by Nes Lessman
Greetings, farm fans! Your award-winning minor league baseball reporter doesn't often get to take the lead on trade items, but in a rare move for GM Rob McMonigal, a minor league player was sent out for more minor league players. It's something that doesn't happen a lot in the BBA, to be honest, but you see when a team feels they have a surplus at one position and can fill holes in other areas.
So while the main team is yet again stuck in the bargain basement, let's take a look at this trade and what it might mean. I'm going to focus mostly on Pepe Gonzales, because with the Nine starved for power (it doesn't look like they'll have anyone reach 30 home runs, let alone 40), sending away a power hitter at a corner position (don't even ask the last time the Nine had one of those) seems like a potential mistake. So who is Pepe Gonzales and will McMonigal regret sending him to the frozen north and a division competitor?
College Years and First Professional Season
You can see why Twin Cities was interested in Gonzales. He's a 2-time College All-Star and 2-time College Platinum Stick Award winner. Selected in the 4th round of the 2058 draft by the Nine, he then rolled right into Rookie Ball with the powerhouse Road Runners and was an All-Star there too that year. He also was the MVP of the first two rounds of the Rookie League playoffs in '58 on the way to being a part of Alamogordo's championship team. Pepe won that level's Platinum Stick (at DH, a point I'll get to later, because it's important) and finished second in the HL Frank Moore Award for best batter.
Quite a start! The kind of guy you want to hang on to, right?
Well, that's where things got complicated.
Cat (Lack of) Power
After banging 21 home runs in his first professional season and making McMonigal look like a genius, Gonzales traveled to Cat Island and while he still kept up a solid average (.289), his OPS tanked down to .762 from .961, largely due to only hitting 2 home runs. He found himself demoted from starter to fill-in, getting only 29 starts compared to 60. Pepe's 2060 was a bit better. His OPS came up to .870 but he did remain in a part-time role, starting only 12 times and having just 3 home runs.
So why the fall from grace?
Well, it wasn't entirely Gonzales's fault. When he arrived in Cat Island, Tony Bunce was also there and had a monster, 4.3 WAR year, with an OPS of 1.006. You don't take that bat out of the lineup. While Bunce didn't have the raw power of Gonzales, his skills and potential future in the BBA were clear. So it made sense that after awhile, Bunce would get the majority of the starts because the Pirates were after a playoff spot, which they obtained.
Aha, my clever readers are thinking, why not play him at DH, as they did in Alamogordo? As bad luck would have it for Gonzales, Roberto Gabriel was locked in there with his .915 OPS. So there really wasn't anywhere for the young man to play. He'd have to wait his turn.
Okay, that squares for 2059. But what about 2060? That's where the defense problem starts. With Gabriel holding down the DH slot again (he probably should have been in Silver Springs but that's a whole other article), Gonzales had to fight for playing time against Phil Minter, and because of Minter's superior defense, he lost out.
Who the hell is Phil Minter? Someone who's unlikely to make it the next time there's a roster crunch, as he can't even bat .200 these days in A-Ball, but at the time, he was a decent .249 hitter. A guy who won't kill you with the bat and will ensure a hot shot down the line gets captured instead of going for a double.
Silver Lining in Silver Springs
Despite not playing a lot in Short-A, Pepe moved up to the Tarpons in 2061 and it probably saved his career. He immediately responded to working with the legendary Dong-Po Thum, and it resulted in positive results across the board. He cleaned up his defense to a 2.5 range, 1.6 ZR, and 1.005 efficiency. His bat came alive, with a .320 average, 7 HR, .903 OPS numbers that got him noticed enough that it was time to go to Santa Cruz mid-season.
I asked him about what happened, and he had glowing things to say about Thum and the Silver Springs coaching staff.
"There's no doubt that Hunter [Thum] was one of the best infielders of all time. He's made hundreds of millions over his career. He has zero reason to be out there on a minor league field shouting out tips on fielding grounders but there he is. I can't thank him enough for that. He also gave me some pointers on my swing, too. I had fallen out of what was working because I wasn't seeing enough live pitching. He got Dave Lee to do some private batting practice with me and that made a huge difference."
But that relationship wasn't meant to last. And leaving Single A so quickly would have some consequences, as we'll see.
Santa Cruz Spotlight
Gonzales had to adjusts to the nearly BBA-ready players at AA, batting .267 but still managing an .807 OPS thanks to 5 home runs in just 105 at bats. His defense held, too, with similar numbers to his time in Silver Springs. Better yet, scouts started talking about that power that we'd see in full display in 2062. He was even rewarded with a platinum bat in A-ball, despite not playing the full year there. 2062 was looking bright.
And what a 2062 he had, too. At least offensively. In addition to hitting 30 home runs, Pepe batted .315 with 97 RBIs, .950 OPS, and 4.5 WAR. His totals were leaders on the Spartans, giving him the team's "triple crown" and in terms of homers, it wasn't even close. (Vance Tracy, minor league filler, had 16 as the runner up.) His homers and OPS lead both AA leagues. It would be insane to just trade a guy like this, but McMonigal did it.
Why?
Selling on a High
One of the reasons I mentioned early on is that McMonigal has several similar players and there's no immediate path for Gonzales. Tony Bunce is going to be at third for awhile and Roberto Gabriel has the DH space locked down as well. So he was theoretically expendable.
There's also the problem of his glove. At AA, they tried seeing if Gonzales could handle shortstop at all. The answer was a hard no. -3.1 ZR in 20 games put an end to that experiment. He was still okay at third, though. 1.1 ZR and a slightly increased 1.010 efficiency. Not bad and not enough to trade away.
But then there were the internal scouts. I was told by several Nine scouts that they saw some bad habits slipping back now that Thum was no longer in the picture. He wasn't making contact quite as well, despite the high batting average. His hits in batting practice were going over the wall a bit less. He was getting slower, which could impact on reaching balls at the line.
I'm sure all those scouts were telling McMonigal that the best time to trade Gonzales might be now. So he did, for OF Manuel Nevada and 1B Stephen Skandalis.
The Future
I don't follow Twin Cities closely, but my guess is they try to harness the power and look to keep Gonzales useful as a 1B/3B type who can be a cheap alternative there. They'll try to figure out what is causing some changes to his swing and monitor it in AAA. He's definitely got a path to the majors and a chance to show McMonigal should have found a spot for him after all.
On the other side, I hear good things about Nevada and Skandalis's work ethic and ability to improve their skills. Both could see their way to the Nine roster, though their potential impact is much lower, I think, than Gonzales if he matures fully.
That's the thing about trading minor league players. You never know when you might have shipped off the next big thing. Did McMonigal do that? I've laid out the facts and will let you be the judge.
