BB, 68 K, 3 HR, 3.94 ERA

Just over a year ago at this time, Aaron Civale was still pitching for Northeastern prior to getting the call from the Indians that he was going to be their third round selection in the 2016 draft. Now he's already at the halfway point in his journey to the big leagues with three starts for the Hillcats under his belt in which the right-hander has gone 2-1 with an impressive 1.96 ERA over 18.1 innings.

After a successful rookie campaign at Mahoning Valley last year where he went 0-2 with a 1.67 ERA in limited innings, Civale entered his first full season without restrictions as he would join the Lake County Captains to begin the campaign. His first 10 starts yielded some mixed results as he went 2-4 with a 4.58 ERA, but thanks to the dominance of Thomas Pannone in Lynchburg that led to his promotion to Double-A, Civale was the tagged as the corresponding move to fill the vacated spot in the Hillcats rotation.

So far, he has risen to the occasion posting the aforementioned 2-1 record and 1.96 ERA allowing only 10 hits and three walks while fanning 15 over 18.1 innings. His pinpoint control and strike-throwing ability has lived up to the hype through his first 26 starts as the Connecticut native has issued only 16 free passes in 113 innings while striking out 96. He's also keeping batters off-balance by holding them to a .234 clip.

The innings are starting to stack up for Civale as well as he is averaging nearly six innings per start with his most recent outing against Wilmington resulting in eight frames of one-run ball, marking the deepest he has pitched into a game in his young career. He may not have the sexy, ace-type stuff, but he's quickly turning himself into a very reliable and durable starting pitching prospect with some early big league implications.

Tribe Insider @Tribeinsider
System moves today
+Transfer LHP Matt Whitehouse from COL>AKR
+Transfer LHP Tanner Tulley from AKR>LC
+Transfer RHP Cesar Ventura from LC>MV

Everyone goes back.

So our big bats over the weekend were the unlikely pair of Eric Stamets and Jr. Soto each of whom cracked three homers in a game.
Stamets is not a minor league lifer; he's only 25 and is always described as a very solid defender at SS who simply needs to hit a bit to have a shot at the majors. All of a sudden he's become a power bat. His homer total is 9 and his OPS for the Clippers is 1.010. His home run totals in prior season were:
2012: 1
2013: 4
2014: 4
2015: 4
2016: 7
1/2 of 2017: 9
He's from Dublin Ohio so he's playing in his virtual home town this year.

Soto is a 6-3 175 pound right handed hitter. He appears to be aN ALL or nothing kind of player:

60 AT BATS
NOT A SINGLE WALK
5 HOMERS
8 DOUBLES
2 SINGLES
19 STRIKEOUTS



He did not come cheap to the Indians:


July 2, 2013: "Dominican outfielder Junior Soto has signed with the Indians for $600,000.
Soto, 16, is 6-foot-2, 190 pounds and stands out for his righthanded raw power. He projects as a corner outfielder. Soto trained with Christian Batista, who is known as “Niche,” and played in both the International Prospect League and the Dominican Prospect League."

Bradley won his 2nd MVP last season in the Carolina League at age 19 compiling this line: 235/342/466 K/BB 2.3 K's 32% of his total AB 29 HR 102 RBI
now as one of the youngest players in the pitching-friendly Eastern League his line is: 250/345/462 K/BB 2.05 K's 26% of his total AB 11 HR 0 RBI

Handling himself well against better pitching and his splits for this season are impressive:
April: 176/318/412
May: 276/337/437
June: 309/387/564

He's learning how to be more than a homer or nothing hitter; he's always had a good Walk ratio and he's cutting down on the K's. Would like to see his spray chart.

I did a quick search and found a Bradley spray chart from the 2015 season but no recent one. If I come across one I'll share.

Did you see the one from Mejia I posted the other day?

Junior Soto, cf, Indians. Soto, who signed with the Indians out of the Dominican Republic during the 2013 international signing period, had not shown much power before Saturday. But he broke out in a big way. Soto, who had six homers in 133 games as a pro, homered three times as low Class A Lake County beat South Bend (Cubs) 5-3. The lanky outfielder had been in a 3-for-29 slide in his first foray of full-season ball until his big game Saturday.

CLE AA Bradley, Bobby 1B 5 1 3 3 .255 2 2B (9), HR (11)
CLE AA Chang, Yu-Cheng SS 4 0 1 0 .218
CLE AA Krieger, Tyler 2B 2 2 1 0 .234 BB (18), CS (1)
CLE AA Mejia, Francisco C 4 2 2 0 .371 BB (14)
CLE AAA Rodriguez, Nellie 1B 4 0 0 0 .137
CLE HiA Castro, Willi SS 6 1 0 0 .282
CLE LoA Ice, Logan C 4 1 1 2 .201 HR (3)
CLE MAJ Gonzalez, Erik SS 4 2 3 0 .333 BB (1) [always making us forget what's his name Martinez]
CLE MAJ Zimmer, Bradley PR-CF 0 0 0 0 .274
CLE HiA Civale, Aaron 7 6 3 3 0 8 2.49 W (3-1)
CLE MAJ Merritt, Ryan 4 7 3 2 0 2 4.50

Ronny Rodriguez was just activated from DL. In his first at bat he hits a 3 run homer for Clips today.

In even more shocking news today from Columbus, Brandon Guyer was hit by a pitch in his first at bat.

Frankie Mejia hits a pinch hit walk off double to win game 3-2 for Akron today.

I have no more words.

Only words needed.....move him up!

Strut like a boss through dugout after a walk off. Go ahead.

Bottle of clean piss laying there in case anybody needs it