Cubs Minor League News: AFL Edition |
After a brief bump in the road, during which the Mesa Solar Sox lost five of six, including four straight at one point, the Solar Sox have whipped that slate clean and gotten back to their winning ways to improve to 10-6 on the season. Their latest victory came against the Glendale Desert Dogs on Saturday, when the Solar Sox pushed across five runs in the middle to build a 5-2 lead before holding off the Desert Dogs 5-4 in the end.
Watching Jonathon Long and Moises Ballesteros continue to mash the ball is a promising sight for the Cubs and their long-term outlook, as both of those guys rank among the league leaders in average, homers, and RBIs. That seems to be a theme for the Cubs when they send players to the AFL, as Nelson Velazquez, Caleb Kilian, and Alexander Canario were once participants in the AFL and went on to become huge stars in the process. However, with both Ballesteros and Long out of the lineup on Saturday, a big chunk of the Mesa production was going to be missing. Prior to this game, Mesa was 0-3 when both of these men were out of the lineup at the same time. They finally put an end to that stat, and they hoped that moving Benjamin Cowles up to the No. 5 spot in the lineup could jumpstart him and lead to a strong finish this summer. Overlooked when discussing the Cubs' top prospects in the AFL, Cowles has responded from a horrendous start to push his average close to .250, but he is still struggling when you look at the big picture. Sure, he has played solid defense, but with his at-bats starting to diminish over the past week, it has been hard for him to get into a rhythm, which is important in this league. Cowles didn't do much batting in the middle of the order for the first time, but did work several good at-bats, resulting in outs. He took some close pitches, worked the count, and did a lot of the little things that many scouts overlook, as he went 0-2 with a walk. Cowles also reached base on another hit-by-pitch, which has been a theme for him recently. Getting to the pitching side of things, fans got to witness Luis Rujano get back on the mound on Friday after having more than a week off, and you could see that rust was a factor. Rujano continued to overpower hitters at times, but his command wasn't sharp, which led to a short outing, and he gave up multiple runs. Saturday was a bit different for the Cubs pitchers, as Vince Reilly was the only one getting time on the mound. Like his minor league season, Reilly has come out of nowhere to be a high-leverage arm and seems to have taken over the closer role in Mesa, much like he did with the Pelicans this season. When you look at his previous three outings, Reilly was about as good as you can be, striking out tons of hitters while limiting minimal contact. Saturday was slightly different as Reilly had his worst outing of the season and saw his ERA rise to 3.38. Reilly surrendered a pair of runs in his one inning of work while walking three and striking out none. The command was the biggest concern over the runs allowed, as the strong command has been a strength of his all season. Fortunately for him, he was able to figure things out before the end of his outing and get through the ninth inning without allowing additional damage to pick up the save in the Solar Sox 5-4 win.
