It was an eventful week in the Midwest League: Let’s get right to it!
Award Winners
The Burlington Bees’ (LAA) Eric Aguilera earned Midwest League Player of the Week honors after returning after a brief promotion to High-A Inland Empire. While his overall numbers don’t stand out, this past week, Aguilera was on fire, going 12/24 with three doubles, two homers, nine RBI and four walks.
Lake County’s (CLE) Robbie Aviles earned the Pitcher of the Week award (again, another prediction) after six almost-perfect innings (he hit one batter but retired the other 18 batters he faced), striking out three. Aviles, 22, has only made three starts and has a stellar 1.23 ERA, 0.84 WHIP and 25 strikeouts to just five walks in 36 2/3 innings. The 2010 seventh rounder was drafted out of a New York high school and has moved slowly through the system, repeating with the Captains this year. If he continues this pace, you could see him promoted very quickly.
Division Leaders
In the Eastern Division, the South Bend Silver Hawks (ARI) have moved into the lead with an outstanding 8-2 record over their last ten games, making them the hottest team in the Midwest League. Thanks to some strong efforts from the offense, South Bend leads the league in home runs (35) and places second in slugging percentage (.401) and OPS (.733). Despite their outstanding pace, the Silver Hawks still have a fairly slim lead (1.5 games) over Dayton and West Michigan and the Lansing Lugnuts are four games back but have been improving steadily. With about 25 games left in the first half, this is a race to watch closely.
In the Western Division, the Chicago Cubs-affiliated Kane County Cougars have been slipping over the past ten games (4-6) but still have a 3.5-game lead over Peoria (STL) for first place. Unlike South Bend, Kane County’s pitching is what has stood out so far. The club has the third-best ERA in the league (3.25) and their WHIP is in a virtual tie for second place with Dayton. Intriguingly, Kane County’s offense is near the bottom of the league, currently in second-last in OPS and dead last in home runs. If the Cougars’ bats don’t turn around, the pitching won’t be able to sustain a pace to keep them on top of the division lead.
Individual Accomplishments
Arturo Reyes of the Peoria Chiefs (STL) threw 6 2/3 innings of shutout ball, only allowing his first hit in the seventh inning, giving up just that one double and walking three while striking out eight batters on Sunday.
Reyes’ teammate, 23-year-old second baseman Mason Katz, emerged from a slump to wallop two home runs among four hits on Tuesday for the Chiefs, adding a walk and four RBI to the pair of home runs and pair of singles.
Tyler Skulina of the Kane County Cougars combined on a no-hitter with teammate Nathan Dorris on Saturday night against the Quad Cities River Bandits. Skulina went 7 1/3 innings and walked two batters while striking out five while Dorris finished up the last 1 2/3 innigns without allowing a base runner and striking out one.
After getting no-hit by the Cougars on Saturday night, Brian Holberton of the River Bandits (HOU) decided to take things into his own hands, hitting for the cycle on Sunday. Holberton, a 21-year-old catcher who was DHing on Sunday, has been tearing up the Midwest League to the tune of a .341 average and .949 OPS and really let loose against the Cougars, going 5/5, scoring twice and driving in five runs.
Leaderboard
Great Lakes’ Joey Curletta still leads in batting average at .341 with Herschel Powell of Beloit a few points behind at .338.
Clint Coulter (Wisconsin) and Eric Haase (Lake County) are still tied for the league lead in home runs with eight.
Mallex Smith (Fort Wayne) is still dominating the stolen base category with 33 steals in 43 attempts.
ERA leader for the Midwest League is Nick Travieso (Dayton) at 1.60, followed by Robbie Aviles at 1.65 and Kevin Ziomek at 2.00. Travieso and Aviles are also number one and two in WHIP (0.81 and 0.85 respectively).
The strikeout leader is Buck Farmer (West Michigan) with 62, followed by Adam Plutko (Lake County) with 58 and Austin Kubitza (West Michigan) with 57.