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MMN Recap: McNeil Hits Inside-The-Park Home Run

By Daniel Muras

July 14, 2018 No comments

Jeff McNeil/Photo by Jennifer Nieves

Las Vegas (44-48) 12, Abuquerque (44-47) 0   Box Score

McNeil continues to absolutely rake, as he fell a triple short of the cycle while leading off the game with an inside-the-park home run to extend his on-base streak to 27 games. Las Vegas also received homers from Borenstein, Evans, and Alonso. Alonso hit his second grand slam with the 51s, which was also his sixth homer since being promoted to Las Vegas. He has had two strong games since returning from the All-Star break and still sports a solid .782 OPS despite struggling to get hits. Guillorme got on base four times and has been on fire since May.

T.J. Rivera played in his first rehab game with Las Vegas and went 0-3 with a strikeout. After five innings, he came out of the game with discomfort. Manager Tony deFrancesco said he will be reevaluated today and then they will see what the plan is.

Crismatt made his second start with Las Vegas, and this one went much better than the previous one, as he tossed six scoreless frames despite allowing a mediocre nine baserunners. The bullpen allowed only one baserunner in three low-stress innings to cap off the shutout. Regnault now has a solid 4.50 Vegas ERA through May, June, and July after a miserable April in which he had an 8.25 ERA. Bautista had allowed at least a run in five of his last six appearances before last night’s scoreless inning. Sewald has been lights out in his brief five games in the minors this year, as he aims to reclaim his once seemingly solidified role in the Mets bullpen.

Akron (53-38) 8, Binghamton (43-46) 7  Box Score

  • Tim Tebow LF: 3-for-5, R, HR, 2 RBI, .276/.341/.404
  • Levi Michael 3B: 2-for-5, 2 R, 2 K, .289/.374/.456
  • Tomas Nido C: 1-for-4, R, 2 RBI, K, .258/.280/.425

Binghamton’s offense scored seven runs on nine hits as the bullpen blew two extra innings lead in the 11-inning loss. Tebow, who recently played in the Eastern League All-Star Game had three hits, including his sixth home run of the season. Tebow has an eight game hitting streak and his hitting .324 over his last 10 games. Nido is hitting .273/.286/.515 in July.

Copeland pitched very well in this start for the Rumble Ponies, allowing just a single earned run over 6.2 innings. Copeland has allowed one run or less in three of his last four starts. Daniel Zamora, who has been excellent in his first season with the Mets, had his worst outing of the season as he gave up four runs in just a third of an inning. With back-to-back rough outings, Zamora has seen his ERA skyrocket from 3.25 to 4.66.

St. Lucie (35-53) 4, Palm Beach (49-37) 3  Box Score

Gladu drove in all four of St. Lucie’s runs and led the team to victory on Friday night. In the second inning, Gladu drove in the first run of the game with a sacrifice fly; in the fourth, he crushed a three run home run, his first hit with St. Lucie. Gimenez continues to have a hot July and is now hitting .370/.383/.522 this month.

Taylor started the game for St. Lucie and, once again, was unable to go deep into a game. While Taylor hasn’t given up more than 3 earned runs in any of his last eight starts, he also hasn’t made it through the fifth inning in any of his last four starts. Pobereyko has struck out 43 batters in 34.2 innings this season,

Columbia (44-44) 7, Hagerstown (34-55) 6  Box Score

Six players in Columbia’s lineup had multi-hit games en route to an impressive seven run, fourteen hit game by the Fireflies. Tiberi hasn’t hit for as much power as many would’ve hoped for this season, but his has gotten hot in July and is now hitting .313/.382/.479 for the month.

Grotz struggled for a third straight start with Columbia as he got hit hard over five innings. In each of his last three starts, Grotz has allowed at least eights and five earned runs. On the bright side, Grotz still has a very solid 27:4 K:BB trough 25 innings this season, so maybe he’s gotten a bit unlucky with all the hits.Hernandez has 39 strikeouts in 32.1 innings this season.

Brooklyn (14-13) 3, Aberdeen (12-15) 2  Box Score

The Cyclones didn’t have much offense in this game as the team only scored three runs on five hits. Chambers scored the first run of the game on a wild pitch in the second inning. Entering the ninth inning down by a run, the Cyclones rallied to take the lead, with Lagrange tying the game with a single and Chandler Avant scoring the winning run with the help of an error by former Mets minor leaguer Milton Ramos.

James made the start for the Cyclones and had his best outing since mid-June as he allowed only the two earned runs through six innings. James has had a nice season with the Cyclones, but one would like to see some more strikeouts from him in the future. He has struck out just 14 batters in 23.2 innings with Brooklyn in 2018. Hill, the Mets 4th round draft pick in this June’s draft, pitched a scoreless inning in his professional debut. Gilliam struck out three batters in a scoreless inning in his second pro relief appearance.

Kingsport (13-9) 5, Greeneville (7-15) 1  Box Score

  • Yoel Romero LF: 3-for-4, R, 2B, 2 RBI, K, .258/.373/.387
  • Ranfy Adon RF: 3-for-4, 2 R, 3B, K, SB, .343/.368/.600
  • Mark Vientos 3B: 1-f0r-3, RBI, BB, K, .270/.352/.365

The Mets offense had a solid game as they scored five runs on seven hits. Adon has gotten off to a hot start to 2018 as he has five extra base hits and an OPS near 1.000 through his first 10 games. While, Shervyen Newton has put up an impressive .896 OPS so far this season, he was 0-for-3 with two strikeouts on Friday and has struck out 38 times in 21 games, which is nearly double his strikeout rate from last year.

Taveras was making his first start with Kingsport after dominating the Gulf Coast League for the first month of the season.He was very good in this outing as he gave up just a single run over five inning and didn’t walk a single batter. Three Mets relievers combined to throw four hitless innings to close out the game. While Jean has walked 10 batters in seven innings this season, he has also only given up one hit.

GCL Astros (11-11) 3, GCL Mets (13-9) 1  Box Score

Despite having eight hits in the game, the Mets could push across just a single run in their game against the Astros. The lone run came on a home run by Lebron in the seventh inning. Lebron now has three home runs in his last five games. Jaylen Palmer, a New York native and recent Mets draft pick, made his professional debut and went 0-for-3 with a strikeout. After twenty straight games with at least one hit to start his professional career, Ronny Mauricio finally had his first hitless outing.

Hutchinson made his fourth appearance since returning from an injury that cost him the first part of the season and went two innings for the first time all year. He has not allowed an earned run in any of his last three appearances. Hardy, the Mets 31st round pick in the 2018 draft, pitched a scoreless inning in his professional debut.

DSL Twins (25-11) 7, DSL Mets1 (21-15) 1  Box Score

The Mets were held to just one hit, a lone single in the sixth inning, in this game. Nunez scored the team’s only run on an error in the sixth inning. Adrian Hernandez, the top prospect on the team, was pulled from the game after batting in the third inning. No reason has been given for his early departure.

Despite the poor offensive showing, Mets pitchers were actually able to keep the game tied until the ninth inning, thanks in large part to another solid start by Santos. Santos has given up three runs or less in all eight of his starts this season and has a 29:4 K:BB ratio. In the ninth inning, three relievers combined to allow six runs, resulting in the Twins putting the game out of reach.

DSL Brewers (21-14) 10, DSL Mets2 (17-19) 2  Box Score

The Mets scattered eight hits in the game, but could push across just the two runs. Valerio, who is just 17-years old, is having a very successful first professional season and has walked almost twice as much as he’s struck out (17 walks to 10 strikeouts).

Despite the lopsided final score, Gonzalez was actually quite dominant in his start against the Brewers. The 18-year old lefty has had a very promising season as he has struck out 35 batters in 29.1 innings.

Las Vegas portion of recap done by Mojo Hill.

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Written by Daniel Muras

I fell in love with the Mets during the 2006 playoff run and became obsessed with the Mets minor league system while looking for a brighter future during the 2009-2014 era. I hope to provide interesting analysis of the minors and am excited to have the opportunity to write for MMO and MMN.

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