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As part of our efforts to expand the minor league content we provide at Battery Power, my aim moving forward will be to fill the gap in minor league coverage that we have every Tuesday with sort of all-encompassing article covering the news of the past week of Atlanta Braves minor league baseball. Oftentimes roster moves, or bits and pieces of notes and the like aren’t necessarily big enough to warrant an entire article from us, so this will provide a dumping ground for those along with a place to preview upcoming series.

Gwinnett Stripers

Record: 19-19, 4th in IL West (8 GB)

Gwinnett finished up a 12-game homestand with six against the Charlotte Knights, taking four of those for their first series win since the first week of April. I will have a piece going out soon (hopefully this week) digging into trends on AJ Smith-Shawver, but he got to make his first two-start week of the year and had a bit of a tough time keeping the ball in the park. The interesting trend has been Smith-Shawver’s drop in fastball usage over his past handful of starts, steadily declining from well above 60% to just above 40% in Tuesday’s outing, but on Sunday it jumped back up to 54% fastballs.

Gwinnett added two players to the roster last week who made varying impacts. Patrick Halligan has been at home in a full-time bullpen role, and he got off to one of the quickest starts in the system with 18 strikeouts and a 0.82 ERA in 11 innings with Mississippi. This earned him a call to Triple-A for the first time, but he got smacked around in his debut and allowed three runs. He bounced back on Sunday though and pitched a scoreless inning of relief in the Stripers comeback. Speaking of that comeback, Bryson Worrell has been a player the Braves have used quite a bit to bounce around the system and just fill in outfield spots where needed. With Luis Liberato hitting the injured list on the 11th and Skye Bolt still on his rehab assignment in Florida, Gwinnett needed short term reinforcement and Bryson Worrell got his second call to the roster this season. He couldn’t have done much more for the team, getting two hits including a two-run walk off home run to cap a series win.

Series Preview

The Stripers head out to Memphis for a seven-game series against the RedBirds, the Triple-A affiliate for the St. Louis Cardinals. Memphis is tied with the Stripers in the IL West with a 19-19 record and are coming off of a 2-4 series loss against the Norfolk Tides. The RedBirds feature seven of Baseball America’s top 30 Cardinals prospects, most notable among those being 3rd-ranked Thomas Saggese and 4th-ranked Victor Scott II. Saggese is ranked as Baseball America’s 71st prospect in their top 100, getting high ratings for his hit tool. Saggese has hit five home runs this season, though his on base percentage has taken a dip in his first full season in Triple-A. Victor Scott ranks 80th overall, but the outfielder has been off to a brutal start in 2024. After breaking camp with the big league club Scott had a -20 wRC+ in 20 games, spurring a demotion to Triple-A to figure things out. He hasn’t done that, putting up a 50 wRC+ in 16 games with the RedBirds, and without much impact contact being made.

The team’s leading hitter has actually been non-top 30 prospect Jose Fermin, who the Cardinals acquired in a cash deal with Cleveland prior to the 2023 season. The 25 year old Fermin has been incredible, hitting .350/.458/.650 for Memphis with 11 walks to only 3 strikeouts in 72 plate appearances. On the pitching end the Memphis rotation features Gordon Graceffo (BA #8), Sem Robberse (BA #11), Michael McGreevy (BA #14), and Adam Kloffenstein (BA #28). Robberse has had by far the best season with a 2.81 ERA and 42 strikeouts in 41 ²⁄₃ innings pitches across seven starts.

Mississippi Braves

Record: 12-21, 4th in SL South (8 GB)

2022 11th round pick Ian Mejia has been the runaway star of the Mississippi Braves, and with another scoreless outing last week he has lowered his ERA on the season to 2.02. Mejia allowed four runs in 1 ²⁄₃ innings in his opening day outing, and has since not allowed more than two runs in any start with a 1.06 ERA in those six starts. It has been just an awful year for Mississippi’s offense, as they continue to produce basement-dwelling power numbers across the team. Justin Dean’s .777 OPS, 16 RBI, and two home runs are all the team-leading marks.

Mississippi has not yet seen offensive reinforcement from the Emperors roster, but it seems they will be strengthening their pitching staff moving forward. Last week Mississippi added Rolddy Munoz, and while he did allow a couple of runs he also struck out six batters in 2 ²⁄₃ innings against Rocket City. With his fastball now touching triple digits the reliever has stepped out of the shadow of his brother, and now stands as one of the system’s top relief prospects. More important to those additions, however, is 2021 second round pick Spencer Schwellenbach, Our third rated prospect in the system, Schwellenbach has had another standout season, putting up a 2.75 FIP and 26% strikeout rate in 32 innings in Rome. The move shouldn’t be much of a surprise, as Schwellenbach’s upcoming rule 5 eligibility makes him a player the Braves will hope to move up quickly.

Series Preview

Mississippi returns home this week to face the Biloxi Shuckers, the Double-A affiliate of the Milwaukee Brewers. Biloxi has been a mediocre team overall, but their pitching staff has one major strength and leads the Southern League in strikeouts and strikeout rate. This can partially be attributed to Jacob Misiorowski, Milwaukee’s second-best prospect and the 29th overall by Baseball America. Misiorowski has been fantastic in his professional career, and has posted a 2.79 FIP with a 36.3% strikeout rate this year. His battles against Nacho Alvarez will be interesting, as it will be strengths against strengths with his high strikeout rate going against Nacho and his ability to draw walks (Misiorowski has a walk rate of 17.7%).

In total the Shuckers have six of Baseball America’s top 30 prospects, but one they don’t have is our old friend Justin Yeager. Yeager was part of the Sean Murphy trade, and was one of the players sent to the Brewers. He missed most of last season with injury and has a 2.26 FIP this season. Biloxi’s best hitter has been Baseball America’s #11 Bike Boeve. Boeve gets on base at a high rate (.407 OBP), and Baseball America gave him a 55 grade on his hit tool.

Rome Emperors

Record: 17-14, 1st in SAL South (+1 G)

The Rome Braves are sitting in first place, and much of that has to do with the incredible season of EJ Exposito. Exposito slowed down every so slightly last week, only posting an OPS of 1.200, and his power production this year has been absurd. He now has eight home runs on the season after adding two against Brooklyn last week, making up 44% of Rome’s home run output this season. Expo has always had some pull side power and loft to his swing, and seeing him make enough contact to tap into that has been a sight to behold. He is a key reason the Emperors are the fourth-ranked offense in the South Atlantic League.

Rome will have to figure out how to move life forward without Spencer Schwellenbach, but the pitching staff as a whole has been fantastic this entire season. They’ve been getting huge contributions lately out of Lucas Braun, who outside of a command hiccup in the opener last week has been brilliant for Rome with 23 strikeouts to four walks (all in that Tuesday start) in his past 22 ²⁄₃ innings. The hope is that Jhancarlos Lara can also step up and help take Schwellenbach’s place, though Lara is off to a tough start in 2024. Coming off of injury his mechanics and command are out of whack, and he has walked seven batters already in just 6 ²⁄₃ innings. Still, his stuck has been electric with his fastball sitting in the upper-90’s, and once he shakes off the rust and even gets back to his command in 2023 he should be more than capable of posting huge numbers for Rome.

Series Preview

Unfortunately for us, the Emperors now head up to Asheville to take on the Tourists, who in the year 2024 still do not have an MiLB tv feed. Owen Murphy takes the ball on Tuesday, which means we very likely will be missing two Murphy starts from the archives. Asheville is the High-A affiliate of the Houston Astros, and they are not a particularly great team. They lead the South Atlantic League in home runs and OPS, but this is partially due to playing their home games in a band box. Pitching-wise they sit with the second-worst ERA in the league (also partially due to their home park) and they have been impacted by injury. Asheville have seven of Houston’s top 30 prospects, but three of these are on the injured list including BA #5 Brice Matthews and BA #7 Zach Cole. This leaves the best prospect on the team as Luis Baez (BA #2), who has had a fantastic season. Baez is hitting .295/.342/.482 with five home runs, though strikeouts remain a bit high for the 20 year old. He is a talented player, though most of his power production has come in home games.

Owen Murphy will be facing off in a top 30 matchup against Trey Dombrowski (BA #21) on Tuesday (and possibly Sunday). Houston’s 2022 fourth round pick, Dombrowski has put up high strikeout rates in the lower minor leagues with a 25.4% strikeout rate this season that looks a bit scary when considering that is the main weakness for the Rome offense. The top pitching prospect for the team is #11 prospect Andrew Taylor, but he was removed from his last start in the first inning with an injury and his status for this week is unclear.

Augusta GreenJackets

Record: 15-17, 4th in CAR South (2.5 GB)

This Augusta offense is…it’s something. The GreenJackets scored two or fewer runs in four of their games against (old, old friends) the Pelicans last week, and yet somehow won two of those games and pulled off a series split. Now they head home for 12 straight at SRP park, and if you’re in the area it is certainly worth heading down one of these weeks to catch this pitching staff. The starters for this team have been out of their minds lately, led by 19 year old Garrett Baumann. Baumann has gone six or more innings in three of his past four starts, allowing one or fewer runs in those three outings. He’s been the brightest star among the newer additions to the system, though others have put their names in the mix.

I can’t imagine Adam Maier will be in Single-A too much longer given his age, though it wasn’t until July that Spencer Schwellenbach received a promotion last year. Maier has impressed me more and more with each passing start, working with an east-to-west approach down in the zone that has just dominated Single-A hitters. The strikeouts aren’t there yet, he’s sitting at just 21.6% in that category, but in watching the games it’s clear the movement on his stuff has created problems for the Carolina League. Riley Frey has also had a wildly good season with 28 strikeouts to four walks in 23 ¹⁄₃ innings. Frey’s pre-draft reports had him up to 93, and if he was still there I would strongly consider him for my top 30. As of now though, I haven’t seen a report of him even touching 90 this season which is a bit of a disappointment considering how good every other aspect of his performance has been. He has a deep four-pitch mix and commands all four well, making him a tough matchup for low level hitters who struggle with movement and pitch selection on the edges. A step forward in velocity could make him a legitimate guy, but I feel his velocity is just too far on the bad end of the spectrum for him to get outs at the major league level at this point.

Series Preview

The first assignment for the GreenJackets on this homestand is going to be the Salem Red Sox, and I’ll just let you guess who they are affiliated with. Salem strikes out a ton of batters as a team, so I’m not particularly hopeful we’re going to see much exciting baseball being played. Offensively they have been marginally better than Augusta this season, but overall I would expect a low-scoring week of baseball.

Overall this Salem team is barren in regards to prospects. Six of Boston’s top 30 players are listed on the roster, but three of those players are injured leaving Miguel Bleis as by far the best prospect on the team. He’s the only healthy player from the Red Sox top 20 prospects on the roster. Bleis is a guy I really like a lot, a guy with huge raw talent that could end up hitting 20+ home runs at the major league level, though he hasn’t had near that impact in his time with the Red Sox. This is his second go at Single-A after injuries cost him most of last year, and he has looked solid with a 102 wRC+ while cutting his strikeout rate to 17.5%.

You have to go all the way down to Elmer Rodriguez-Cruz (BA #29) to find a top 30 pitching prospect on this roster, but boy has been fantastic this season. Rodriguez-Cruz has a 2.25 FIP in 2024, largely due to his strikeout rate jumping up to 37%. This is, however, his third trip to Single-A though he is still just 20 years old. He has faced the GreenJackets twice in his career and allowed two runs in four innings, though he has not faced them this season.

FCL Braves

Record: 0-7, 6th in FCL South (5 GB)

Please just win one game guys. The FCL squad has been awful, despite having a slew of guys on the roster rehabbing. The most notable of these is Isaiah Drake, who left his April 18th game in Augusta with what appeared to be a hamstring injury. Drake has not played consecutive days yet and the Braves will likely be very patient with him, though at some point he does have to actually swing. He has seven walks in 11 plate appearances in the FCL, and I do wonder if the Braves are actively having him take pitches to try to help with his pitch selection once he does return to Augusta. The standout for the team has been Jeremy Reyes, who has a 0.96 ERA in two starts this year. Reyes was sitting 94-97 in his last start with a slider, and will be pushing for top 30 recognition in our midseason update. Reports on Reyes are glowing and his performance thus far has backed that up.

Other News and Notes:

MLB Pipeline updated their top 100 list on Monday, and both Braves guys saw jumps from the preseason list. I’m not sure how much of it is due to prospect graduation, most of the place movement was, but AJ Smith-Shawver went up to 59th overall while Hurston Waldrep came in at 75th.

Last week I did a write up of some of the non-top 30 players who have impressed early this season. EJ Exposito continues to be the standout from the group.

Finally, for those who aren’t aware, Gaurav Vedak, Joe Carson, and I have birthed the spiritual successor to Road to Atlanta with the Peach State Prospects podcast. The format is different than R2A with a focus more on player progression rather than weekly performance, and we’re three episodes in with a look at AJ Smith-Shawver.