The most exciting event of the Arizona Fall League season was this past Saturday night at Salt River Fields as the top prospects of the AFL took to the field in the Fall Stars Game.
The biggest highlight of the game came from the player that is putting up the best numbers in the league this fall, Gregory Bird. Bird may be just the 11th ranked New York Yankees prospect according to MLB.com, but he was the talk of Scottsdale on Saturday night. After Cincinnati Reds prospect Nick Howard had a perfect first inning, including two strikeouts, he faced Bird to lead off the second. Bird fell behind 0-2 quickly, then fouled off four pitches before taking the next two for balls. The ninth pitch of the at-bat was a hanging breaking ball that was absolutely crushed. Salt River has a multi-level batter’s eye 410 feet away from home, and Bird deposited the ball in the second tier from the top of the eye. Coming into the Fall Stars game, Bird already had six home runs in just 76 at-bats in the AFL this season, two more long balls that anyone in the league this season.
Howard was a closer at the University of Virginia, and looked to struggle in his second inning of work, going just 1.2 innings and giving up four runs on four hits and two walks, all in the second. His whippy arm action and compact delivery doesn’t look like it could hold up to a starter’s work load, nor does his body structure.
One pitcher that shows no concern over body type to be a starter was the man to toed the rubber to kick off the game, Archie Bradley. Bradley showed a lack of consistency with his breaking ball, but put in two strong innings and looked every bit the part of a future front end starter.
Dalton Pompey showed off his elite speed when he put a ball in the right field corner and arrived into third base with a stand-up, two-run triple that capped the four run second inning for the East squad.
Another speedster shined for the East as Roman Quinn had two RBI singles, and wasn’t done as he stole both second and third in the eighth. Quinn leads the AFL in steals, coming into the game with 13 in just 17 games.
For the West, the star of the game was Hunter Renfroe, who launched a ball well up the left field grass driving in the second and final run for the West, the first coming when Nick Williams scored on a wild pitch in the fifth.
Parker Bridwell pitched the fifth inning for the West side, allowing one hit but striking out the other three batters he faced.
In all, it was not much of a competitive game, as the East squad had the game pretty well in hand from the second inning on, but the stars of tomorrow were certainly out in full force under the lights of Salt River.