The first week of the year featuring action from all four minor league affiliates of the Cincinnati Reds is in the books, and Farmers Only is here to highlight the best of said action.<\/p>\n
We\u2019ll start with the AA Chattanooga Lookouts, seeing as that squad won each of their first three games of the season and sits undefeated at the time of writing this. And helping lead that charge so far is none other than Austin \u201cFox in the\u201d Hendrick, the 1st round pick of the Reds back in 2020 about whom we\u2019ve almost completely forgotten.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s always flashed elite power potential, but the lack of consistent contact and strike zone awareness has dogged him since being selected out of high school in the Pittsburgh area. He\u2019s still somehow just 24 years old, however, and he\u2019s begun the year 6 for 12 with a homer and 5 runs driven in for the Lookouts. Maybe, just maybe, he\u2019s figuring things out a little bit (and we\u2019ll ignore the 4\/0 K\/BB so far for the time being).<\/p>\n
Leo \u201cShuffle\u201d Balcazar has also been red hot for Chattanooga out of the gates after being added to the team\u2019s 40-man roster this winter. He went 5 for 11 with a homer, a double, and a walk to begin the season.<\/p>\n
Chattanooga begins a big six-game road trip in Birmingham on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Alfredo Duno is off to a hot start over in Dayton as the High-A Dragons split their first two games of the year only to have Sunday\u2019s contest rained out. Duno has begun the season 2 for 7 with a pair of doubles and as many walks (2) as Ks (2) so far, while the perennially overlooked Carlos Sanchez has begun the year 3 for 8 with a double, walk, and stolen base.<\/p>\n
Dayton opens a big six-game homestand against Lake County on Tuesday evening.<\/p>\n
Down in the land of humid air and pitching paradises, Tyson \u201cSuper F.\u201d Lewis and the Daytona Tortugas of the Class-a Florida State League dropped two of three against Jupiter to begin the season – and that includes an ugly 14-1 whoopin\u2019 on Saturday. Lewis, though, does have an early homer under his belt after starting 3 for 12, but he\u2019s already struck out an alarming 7 times so far. That\u2019s tied for the most of any player in the FSL so far.<\/p>\n
Daytona hits the road to take on Lakeland for the rest of the week with the series opening on Tuesday evening.<\/p>\n
Over in Louisville, the 4-5 Bats are chugging along with a mix of potent offense and pitchers who can\u2019t get an out. Each of Chase Petty and Julian \u201cCalendar\u201d Aguiar – two arms with big league experience who are being counted on as depth at the moment – have been shelled, the two combining for 15.1 IP and 16 ER so far. Relievers Zach \u201cBig Sugar\u201d Maxwell and Luis \u201cGonna Be\u201d Mey have both also been rocked, while Kyle Nicolas has only allowed one run in 3.0 IP.<\/p>\n
Offensively, though, this team is a juggernaut. We detailed how Rece Hinds was destroying baseballs already this year, and he paces the International League with 14 ribbies at the moment (with his 4 homers second most). JJ \u201cSlovenia\u201d Bleday has but a lone homer, but he has 4 doubles and an even 7\/7 K\/BB to date, while Hector \u201c5 Weight\u201d Rodriguez is showing the kind of plate discipline he\u2019s long been dinged for not having by also posting 7 walks so far (along with a pair of homers and a .934 OPS).<\/p>\n
Edwin \u201cI\u2019ll Be\u201d Arroyo, meanwhile, has a bit of a power stroke back. He\u2019s already homered, tripled, and doubled while swiping 3 bags to lead the club (and owns a .350 OBP). Keep an eye on him – he\u2019s going to be back back as a prospect this year.<\/p>\n
The Bats take their talents to Indianapolis and begin their six-game road series on Tuesday evening.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The first week of the year featuring action from all four minor league affiliates of the Cincinnati Reds…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":666826,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2400],"tags":[5,535,50,84883,4259,4,536],"class_list":{"0":"post-666825","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cincinnati-reds","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-cincinnati","10":"tag-cincinnati-reds","11":"tag-cincinnati-reds-prospects","12":"tag-cincinnatireds","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-reds"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116359087875152744","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/666825","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=666825"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/666825\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/666826"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=666825"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=666825"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=666825"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}