Maple enters the Amateur Draft in 2022, 4 games behind San
Francisco in the Billy Martin Division in the Thurman Munson League.
Maple has been playing better ball of late after going .500 in April they
improved to 16-11 in May. Most fans expected a very tight Billy Martin
Divisional race again this year especially when last year champions dealt
Maurice Gould SP to Montreal. Well, Maple as usual is never finished with
the “merry-go-round” of transactions as they worked with division rivals South
Carolina to land “Flipper” John Martin SP. The Scouts didn’t like the
trade from the Maple perspective as the price was extremely high,
however; we decided to take a chance here on Flipper based on his age.
Maple is 9-10th in most batting team categories in the
TML while 1-4th in most team pitching categories in the TML and 1st
in team defense in the TML. The batting has been getting better as the
season wears on and so has the pitching and defense. We hope to continue
this momentum and trend into June.
Some bright spots for Maple early in the season have been 1)
Ronnie Talley – GG winner from last year is hitting .330, 2) George Evans
finally getting a chance to play full-time has 11 HRs and is tied for the team
lead with Bartolo Valentin. Valentin also leads the team in swipes with
14. Pitching wise, Jake Nelson has been fabulous so far; 2.17 ERA, 7 Wins
and 84Ks in 78.2 IP which are all #1 for the team.
Only one costly injury so far and that was to Arama Huanu OF, who
at the time was hitting .321 with 37 RBI.
Down on the farm, Maple continues to field very competitive teams
in AAA, AA and A ball. Astoria (AAA) is 2nd, 1.5 games back at
31-25, Sandy Springs (AA) is 1st, 39-16 record and Kingwood (A) is
2.5 games back in 2nd with a 31-25 record.
Top Prospects have been ever changing since the moves in the
off-season. However; we have some fantastic prospects up and coming to
the ABL led by: CF Felipe Navarro .287/.387/.500 in AA, 1B Adam Hounsell
.232/.295/.311 in A, C Sean Clare, .226/.312/.401 in A and SP George Bedford,
11G, 1S, 37.1 IP in AAA to just name a few. Also watch out for Mark
Blackburn 1B, Maulik Shaw MR, Dylan Butlin SP and Wayne Soileau 2B
Attendance is down -13.6% so far this season and is typical of the
cold early weather near Toronto. We expect to close the gap as the summer
approaches.
In the International Complex look out for one of our best finds
ever in 3B Anastasio Rivero. He is up to 2.5* potential and
climbing. This 16 year old from Venezuela should be a keeper for years to
come.
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