None of the Orioles affiliates had a winning week this time around.
Here on Camden Chat, in addition to our daily minor league coverage, we’ll be stepping back every Tuesday morning to look at the bigger picture across a whole week of results and how the team’s prospects are faring so far. Most of the focus will be on players from Camden Chat’s composite top O’s prospects list from the preseason, with mentions of some standout efforts from players who could be ranked on a future list.
Triple-A Norfolk Tides
- Last week: 3-4 at Charlotte (White Sox), counting completion of suspended game
- Coming week: vs. Durham (Rays)
- Second half record: 16-17, t-sixth place (5.5 games back) in International League East
At the beginning of the year, this was a lineup loaded with prospect and prospect-ish hitters almost from top to bottom. Last week’s trade deadline shipping out Connor Norby, Kyle Stowers, and even Billy Cook, plus the promotions of Jackson Holliday and Coby Mayo, have cleaned the place out. The only one left on Norfolk’s roster is Heston Kjerstad, who didn’t play in any of the four games after he was optioned back to the Tides on Thursday. That’s a little odd. I don’t know what’s up with that.
Two outfielders who were left behind after the promotion/trade wave had themselves a nice week. Good work by Daniel Johnson, collecting nine hits in these games, including three home runs and a pair of stolen bases. Johnson is now the active Tides leader for season homers with 17. Shayne Fontana wasn’t far behind him, with eight hits and a pair of dingers.
Having gotten a taste of the majors, Cade Povich and Chayce McDermott are back with the Tides. McDermott struck out ten batters across a six inning complete game, allowing two runs on five hits and three walks. Povich cleared seven innings, striking out eight, with the only damage against him a pair of solo home runs.
If you only look at the earned run column, this was also a nice week for Brandon Young, with the 6’6” righty also striking out ten batters and even more impressively allowing no walks. His five inning start saw five runs allowed, but only one was earned.
Double-A Bowie Baysox
- Last week: 2-4 vs. Somerset (Yankees)
- Coming week: vs. Harrisburg (Nationals)
- Second half record: 13-20, fourth place (9 games back) in Eastern League Southwest
Let’s get the Samuel Basallo update going first, both because he’s now the top Orioles prospect still playing in the minors and because he was awesome over this past week. Basallo added a couple of homers to his season tally in a 9-19 week and even stole a base. That’s a 1.342 OPS across five games, raising his season OPS up to .802. Basallo has hit 15 homers in 88 games as a 19-year-old at this Double-A level. It’s very good.
Above even Basallo in the results over this past week was infielder Frederick Bencosme, who at 21 is still fairly young for this level and enjoying some occasional success, including in these six games with 11 hits and three stolen bases. Bencosme has hit just five homers in 89 games, so power isn’t part of the profile, but there’s some fun hitting potential in there somewhere.
It was not a good week for either Dylan Beavers or Jud Fabian at the plate. I’ll just leave it at that.
Pitcher Patrick Reilly, acquired in the minor leaguer-for-minor leaguer swap that sent Cook to the Pirates, was promoted to the Double-A level as he joined the organization. The Orioles tossed him in for 3.1 innings of relief for his first action, as Reilly put up zeroes in the runs column while allowing two hits and two walks with five strikeouts.
Among the incumbent Baysox starting pitchers, Cameron Weston (2022 8th round pick) held Somerset to a run across 5.1 innings, with just two hits and walks along with six strikeouts. Weston has a 1.077 WHIP across 60.1 IP since joining the Baysox. That’s really not bad at all and it might make him the most interesting pitching prospect on this team now that Seth Johnson has been traded.
High-A Aberdeen IronBirds
- Last week: 3-3 vs. Brooklyn (Mets)
- Coming week: at Hickory (Rangers)
- Second half record: 19-17, third place (1 game back) in South Atlantic League North
There was good news for last year’s first round pick Enrique Bradfield Jr. in these games: He walked in 12.5% of his plate appearances, and he stole five bases, upping his season total to 55. It’s a lot of steals. The unfortunately characteristic bad news is he had just four hits in 21 at-bats, none of which went for extra bases. .190 in the BA and SLG lines ain’t gonna cut it. For the season: .275/.352/.370. If this batting line was dropped into MLB, it would rank 137th of 142 qualified batters in ISO (isolated slugging, SLG – BA).
Fellow 2023 pick Tavian Josenberger, a switch-hitting outfielder, led the IronBirds with 7-16 hitting across the six games, with four walks and six stolen bases working in his favor as well. Josenberger started slow in April and May but has posted a .794 OPS since June 1. He’s more on my radar than he was at the start of the season.
The Trade Reaper scythed through this pitching staff as well, sending Jackson Baumeister and Moisés Chace elsewhere. The most interesting of those remaining who also had any kind of outing this past week worth mentioning in a positive light is 20-year-old righty Michael Forret, who struck out four batters over a four-inning long relief outing, with three hits, one walk, and one run allowed. Like many current Orioles pitching prospects, keeping the walk rate down seems to be a major key to his future value and success.
IronBirds season-to-date stats.
Low-A Delmarva Shorebirds
- Last week: 2-4 vs. Myrtle Beach (Cubs)
- Coming week: at Salem (Red Sox)
- Second half record: 15-21, last place (8 games back) in Carolina League North
MASN’s Steve Melewski reported on several prospect promotions that will impact the Shorebirds roster starting this week. A pair of infielders will be on the way up from Delmarva to Aberdeen: Aron Estrada and Anderson De Los Santos, as well as the 7-foot pitcher Jared Beck. Additionally, a handful of players are joining from below, including infielder Edwin Amparo and pitcher Keeler Morfe.
Estrada, a 19-year-old switch-hitting infielder, heads up a level after a week where he collected six hits and five walks in six games played. He wraps up (hopefully) his Delmarva tenure with a .296/.361/.434 batting line in 91 games, which I think should mark him as a more interesting prospect heading into next season. De Los Santos, 20, went 4-17 at the plate this week; he carries a .647 OPS up to the next level. Beck, 23, had four scoreless outings this week but also walked four batters. His BB/9 is 8.7. It’d be too high if it was half that much.
For the players joining Delmarva, Amparo is another 19-year-old switch-hitting infielder. He arrives after posting a .245/.400/.384 batting line with the FCL Orioles. Morfe, who only turned 18 in June, is a righty starter who struck out 38 batters in 22 innings for the Dominican Summer League Orioles Orange.
Yet another 2023 outfield draftee was the Delmarva standout for the week, with Jake Cunningham collecting seven hits, including a pair of doubles, across 18 AB. He stole three bases too and is 20/21 for the season in that department. That’ll work.
Finally, a little shoutout to Cole Urman, who’s usually a catcher but who pitched five innings on Sunday to save the pitching staff. Urman’s outing didn’t go well – he gave up eight runs -but that’s about as good of a teammate as a guy can be to his minor league squad.
Shorebirds season-to-date stats.
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The player of the week chosen in last week’s poll was Billy Cook, who got 81% of the votes in a three-way poll. So long, Billy. He’s one two two-time winners this year, joining Heston Kjerstad. Other past poll winners traded lately are Norby and Matthew Etzel. Other single-week winners: Povich, McDermott, Fabian, Beavers, Kyle Brnovich, Basallo, Estrada, and Mayo.
Will we add another two-time winner this week? The choice is yours.