BRADENTON, Fla. – Adrian Valerio celebrated his 20th birthday in a big way today. In the intrasquad game between the West Virginia and Bradenton clubs, Valerio homered in his first at-bat, and doubled in a later at-bat. The results were encouraging to see from a guy who shows the raw tools to be a good hitter, but hasn’t been consistent enough in game action early in his career.
Valerio ran into issues last year where he would have a big day like today, then try to become a power hitter. He’s got the capability to hit some home runs, but most of his power game should be line drives to the gap. When he would homer, he’d go into a stretch where he would try and hit for home runs, throwing him off his game.
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I’d say that the upcoming games will give an indication of whether Valerio will learn from his habits, but really that is something that will be seen during the season more than in Spring Training. He will be going to West Virginia, and currently looks to be splitting time in the middle infield with Stephen Alemais, with Alemais likely to play more shortstop.
**Speaking of Alemais, I wrote about him last week (in the new Extra Innings feature, before it had the official name) and how he spent the offseason learning offensive tips from Carlos Beltran and Jose Reyes. He put those to good use today, starting off the game with a hard hit double to the left-center field gap. He followed that up with a seeing eye single up the middle just past the shortstop, and used his speed to steal second (the article last week also discussed some tips he picked up from Reyes on stolen bases).
Alemais looks like he will start the 2017 season in West Virginia. He’s got an advanced understanding of hitting, but will probably need to show his offense consistently in games before he can move up. There are also some shortstop prospects ahead of him, with Kevin Newman in Altoona and Cole Tucker in Bradenton. I could see all three of them moving up at the same time this summer, starting when Newman eventually gets promoted to Indianapolis.
**There were a lot of home runs today. Usually that means the wind is blowing out and carrying balls with it. That wasn’t the case this afternoon. One of the hardest home runs came off the bat of Kevin Kramer, who homered over the tall wall in right-center field on field 4.
I’ll have an article on Kramer this week, but an early spoiler alert: He’s my breakout pick in Altoona this year. I watched Kramer hit the ball hard all spring last year. I then saw him making hard contact all year in Bradenton, only the numbers didn’t match the on-field results. That reminded me a lot of guys like Adam Frazier, Max Moroff, and Eric Wood, who showed good skills in Bradenton, but didn’t show the numbers until they reached Altoona. Kramer seems like he will be the next in line from that group.
**Other players that I saw homer today were Mitchell Tolman and Brent Gibbs. Tolman was drafted as a third baseman, but moved to second. He should play in Bradenton this year, and has a bit of power in his bat. Gibbs is a very raw catcher who missed time last year with a hand injury after being drafted. He had some good numbers in JuCo, and shows some promising tools behind the plate.
**The best moment of the day actually came with Gibbs at the plate. Eduardo Vera got him looking at strike three for the final out, then walked off the mound, followed by the entire team. At first it looked like Gibbs was discussing the pitch with the umpire, trying to figure out where it was in the strike zone. A few seconds later, Wyatt Toregas — the manager of West Virginia, where Gibbs was playing — came out and pointed out that it was only strike two. He started joking with the other team that there are three strikes in this league, and that he was going to need them to play the final out of the inning.
So the team took the field again, with Gibbs sitting at two strikes. He then crushed a double to the left-center gap. The fun that you can only experience during a minor league intrasquad game.
