This Week in the Blue Jays Minor Leagues

Mandatory Credit: Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports

Time to look at the player movement down on the farm and how our team faired this week. Not much movement has gone on this week with the only movement occurring on May 7th. We can expect some movement in the next day or two with Casey Janssen coming off the Disabled List which will cause a domino effect to follow.

May 7th

The Bisons added another veteran arm by adding Shawn Hill from New Hampshire. Hill started the game on the 7th and took the loss going 6 inning and allowing 5 runs. Ricardo Nanita was moved to the inactive list, maybe seeing his last at bat with this organization. Nanita has only gotten into 6 games and was hitting below .100.

New Hampshire Fisher Cats activated RHP Randy Boone from the 7-day disabled list. Boone has pitched a scoreless inning with a strike out since his return.

Buffalo Bisons

 The Bisons started the month off strong but have dropped their past 4 games and are 5-4 in May. The Bisons are 19-14 on the year and are currently tied with Pawtucket Red Sox for first. The Bisons continue to play well at home with a 11-5 record. 

Player of the week: Liam Hendriks and Kevin Pillar. Liam went 1-0 with a 0.65 ERA in two starts. He pitched 7 inning in both starts and struck out 8 while only walking 1. Henricks is now 4-0 with a 1.01ERA in 352 innings. Pillar has been making it looks easy the 2 weeks and is now hitting over .300 and he hit his first home run this week. Pillar had 6 multi-hit games this week and has 16 hits in his past 10 games.

New Hampshire

Fisher Cats The Fisher Cats went 3-4 this week. Aaron Sanchez had a bit of rough outing on the 8th, but he has been impressive so far this season. Deck McGuire has lost his past two starts and Casey Janssen pitched a couple innings of rehab. The Fisher Cats are sitting in 2nd last in the Eastern League Eastern Division with a 15-19 record and are 6.5 games back of the Portland Sea Dogs…also a Red Sox farm team.

Player of the Week: Mike Crouse has hit .294 in his past 10 games and got his first homerun of the year to along with 3 extra base hits.

Dunedin Blue Jays

The D-Jays have been on fire all season long , 26-9, and this week was no different as they went on a 5 game win streak and finished the week 6-1. Surprisingly the D-Jays are not running away with the division but they do hold a 3 game lead over the Lakeland Flying Tigers who handed the D-Jays 2 losses to start the month.  K.C. Hobson hasn’t been hitting much but has clutch with runners in scoring position as he sports a ..300 average with runners on and leads the team with 30 RBI.

Player of the Week: This could go to either Dalton Pompey or Daniel Norris. Pompey has 11 hits in his past 10 games had his second 2 steal game in 10 games…..he has 17 in 32 games. Norris didn’t register a win but he did got9.1 inning over two starts and only allowed the one run. He also struck out 16 batters will walking 4. In 6 games Norris is 3-0 with a 0.81 ERA and is holding opponents to a .176 BA.

Lansing Lugnuts

The Lugnuts are 4th and are 4.5 GB with a 17-18 record and went 3-4 this week. West Michigan Whitecaps…another Tigers farm team…have had their way with the Lugnuts this month to a tune of 2-4. The Lugnuts continue to be lead on offence by Justin Atkinson, Matt Dean, Derrick Loveless and Mitch Nay.

Player of the Week: Tom Robson got off to a terrible start and I for one thought that he would be sent to short season ball once it started, but he seems to have turned the corner this week. In 2 starts this week had 11IP, 2ER, 4BB, and 10K. Not bad for a guy that couldn’t get past the 4th inning in his first 4 starts.