The breakout man of the 2026 season had another outstanding day for Rome, providing more with his glove this time than his bat. His early double did contribute an RBI for the Emperors, but it was him soaring to rob a three-run home run that ultimately led to the Emperors prevailing in a close matchup. Elsewhere Alex Lodise had a home run while Derek Vartanian continues to impress in his professional debut.
(25-16) Gwinnett Stripers 2, (16-25) Durham Bulls 7
- Jim Jarvis, SS: 2-5, .314/.420/.445
- Nacho Alvarez Jr., 3B: 2-5, .240/.329/.339
- Victor Mederos, SP: 4.2 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 1 BB, 2 K, 2.53 ERA
- Daysbel Hernandez, RP: 1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 1 K, 3.72 ERA
It wasn’t a particularly good day for the Gwinnett Stripers, though a few flashes of good things came their way in an underwhelming loss. Victor Mederos pitched relatively well for the first time through the Durham order, but the second trip around combined with a dip in his velocity in late innings led to a poor ending. Running Mederos out for the fifth inning led to him getting hit extremely hard with two home runs, four three total runs, and three 100+ mph batted balls getting recorded against him. He was shuffled out of the game and the bullpen continued to struggle with four runs allowed over the next 2 1/3 innings, a deficit that would ultimately sink the Stripers in the game. For Daysbel Hernandez his inning of work was a nice milestone for his season as he averaged his highest fastball velocity in any outing of 2026 and pitched his fourth consecutive scoreless outing. Since a rough start to the season with diminished velocity he has turned back into more a semblance of his old self with one run allowed and nine strikeouts over his past 6 2/3 innings, though his velocity is still a tick down from where it’s been the past two seasons.
Offense was hard to come by for the Stripers in this game, as with no extra base hits and an 0-10 team performance with runners in scoring position it was no surprise that they struggled to score any runs. The two biggest contributions came from the two you would most want to hear good news from as both Nacho Alvarez and Jim Jarvis had solid performances. Alvarez’s two hits were both hard contact off of fastballs that he shot the other way, and Alvarez has thus far looked significantly more comfortable at the plate in May. He hasn’t been able to feed off of the two home runs he hit earlier in the month with no extra base hits since then, but his .395 OBP is more in line with what we’ve become used to seeing out of him and he’s hitting the ball hard more often. Jarvis also had a couple of hits and three total batted balls over 100 mph, though two of those contributed to his outs in the game. Jarvis smoked his hardest batted ball of the day in the third inning but sprayed it right at the first baseman for a lineout, and in the ninth inning sent a fly ball out to the wall in dead center field but just came up short of clearing the yard.
Swing and Misses
Victor Mederos – 6
Tayler Scott – 3
Daysbel Hernandez – 2
(17-17) Columbus Clingstones 9, (19-16) Knoxville Smokies 5
- Lizandro Espinoza, CF: 1-4, 3B, .284/.405/.559
- Patrick Clohisy, RF: 1-3, 3B, 2 BB, .231/.300/.374
- Jordan Groshans, 3B: 4-4, 2B, HR, BB, 5 RBI, .237/.302/.517
- Jack Dashwood, SP: 3 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 5 K, 8.84 ERA
- Luis Vargas, RP: 2.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 4 K, 4.57 ERA
Jordan Groshans had a monster day at the plate, his four hits and five RBIs leading the offensive charge in a high-powered win over the Smokies. Groshans got off to a hot start with a double in the first inning that one-hopped the center field wall, capping off a three-run inning for Columbus that gave them their first lead of the game. While Knoxville did answer with a couple of runs to tie the game up, the Clingstones kept coming and were fortunate to have three triples in this game. One of those came from Drew Compton in the fourth inning after a deep fly ball to right center field took a wild hop off of the tiptop of the wall and skittered away from both defenders. Compton would then score on a sacrifice fly and Groshans padded the lead the next inning to ensure the Clingstones would never trail again. This time Groshans got every bit of the ball and crushed a two run home run into the bullpen, ballooning the lead from one to three in the blink of an eye and giving Columbus all of the runs they would need to withstand the Knoxville offensive push. Groshans capped his day off with a bases-loaded, check swing single that scored two runs, a funky way to end Groshans’s best day as a Clingstone. More on those triples, Lizandro Espinoza kept up his hot hitting in the first inning of this game and got Columbus on the board first. He laces a liner into the left field gap, and an ill-advised dive allowed the ball to roll to the fence and bring home Patrick Clohisy while also letting Espinoza motor in to third easily. Six of Espinoza’s eleven hits this month have gone for extra bases, and he is currently in the midst of an eight game on base streak.
Starting pitching was a struggle in this one for Columbus thanks to another poor start from Jack Dashwood, who has had a hard time of it over his past four appearances. In these four games he has allowed 14 earned runs while only covering 10 1/3 innings, and he was only able to give the Clingstones three innings this game. After his departure Samuel Strickland had some success, but got ran out for a third inning and allowed two runs to shrink a comfortable Columbus lead to just one run. With the tying run on second and two outs in the sixth inning Columbus turned to Luis Vargas, and that decision was one that was critical in lifting the team to a win. Vargas quickly got out of the sixth inning and then pitched two dominate innings on his own, striking out four batters and not allowing a single ball to leave the infield. This was a great bounceback for Vargas after his worst outing of the year, and though his command has been spotty his stuff looks sharp and he has allowed a contact rate of just 66.5% this season.
Swing and Misses
Jack Dashwood – 11
Luis Vargas – 8
(20-15) Rome Emperors 4, (8-26) Brooklyn Cyclones 3
- Isaiah Drake, DH: 1-3, BB, .294/.373/.507
- John Gil, SS: 0-4, .288/.388/.480
- Eric Hartman, LF: 1-4, 2B, RBI, .326/.408/.689
- Colin Daniel, SP: 5.2 IP, 3 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 3 BB, 10 K, 5.34 ERA
The Rome Emperors went off in the first inning for four runs, and that was enough to seal the victory even with the offense in cruise control for the final seven innings. Who else but Eric Hartman got the game off to a quick start by hooking a liner into right field for an RBI double to score Isaiah Drake, and with two outs the runs started to pile up quickly. A Will Verdung double made it 3-0 in favor of Rome, and after chasing the starter from the game the Emperors got another on an RBI single from Mac Guscette. The bottom of the order did a great job of getting on base for the remainder of the game, but a combination of the top three not having their best day, lack of extra base hits, and unfortunate sequences led to the Emperors getting no more runs. Between Verdung, Keshawn Ogans, Guscette, and Jake Steels the bottom four produced six hits and three walk, but no extra base hits after the first inning and only one other runner even getting to third base. The Emperors were clearly the better team this game, but it would come down to a test of whether the Rome pitching staff could shut down Brooklyn for the rest of the game.
That last part isn’t exactly the toughest thing in the world to do. Brooklyn has the lowest team OPS in the South Atlantic League and no hitters in the lineup above an .800 OPS, so Colin Daniel and friends had their easiest matchup of the season facing them. Daniel has had a few games where his command has gotten inconsistent this season and that’s where trouble has arose for him, and today was a case where walks and poor location were something of a problem for him. His struggles were at their worst in the third inning when he allowed two walks, two hard hit singles, and a couple of runs, but Eric Hartman showed up with the glove and saved Daniel from disaster. Leadoff man Mitch Voit smoked a ball to left field with two runners on, and as the ball carried towards the wall Hartman chased it in a dead sprint. Hartman timed his jump and leaped at the wall and made a spectacular robbery, preserving the lead with the best defensive play of the prospect season thus far. Voit would bite Daniel with a tape measure shot two innings later, but this time with no runners on base Rome retained the lead by a single run. Daniel would likely have faced more trouble in this game if he wasn’t missing bats like crazy, racking up 10 strikeouts and 20 swing and misses, both season highs. The bullpen kept the energy high and retired every batter they faced, striking out six of those to close out the win.
Swing and Misses
Colin Daniel – 20
Riley Frey – 6
Isaac Gallegos – 3
(19-16) Augusta GreenJackets 3, (16-17) Myrtle Beach Pelicans 1
- Tate Southisene, 2B: 1-4, BB, .273/.430/.508
- Alex Lodise, SS: 2-5, HR, .252/.323/.4
- Luis Guanipa, DH: 1-4, .302/.345/.527
- Derek Vartanian, SP: 5.2 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 3 BB, 7 K, 3.66 ERA
- Carter Lovasz, RP: 2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 4 K, 1.02 ERA
You can always count on Augusta to give you something to get excited over. The trio once again all had hits and made an impact in a winning effort, and this time Alex Lodise is the one who stepped up with the biggest play of the game. Lodise hit an opposite field home run late in this game for his second hit of the evening, and there have been some good aspects to this mostly disappointing month of May. His strikeouts are still hovering in concerning territory, though his contact rates thus far give some indication he may improve by simple regression. His contact rate is still below the league average which is a major red flag for a major D1 player at Single-A, but his strikeout rate is hovering at about 4 percentage points higher than should be expected. The biggest recent switch is his power as he has three home runs in his past six games. Lodise’s power numbers are by far the best part of his profile thus far, and he is hitting the ball hard enough to deserve the performance he has put up. He has a .163 ISO despite not having a non-HR extra base hit since April 22nd, and with a few more doubles mixed in his should see his numbers tick up a bit more even from here. After spending basically the entire Augusta recap yesterday ranting over Tate Southisene he responded with a poor game especially by his recent standards, striking out a couple of times and only getting in the hit column on an infield tapper in the ninth inning. He was also caught stealing and had an error in the field to round out what was unfortunately a tough day for him. To round out the recap of the group Luis Guanipa had a decent day at the plate with a line drive single in the first inning and a sharp line out in the second inning. Outside of the three strikeout performance last night Guanipa has just looked so consistently comfortable and explosive at the plate over the past couple of weeks, and his contact rate is quickly catching up to the norms of past seasons.
Derek Vartanian is steadily putting up impressive outings down in A ball, and though this wasn’t his best outing in regards to his command he was still able to hold the game together and put out one run over 5 2/3 innings. He had times where he struggled in this one to dial it in and keep his secondary pitches down in the strike zone, but he has shown consistently that his splitter is a pitch that hitters at this level aren’t equipped to handle. The pitch carries about a 15 mph gap to his fastball (arguably too much for higher level hitters) and he has made lefties at this level look foolish. Left handed hitters have no home runs, a strikeout rate of 32%, and an OPS of .599 against Vartanian and it comes down to his ability to get whiffs on that splitter. His fastball is good enough when his command is on, but the real question moving forward is how he and the Braves choose to develop his slider. Right now it’s a hard, short pitch that doesn’t have quite enough power or movement to get a ton of whiffs, and while that’s sufficient against A-ball competition he’ll really need a more effective breaking ball to crack into real prospect conversations. He’s had struggles against right handed batters and has had to rely on a fringe fastball to get outs against them. Still this is a guy who, despite being 22 and in Single-A, does not have a ton of high-level experience with only 43 innings between Campbell and Augusta after transferring from two years at the JuCo level. He’s going to need a bit of refinement and development but has loads of talent for a guy the Braves were able to land as an undrafted free agent. He has been in control of basically every start he has made so far and is scratching at getting some top 30 consideration.
Swing and Misses
Derek Vartanian – 13
Carter Lovasz – 7
COVERS INTEL: The Dodgers haven't been making quality contact lately, 
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