Randy Holt

With the Salt River Rafters’ victory over the Surprise Saguaros on Saturday, the Arizona Fall League season officially reached its end. Let's review the week that was for Red Sox prospects. The AFL features a concise playoff format, with a semi-final play-in on Friday followed by Saturday’s championship game. Unfortunately for the 14-16 Mesa Solar Sox, their fifth-place finish didn’t afford them a chance to even compete for a spot in the title game. Nevertheless, there’s plenty worth talking about from the Boston Red Sox contingent in the 2024 Arizona Fall League. Most notable among the eight players Boston sent to Mesa was Brooks Brannon. The team’s no. 27 prospect (according to MLB Pipeline) was set to use the AFL to get some at-bats after missing time in each of the last two seasons due to back and knee injuries. Brannon appeared primarily as Mesa’s designated hitter, with the Cubs’ Moises Ballesteros grabbing the bulk of the starts behind the plate. Brannon did, though, use his time to his advantage, slashing .309/.347/.456/.803 with a pair of homers and four doubles. He’ll have to rein in the discipline moving forward, given a 21-4 K-BB ratio that wasn’t terribly different from his time in Salem this year. Beyond Brannon, the offensive output for the Red Sox representatives presented its level of intrigue. Caden Rose paced the team with 102 PAs – entrenching himself in centerfield for the majority of the time – but hit just .224 and struck out 29 times. He did, though, walk 16 times and post a respectable .353 on-base percentage. His five steals were second on the Solar Sox. Infielder Max Ferguson posted an eerily similar group of numbers. He went for an average of only .235 but reached base at a .357 clip, thanks to a respectable 20-14 K-BB ratio. He swiped three bags of his own. Rose does project as the higher-upside hitter, but both bring a fair bit of discipline to the table in conjunction with quality defense. It had to be pleasant for Sox brass to see some of those traits on display, even if they were a bit scattered throughout the fall season. While one might have to dig a little deeper to find the elements of success on the positional side, the threshold for success on the mound was of a much more black & white variety. As in, there was a lot of it. Former Oakland Baller Danny Kirwin was among Mesa’s leaders in innings at 12.2. He struck out 16 and surrendered just a single walk while pitching to a 2.84 ERA. It was more of what the organization saw in Single-A, as he struck out 69 hitters in 69 innings. That fastball-slider-cutter combo is going to be tantalizing moving forward. With almost every other Boston arm being utilized in relief, their usage was a little bit more inconsistent. The success wasn’t, however. Zach Fogell turned in a 0.96 ERA in 9.1 innings, striking out ten and allowing only two hits. Conor Steinbaugh threw only five innings but only allowed one run. However, he did strike out eight hitters, courtesy of his fastball-slider combination. Tyler Uberstine’s ERA came in at 3.12 in 8.2 innings. An impressive mark considering he allowed 19 baserunners in that span. If there’s a notable struggle among Red Sox pitchers, it comes in the form of Cooper Adams. Among the leaders in IP, Adams wasn’t quite as successful as his high-volume counterpart in Kirwin. While throwing 12.1 innings, Adams had difficulty navigating AFL hitters. He walked seven and allowed allowing 16 hits. His six wild pitchers were more than anyone else on Mesa’s roster. In fact, it was a mark twice as high as anyone else on the roster outside of Tampa Bay’s Alexander Alberto, who threw four. Boston sent to Arizona an intriguing group comprised largely of recent draftees, undrafted signees, or guys working their way back from injury. What appears evident, though, is that elements of each individual skill set were demonstrated throughout the fall slate. This could serve as an effective springboard as this group prepares for their offseason work, and the front office begins to think about their short—and long–term directions ahead of 2025. View full article

The baseball world spent much of the week waiting for the World Series to begin. The week was made more laborious by the slow start for the Boston Red Sox contingent of the Mesa Solar Sox in the Arizona Fall League. The Sox had a day off on Monday, and only Brooks Brannon appeared in a game for Mesa before Wednesday. And that was an 0-for-4 start that featured a pair of strikeouts. The good news is that things got a bit more exciting, if not altogether busier, for the Red Sox group on Wednesday. Each of infielder Max Ferguson & Caden Rose drew a start, and each recorded at least a hit in the Mesa victory. Ferguson went 2-for-4 with a run scored. More importantly, though, Rose slugged his first home run of the fall season courtesy of an eighth-inning solo shot. That particular game also had six innings from Red Sox pitchers. Cooper Adams drew the start, and while his three innings did feature three runs allowed, his four strikeouts were at least encouraging. Danny Kirwin immediately succeeded him with three of his own, which led to a bit more success. He also struck out four but could hold Glendale to just one run. On the surface, Thursday was a return to the quiet atmosphere of Tuesday’s game. While the Sox did have a bit more representation than they did when the week kicked off, Ferguson & Rose didn’t experience quite the loud output that they had in their first start. Ferguson was 0-for-2 but did walk twice. Rose was 1-for-4 but did steal a base. Solid, but unspectacular for both. At the same time, Ferguson’s two walks and Rose’s steal speak to things you’d like to see develop in their respective (and similar) games. You’re not going to get a ton of power from either at this point in their development. But you want to see them work on the approach and utilize the wheels. We saw the former from Ferguson on Thursday and the latter from Rose. That’s what makes the AFL exciting; it’s these small bits along the way toward their final form as a player. Digression aside, Ferguson drew another start on Friday while each of Zach Fogell & Tyler Uberstine appeared on the mound. Ferguson recorded a hit and a run across five plate appearances for Mesa as the starting shortstop. Fogell was very solid in 2.1 innings of work, allowing just one (unearned) run while striking out four. His appearance came directly in relief of Uberstine, who wasn’t quite as sharp. He allowed eight baserunners (five hits, three walks) in 1.2 innings but navigated it fairly well, only allowing two runs to cross the plate. Saturday’s game saw the return of each of Brannon & Rose to the lineup. Brannon’s start was the more notable of the two, as it was his second consecutive appearance behind the plate. Oh yeah, he also hit a 468-foot home run. The position & power are both important components of Brannon’s game. You’d like to see him get the work in behind the plate, given that his positional future is a bit in question. But as long as those questions persist, it’s also not terrible to know that you have a guy with 470-foot power to input into your lineup regardless of position (Rose was 0-for-3). It felt like a quieter week for the Red Solar Sox, especially on the mound. But Brannon’s power and the approach/speed trends from each of Ferguson & Rose feel fairly promising, even if they’re not in the mix every single day. While things were a bit more uneven on the mound, the Red Sox have at least two of the four Solar Sox with ERAs at zero as we get closer to the midway point of fall play (Fogell & Conor Steinbaugh). Mesa gets back underway against Surprise on Monday. View full article

The Boston Red Sox may not have sent the top of their prospect list to the Arizona Fall League, but that doesn’t take away from any intrigue we might’ve seen so far as we hit the midway point of the fall slate. Representing the Sox on the Mesa Solar Sox, Boston sent eight players to the AFL. C/1B/DH Brooks Brannon, infielder Max Ferguson, and outfielder Caden Rose are representing them on the positional side, while Cooper Adams, Zach Fogell, Danny Kirwin, Conor Steinbaugh, and Tyler Uberstine stand as the Sox contingent on the mound. Because Brannon is actually on MLB Pipeline’s Top 30 Boston Red Sox prospects, his involvement does stand as the marquee presence on Mesa’s roster. And he has not disappointed in the slightest. Across 31 plate appearances, his slash includes a .357 average and .419 OBP. Brannon also has a double and homer to his credit, with the latter coming on an opposite-field solo job back on Wednesday evening. He appeared behind the plate once and as Mesa’s DH twice, recording multiple hits in his three starts this week. We haven’t seen too much of him behind the plate, but the bat has played so far. Ferguson & Rose have each factored heavily into Mesa’s fall season to this point, though the output hasn’t been quite as loud as Brannon’s for either player. The versatile Ferguson started twice at shortstop and once in right field this week. He recorded one hit in his Tuesday start and none in his Friday start but went on to walk four times on Saturday. That discipline leaves his .394 OBP through 33 PA, which is no surprise given his penchant for having an approach. Rose, meanwhile, hasn’t been entirely dissimilar in his output. He hasn’t had a breakout performance to this point in the AFL from a hits perspective. And he’s hitting only .192 after a handful of 1-for-4 outings this week. But he’s drawing free passes to the point where a .364 OBP is buoying his line. He has seven walks against eight strikeouts across his own 33 PAs. As a glove-first type of prospect, you’re probably not too upset with that type of trend on the approach side, at the very least. On the bump, Steinbaugh got the BoSox MeSox representatives off to a solid start on Tuesday as he threw a pair of strong innings. He struck out four against one hit and one walk. It was his only appearance of the week, but he has five strikeouts in just three innings of work this fall. Kirwin & Adams combined to start things off for Mesa on Wednesday, with Kirwin tossing 2.2 innings and Adams following up with 2.1 of his own. The former was certainly the stronger of the two, holding Peoria to one run on three hits and a walk. He struck out two. Adams struggled a bit in his outing, surrendering three runs on four hits and a walk. Neither threw for the rest of the week, leaving Kirwin at a 3.18 ERA through 5.2 innings (7 K/0 BB) & Adams at an 8.44 mark through 5.1 (3 K/1 BB). Each of Fogell & Uberstine appeared to close out a Mesa loss on Friday vs. Glendale. Fogell struck out one in a clean inning, while Uberstine allowed a single hit in an otherwise quiet outing. The two have thrown a combined six innings in the fall season, and neither has allowed a run up to this point. The Arizona Fall League will be off on Monday before Mesa gets back underway on Tuesday. They’ll head out of the Phoenix area to Surprise to get things started. One imagines another Kirwin and/or Adams start should be nigh in the next couple of games, given that they’ve each started one to date. View full article