Astros Farm Report: 1/22

Catching you up on the latest Astros MiLB offseason news ...

WISHING A VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO

Carlos Sanabria - July 2017

Photo by Jayne Hansen

1-22: RHP Mike Hauschild (28)
1-22: 1B Angel Tejeda (21)
1-24: C/1B Jose Carrillo (20)
1-24: RHP Carlos Sanabria (21)
1-25: RHP Bryan Solano (20)
1-27: LHP Antonio Pujols (20)

ROSTER MOVES/TRANSACTIONS

There haven't been any posted moves since the big Garrit Cole trade last week. You can check the cumulative Astros offseason transaction list here to see if you've missed any of the posted moves this offseason.

FALL AND WINTER LEAGUE UPDATES

Since most of the Astros minor leaguers are finished with winter ball, I'll only be including the active players here. For the final stats for players having participated in the Arizona Fall League, Venezuelan Winter League, Mexican Pacific Winter League and the Dominican Winter League, please visit my Farm Report from 1/1.

AUSTRALIAN BASEBALL LEAGUE (ABL)

Coming into the final week of the regular season, Rodrigo Ayarza has continued to impress with a solid season. On Sunday, Ayarza went 3-for-5 with two doubles and scored two runs, punctuating a 4-game series in which he was 5-for-18 with five runs scored, two doubles; he walked once and struck out four times. The ABL regular season will conclude on Saturday.

Adelaide Bite
Rodrigo Ayarza - 36G .293/.329/.493 10-2B 1-3B 6HR 13RBI 8BB:31SO 5SB:2CS

PUERTO RICAN WINTER LEAGUE (LBPRC)

Ruben Castro - August 2016

Photo by Jayne Hansen

Ruben Castro appeared in four games since my last post, two as the starting catcher, one as a defensive replacement and one as a pinch hitter, going 4-for-9 with a run, one walk to three strikeouts and four stolen bases allowed. Carlos Sierra appeared twice over the past week. In his first appearance on Thursday, he allowed two hits and a walk without recording an out (none of his bequeathed runners scored or it could have been worse for him!) and on Sunday, he pitched one inning of relief, allowing one hit, one walk and no runs. The LBPRC will end its abbreviated regular season on Tuesday with postseason play starting on Wednesday.

Cangrejeros de Santurce
RHP Carlos Sierra - 5G 3.1IP 5.40 ERA 3.900 WHIP 1SO:7BB
C Ruben Castro - 5G .500/.545/.600 1-2B 1RBI 1BB:3SO

NEWS AND LINKS

Jeff Sullivan of FanGraphs weighs in on the Gerrit Cole trade.

MiLB.com looks at the reality of minor league free agency.

Travel headaches in the Pacific Coast League, a league that stretches more than 2000 miles from the Pacific.

A history of some of minor league baseball's oldest team names.

The Astros front office released the 2018 minor league coaching staff on Friday. There are a couple of notable departures with 2017 Corpus Christi Hooks Pitching Coach Dave Borkowski leaving for the Dodgers AA staff and Hooks 2017 Hitting Coach Joel Chimelis joining former Fresno Manager Tony DeFrancesco on the Mets AAA roster. Notably returning to the Astros fold is Josh Bonifay who will be the minor league Fielding Coordinator after spending one season with the Rangers. In addition, there are several Manager promotions, including Rodney Linares from AA to AAA, Omar Lopez from Low A to AA and Morgan Ensberg from short season A to High A. One final note: Assistant Pitching Coordinator Chris Holt is this Chris Holt and not that Chris Holt.

It is prospect ranking season and more are starting to come out. MLB Pipeline is currently rolling out their Top 10 by position. They have Forrest Whitley as second on their list of right-handed pitching prospects, behind only Shohei Ohtani.

And Baseball America came out with their official Astros Top 10 list, after giving us a sneak peak in the run up to the Gerrit Cole trade. The scouting reports are insider only. [Note: If you're interested in prospects, college players, draft rankings, international rankings, etc., a BA subscription is your best friend!]

And just this morning, Baseball America came out with their Top 100 Prospect Rankings, with RHP Forrest Whitley (#10), OF Kyle Tucker (#15), 1B/OF Yordan Alvarez (#62) and RHP J.B. Bukauskas (#76) all making the list. In addition, former Astros RHP Franklin Perez (#35), RHP Albert Abreu (#77), OF Brett Phillips (#80) and RHP Jorge Guzman (#87) were also ranked. BA included tool rankings for all 100 here.

When MLB Pipeline posts their 2018 pre-season prospect list, Baseball America releases their 2018 Prospect Handbook and FanGraphs weighs in with their Top Prospect list, I'll do a consensus prospect list. In the meantime ...

In case you missed it, I started a "Beyond the Top 30" series, looking at both those Astros players who are considered Top 30 prospects and others at each position who may not be top talents (or may grow to be), but will be interesting to watch nonetheless. So far we've looked at ...

Shortstops
Second Basemen
First Basemen
Third Basemen - Coming this week