According to Todd Murray, who writes for the Dominion Post out of Morgantown, Pirates’ first round draft pick Kevin Newman has been promoted to the West Virginia Power(H/T Bucs Dugout). Also being promoted is relief pitcher Edgar Santana, who is a 23-year-old with a fastball that hits mid-90’s.
This is an interesting development with Cole Tucker not playing the last 11 days. Since Newman is going there, I imagine the plan is to have him play almost everyday. He hasn’t done well for Morgantown, hitting .227/.283/.344 in 37 games, but the South Atlantic League isn’t much more advanced than the NYPL at this time of year. The SAL has players that haven’t been promoted to high-A yet, while the NYPL is full of college players just drafted. The average age of pitchers in the NYPL is actually higher than the average age of SAL pitchers(21.6 years/21.3).
Santana has a 2.70 ERA in 30 innings, with 32 strikeouts. He has a .219 BAA, 1.00 WHIP and a 1.95 GO/AO ratio, so he’s doing good in all areas. Reports from the DSL last year said he had the best fastball velocity among everyone there, although he wasn’t a polished pitcher and didn’t have much success, so he has obviously made a lot of progress in one year.
