Offense Booms While Spruill And Clemens Add Good Pitching To Monday's Atlanta Braves Minor League Action

As the title implies there was a lot of offense and a lot of winning tonight in the minors for Atlanta Braves affiliates. Lynchburg is increasingly looking like the team with the most offensive talent, but everyone there has some sort of question about how they will develop. They still have some pretty impressive games though. Meanwhile, Mississippi may have one of the best rotations we have seen in the minors. 

Toledo Mud Hens 5, Gwinnett Braves 10

• Jordan Schafer CF - 2-5, RBI, .254 Avg
• Mauro Gomez 1B - 2-5, HR(7), .355 Avg
• Wilkin Ramirez DH - 3-3, 2B, BB, SB(6), .240 Avg
• Dan Nelson 2B - 2-3, 2B, HR(3), 6 RBI, .264 Avg

The Braves offense busted out in a big way against the Mud Hens on a night where Rodrigo Lopez wasn't as sharp as recent outings (though he did rack up his sixth win of the season). Dan Nelson delivered the big damage with a 6th inning four-run homer that knocked starter Thad Weber out of the game. The Braves were actually down 2-1 going into the 5th inning but scored 2, 4, 2 & 1 over the next four innings to put the game out of reach. 

Julio Teheran was supposed to take the mound tomorrow, but J.J. Hoover should be called up to make his first triple-A start.

Jacksonville Suns 8, Mississippi Braves 0

• Paul Clemens 7 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 BB, 6 K, 1.99 ERA

The only Braves team to lose on the day did so in a fairly humiliating manner as the offense collected just two hits and four walks in the contest. Paul Clemens continued to do excellent work and has allowed just 17 hits in his last 34 innings of work while posting a 1.56 ERA. Quick stat fact: Clemens 1.99 ERA leads the Southern League. J.J Hoover is second at 2.16 and Randall Delgado is third at 2.38 with Brett Oberholtzer waaaay down at 11 with a 3.10 mark. All three are also in the top ten in strikeouts with three of them in the top ten in WHIP as well. Is this the best pitching staff in the minors? 

J.J. Hoover will make his bid to take over the ERA lead from Paul Clemens against the Suns tomorrow night, if he's still in Mississippi.  Otherwise, recently promoted Matt Crim probably gets the start.

Lynchburg Hillcats 11, Kinston Indians 0

• Phil Gosselin 2B - 2-3 2B, RBI, .231 Avg
• Joey Terdoslavich 1B - 2-4, 2B, RBI, BB, 2 K, .261 Avg
• Barrett Kleinknecht 3B - 1-3, HR(2), BB, K, .370 Avg
• Braeden Schlehuber C - 2-5, 2B, HR(3), 6 RBI, .265 Avg
• Zeke Spruill 9 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 5 K, 2.88 ERA

More big offense from the minors with a dash of excellent pitching to give the Hillcats their second straight win. Braeden Schlehuber has come out of nowhere to be a productive offensive player while also being an excellent defensive catcher at the same time. His three homers are just two short of his career high in about 1/6 of the at bats and his OPS is currently almost .200 points above his career average. I am ready to declare that Barrett Kleinknecht is a good hitter but he takes walks like I take shots: rarely and begrudgingly.  Speaking of walks Joey Terdoslavich has eight on the season but four have been in his last five games and six in his last ten.  Not coincidentally his slash line in his last ten is .314/.405/.600.

The Braves released Riaan Spanjer-Furstenburg from the organization yesterday, and added shortstop Kyle Davis, who was released earlier this year from the ChiSox organization.

Cory Rasmsus will look to rebound against the Indians tomorrow night. 

Savannah Sand Gnats 6, Rome Braves 7

• Edward Salcedo 3B - 2-4, RBI, 2K, E(13), .292 Avg
• Robby Hefflinger LF - 2-4, 2B, RBI, K, .266 avg
• Jakob Dalfonso 1B - 2-4, 2B, K, .290 Avg
• Chris Garcia DH - 2-3 HR(3), 2 RBI, BB, K, .275 Avg

Chris Garcia has played ten games with Rome and is already second in homers (to Barrett Kleinknecht who is in Lynchburg). I saw him hit his first one in Augusta and it cleared the 20 foot wall in center field by about 10 feet. He has a stocky build and I definitely didn't expect him to launch a ball like that but obviously he has a little power. I am actually interested as to why he didn't stick with the Angels organization since he posted two good offensive seasons with them in rookie ball and then disappeared for three years. He isn't a prospect since he is 24 years old in the Sally League but hey, this team needs all the offense it can muster. 

Steve Kent will go against Asheville tomorrow in an attempt to build an actual win streak for Rome.