SF Giants Minor Lines, 6/22

Big news from the top of the draft last night

2nd-round pick (59) Bryan Reynolds @FirebirdsCCBL '15 signs w/@SFGiants for $1.35 mil. pic.twitter.com/4tebfIS4N2

— BEACHSPIKES ™ (@beachspikes) June 23, 2016

Reynolds singed for $0.26mm above slot value. That leaves just Garrett Williams of the top 10 rounds picks yet to sign. They've signed 22 of their top 28 picks, with two of those left unsigned still playing in the College World series.

PS. I chose the Cape Cod League twitter pic over all the Vanderbilt ones because it's goofier, and because it's the Cape Cod League (drink!)

HIGHLIGHTS: Jean Angomas singled three times to drive his average over .500. Robinson Medrano doubled twice. Ricardo Genoves went 3 for 4 with two RBI.

Sacramento lost to Tacoma Rainiers (Mariners), 5-2

The RiverCats managed just five hits in this game, including Juan Ciriaco's solo HR. They supplemented with five walks, but it wasn't enough to push across any runs. A Rando Moreno double and two-out RBI single from Austin Slater was the only other offense they could generate. With both Jarrett Parker and Mac Williamson out of the Sacramento lineup, it's a pretty toothless offense, particularly with Austin Slater still working on the level adjustments and Andrew Susac's continued struggles. Susac is now SLG .288 in the PCL in over 100 ABs this year. There's just no possible way he's healthy. The health-challenged Catcher looks to be working on his second consecutive lost year.

#SFGiants fans - Sergio Romo warming up in @RiverCats bullpen! #lookinggoodfeelinggood #giants pic.twitter.com/XbeSwIQiGm

— Wayne Gravelle (@GiantGators) June 23, 2016

The best sight of the game was Sergio Romo coming in to pitch another perfect inning. Twelve pitches, seven strikes, one strikeout. Hopefully he'll be healthy enough this time to join the Giants when they return home. It's been a long time since we've seen his slider in a real game.

Worth noting, Sergio is currently on the 60 day DL, which means when he's ready to return, somebody has to get lopped off the 40 man.

Ty Blach's propensity for getting hit continues unabated, and, perhaps trying to avoid so much contact, his walk rate has gone up this year as well. For a pitcher with just a 14% K rate, you'd certainly like to see better than just a 2 to 1 K:BB ratio. Ty's probably living on the far edge of his 40 man existence at this point (this is connected to the point about Romo above).

Anyway, you can see from Augie's face what the experience of sitting through this game was like:

Ciriaco homers, Augi gets tossed, #RiverCats fall to @RainiersLand 5-2. #ClawsUp

RECAP: https://t.co/8G6Way78b8 pic.twitter.com/PbBBtIJfG8

— River Cats (@RiverCats) June 23, 2016

Final note: the RiverCats released Braulio Lara from his contract to allow him to take an offer to play in Korea.

* * *

Richmond lost at Hartford Yard Goats (Rockies), 7-6

Richmond jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the top of the first inning, and used 14 hits to extend their lead out to 6-2 by the end of the fifth.  Five different members of the lineup had mult-hit games, including three hit efforts from both Christian Arroyo and C Steven Lerud. Hunter Cole doubled and homered. The HR was his 7th of the season and second in two days in this series.

Christian Arroyo, in this game, was getting his fourth consecutive start at 3b. It's only the second time this year he's played more than two straight games away from SS. The other was a five game stretch in late May, also predominantly spent at 3b.

DISCUSSION TOPIC:

San Francisco Giants: Could Christian Arroyo be nearing a debut? https://t.co/p4JE36Je81

— SF Giants Update (@SFGiantsUpdate) June 22, 2016

The series has been played in somewhat bizarre fashion, as the venue change to New Hampshire (home of the Fisher Cats) was announced late and, of course, neither team has fans in the area, so the stadium was almost entirely empty in game 1. For game 2, the crowd was almost entirely made up of local boy Matt Gage's friends and family, and he gave them a good show.

Unfortunately, after Matt left the bullpen gave away the game. Former Yankee Preston Claiborne surrendered a three-run HR in the 7th to Rosell Herrera to make it a one-run game, and in the bottom of the 8th Tyler Mizenko gave up two more to lose it. It's note-worthy to me that if the Giants really wanted Ray Black to get used to major league work load this was a great opportunity to get him a back to back day AND dirty inning opportunity. For that matter, closer Tyler Rogers was well rested, not having worked in four days. But the Squirrels were content to let Mizenko lose it on a single, double, WP, and Sac Fly. The inning only ended on a CS.

* * *

Salem-Keizer won at Boise Hawks (Rockies), 3-2
winning their three game series, 2-1

Highlights of Concepcion, so that you can appreciate how he put up those numbers. https://t.co/pCiPDrqihU

Skinny guy with big stuff.

— GiantsProspectTalk (@giantsprospects) June 17, 2016

Victor Concepcion bounced back well from his first start going 6 innings and allowing just one unearned run. Concepcion had the ground balls going, as he had an 8-2 GO/FO ratio. And he helped his own cause extraordinarily, by picking off three of the six baserunners he allowed.

The Volcanoes offense wasn't much more powerful than the Hawks. They strung together two singles and a Sac Fly in the 3rd inning to take a 1-0 lead. And then in the 5th they picked up two unearned runs thanks to two more singles sandwiched around a two-base error by the 1b who couldn't handle the throw from third on a slow roller. Jean Angomas was involved in both of those rallies, and continues to sting the ball early on.

SK is back at home tonight, which means a nice fulfilling sleep on the bus last night for their 8 hour or so ride back home after the game. It's a glamorous life!

* * *

AZL Giants beat the AZL Athletics, 5-3

Stetson Woods is now in his 3rd AZL season. The HS draftee from 2014 was a HS basketball star and is still growing into his body from a baseball perspective, but he probably needs to start showing some development strides this year. 14th round pick Conner Menez (also from the Master's College!) grew up a Giants fan and his favorite player was Madison Bumgarner, as you can read here:

Here's the incredible story on @cmenez_13 signing with his childhood team, the @SFGiants. Nice guys do finish 1st. https://t.co/We8tjLfrUS

— Emanuel Lee (@EmanuelLee4) June 16, 2016

Last night we get Conner's first hand reports from the desert, so let's see what his impressions of the night were.

# 67 pitching for #AZLGiants after two innings of Stetson Woods. Not on roster, so I have no idea who he is but he's throwing hard

— GIANT Potential (@giant_potential) June 23, 2016

So # 67 is 8th rounder Stephen Woods, who confusingly came in to replace Stetson Woods. #AZLGiants

— GIANT Potential (@giant_potential) June 23, 2016

Ah, the confusing Stetson/Stephen Woods duo!  No problem distinguishing them, as you can see here they look totally different!

Photo Gallery of the AZL Giants @ AZL A's game tonight at Fitch Park https://t.co/N3vH6Bb6Zs pic.twitter.com/GVuBxvUTYY

— 37FraamesPhoto (@37FraamesPhoto) June 23, 2016