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White Sox Minor League Update: August 3, 2021

Quite a few homers in the system, just not a ton of wins, as Romy González goes long and Alex Destino hits his eighth homer in the last 17 games

By Darren Black
Alex Destino keeps homering!
Winston-Salem Dash

An early lead for the Knights quickly disappeared, as Charlotte pitching was not up to the task early and the hitting was not up to snuff late.

First, the pitching, with a 4-1 lead, Tanner Banks and Lane Ramsey allowed the three runs in the third to tie the game. After that, Ramsey settled down for the next inning, but Jace Fry came in and allowed the go-ahead run. Though two innings and one earned run is not a bad a result, it was still the margin of defeat tonight. To round out the pitching, Zack Burdi is still pitching poorly. He went one inning and allowed a run, though he struck out three.

For the offense, it was alright — until a runner made it into scoring position. The Knights were 2-for-15 with a runner on second or third, so a two-run loss hurts a bit more knowing that. One of those hits was from Marco Hernández, who had three hits on the day, including his fifth homer of the season.

Danny Mendick had a nice night at the plate, too. He had a couple of singles, and two walks; he seemed to like first base a bit. Unfortunately for the Knights tonight, not enough batters liked going home.

Poll

Who was the Knights MVP?

This poll is closed

  • 86%
    Marco Hernández: 3-for-4, 1 HR, 2 RBI, 0 BB, 0 K
    (86 votes)
  • 14%
    Danny Mendick: 2-for-3, 1 R, 2 BB, 0 K
    (14 votes)
100 votes total Vote Now

Poll

Who was the Knights Cold Cat?

This poll is closed

  • 39%
    Tanner Banks: 2 IP, 2 ER (3 R), 4 H, 0 BB, 3 K
    (32 votes)
  • 60%
    Zach Remillard: 0-for-4, 0 BB, 3 K
    (49 votes)
81 votes total Vote Now

Somehow the Barons lost, but outhit Mississippi in the process. Romy González got the offense started very quickly, leading off the first inning with his 16th homer of the season.

That was the first of González’s three hits on the night. He even added a walk for good measure, but his offensive day was sort of how it just went for the Barons. González reached base three times after the homer and never scored. He was one of three batters to have multiple hits on the day. Another was Craig Dedelow, who also added a solo homer. The third, was Yolbert Sánchez, as he continues to just get hits anyway he can. Sánchez is hitting .488 with a 1.080 OPS since his promotion to Double-A, and that increased because of a three-hit performance tonight.

The pitching, on the other hand, was not so good, especially Blake Battenfield. He went five innings and allowed five runs, and a sixth crossed the plate due to an error; the Barons had four errors in the game, though JJ Muno had two of those. The bullpen was better, though the offense was not getting anything going to make a run for the win. Of note, Andrew Perez went two perfect innings that included two strikeouts.

Poll

Who was the Barons MVP?

This poll is closed

  • 57%
    Romy González: 3-for-4, 1 HR, 1 BB, 0 K, 1 Error, 1 SB
    (59 votes)
  • 39%
    Yolbert Sánchez: 3-for-5, 1 RBI, 0 BB, 1 K
    (40 votes)
  • 1%
    Craig Dedelow: 2-for-4, 1 HR, 2 R, 0 BB, 2 K
    (2 votes)
  • 0%
    Andrew Perez: 2 IP, 0 ER, 0 H, 0 BB, 2 K
    (1 vote)
102 votes total Vote Now

Poll

Who was the Barons Cold Cat?

This poll is closed

  • 80%
    Blake Battenfield: 5 IP, 5 ER (6 R), 8 H, 1 BB, 2 K
    (59 votes)
  • 19%
    Jameson Fisher: 0-for-4, 0 BB, 3 K
    (14 votes)
73 votes total Vote Now

A close win where the bullpen — well, one member of the bullpen — almost blew it. Davis Martin has had a down year (5.32 ERA), but he had a great start today. He went five innings and allowed just one run. Overall, the bullpen was fantastic, Edgar Navarro just made things a little tricky in the sixth inning. He allowed two runs, to make it a one-run game, however, the rest of the bullpen no-hit Asheville to preserve the lead and eventually earn the win.

Of course, there needed to be at least a little offense in order to win. Alex Destino had the big hit today with another homer, a two-run shot in the first inning to put the Dash up. He would later drive in a third run with a sacrifice fly. Destino was one of four batters to collect a hit today. Samir Dueñez led the way with two hits, both singles, and Yoelqui Céspedes added his 12th double of the season. Céspedes would walk, as well, to help raise his OPS to .782 as he continues to do pretty well to finish up an extremely strange couple years for him.

Poll

Who was the Dash MVP?

This poll is closed

  • 3%
    Samir Dueñez: 2-for-4, 0 BB, 2 K
    (2 votes)
  • 50%
    Alex Destino: 1-for-3, 1 HR, 3 RBI, 0 BB, 0 K
    (33 votes)
  • 46%
    Davis Martin: 5 IP, 1 ER, 5 H, 0 BB, 5 K
    (31 votes)
66 votes total Vote Now

Poll

Who was the Dash Cold Cat?

This poll is closed

  • 35%
    Edgar Navarro: 1 IP, 2 ER, 2 H, 2 BB, 1 K
    (21 votes)
  • 50%
    Evan Skoug: 0-for-4, 0 BB, 3 K
    (30 votes)
  • 15%
    AJ Gill: 0-for-3, 0 BB, 3 K
    (9 votes)
60 votes total Vote Now

Kannapolis was rained out tonight.

Not great, Arizona Complex League White Sox, not great at all. The ACL Sox are shut out and the pitching did not do so well, either. Starter Jacob Gilliland went four innings and gave up three runs. It should have been worse, with seven hits, but the five strikeouts helped out. Obviously, the offense already doomed the team with no run support, but the bullpen continued the poor play. Tommy Summer was OK in his two innings, but he did allow a solo homer. Zach Cable was the next pitcher to really struggle, he allowed two runs while a third scored off of an error in the process of getting only two outs.

Of course, the worst of it the lineup. The ACL Sox only got three hits, two of which were from Adam Hackenberg; the 18th rounder in the 2021 draft went 2-for-2 in his first professional game. So he just has a cool 1.000 batting average, that I’m sure will keep up. Misael González had the third hit, but that was it. ACL had five walks overall, but those did not amount to much.

Poll

Who was the ACL Sox MVP?

This poll is closed

  • 96%
    Adam Hackenberg: 2-for-2, 0 BB, 0 K
    (58 votes)
  • 3%
    Kohl Simas: 1 IP, 0 ER, 0 H, 1 BB, 2 K
    (2 votes)
60 votes total Vote Now

Poll

Who was the ACL Sox Cold Cat?

This poll is closed

  • 12%
    Jacob Gilliland: 4 IP, 3 ER, 7 H, 1 BB, 5 K
    (6 votes)
  • 44%
    Logan Glass: 0-for-4, 0 BB, 4 K
    (22 votes)
  • 42%
    Zach Cable: 2⁄3 IP, 2 ER (3 R), 2 H, 2 BB, 2 K
    (21 votes)
49 votes total Vote Now

The offense was clicking, but the pitching was certainly not, as the DSL Sox came up short in their comeback. They had 11 hits to go along with seven walks this afternoon, a pretty decent day at the plate for all involved. Seven of the nine in the starting lineup had a hit, and one more was able to add a walk to add to the bases-reached total. Several players had multiple base hits, or at least reached base twice, but Randel Mondesi was by far and away the best hitter of the day. He had three hits and one of those hits was a homer, the first of the season, as his batting average rose to .361 on the year.

The pitching, with nine runs allowed, was clearly not great. Three of the four pitchers used allowed a run, while two allowed three or more earned runs. The lone good pitcher of the day was Gabriel González, he kept his scoreless streak going with a shutout seventh. That makes four straight appearances with no runs allowed for the 18-year-old.

Poll

Who was the DSL Sox MVP?

This poll is closed

  • 100%
    Randel Mondesi: 3-for-4, 1 HR, 2 R, 2 RBI, 0 BB, 1 K
    (57 votes)
  • 0%
    Roberth Gutierrez: 2-for-3, 1 R, 1 RBI, 1 BB, 1 K
    (0 votes)
57 votes total Vote Now

Poll

Who was the DSL Cold Cat?

This poll is closed

  • 20%
    Carlos Gomez: 0-for-3, 0 BB, 3 K
    (9 votes)
  • 22%
    Jorge Ferrer: 2 IP, 3 ER (4 R), 4 H, 2 BB, 3 K
    (10 votes)
  • 56%
    Miguel Toribio: 2 IP, 4 ER, 4 H, 0 BB, 1 K
    (25 votes)
44 votes total Vote Now

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