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The 2023 Minor League season is in full bloom, and as temperatures begin to heat throughout the nation from Portland, Me., to Lake Elsinore, Calif., one thing else is coming again, too – the baseball highway journey!

We’ve documented loads of methods you may plan and begin your odyssey via the Minors with the Ballpark Guide collection, and now it’s about time we additionally present you what it’s like on the market on the path to the Majors that's Minor League Baseball. With that in thoughts, the MLB Pipeline Game of the Month is again for 2023. We’re beginning the collection up once more at Double-A Amarillo’s HODGETOWN on Thursday, April 27.

To stroll you thru what to anticipate from the April Game of the Month, we’re going to borrow some lyrics from Texas native Willie Nelson:

Each month this season, at the very least one member of the MLB Pipeline crew will journey to a ballpark as a part of the Game of the Month collection, the place we’ll deliver you a great deal of content material in regards to the gamers, groups, stadiums and atmospheres that make Minor League Baseball so particular.

The sport itself can be our Free Game of the Day on Thursday and can be simply streamed on MLB.com, no matter whether or not you might have an MiLB.TV or MLB At Bat subscription (though you completely ought to to get each different televised Minor League contest this summer time).

You’ll wish to tune into this one too. The Sod Poodles boast No. 9 total prospect Jordan Lawlar, the highest-ranked participant within the Texas League, and still have strong hitters in Deyvison De Los Santos (AZ No. 4), A.J. Vukovich (AZ No. 12) and Ryan Bliss (AZ No. 30). The visiting Frisco RoughRiders simply occur to have a roster MLB Pipeline named as essentially the most loaded in baseball with 4 Top 100 prospects of their very own, led by No. 36 total expertise Evan Carter, who enters the week with a .525 OBP in Texas League play, and No. 65 Luisangel Acuña, the youthful brother of Braves outfielder Ronald Acuña Jr.

Goin’ locations that I’ve by no means been

HODGETOWN is among the Minors’ latest ballparks, having opened in 2019. We’ll be recording a ballpark tour that’ll take followers contained in the nooks and crannies of the Sod Poodles’ stadium. That will embody a culinary sampling of the membership’s (gulp) Calf Fries, made well-known by their viral alternate identification for the 2023 season.

In addition, NFL Hall of Famer Troy Aikman can be making an look and pouring beer as a part of Thirsty Thursday.

We’ll even be conducting interviews with gamers from Amarillo and Frisco that you will discover on the @MLBPipeline and @MiLB social media channels. Down the highway, we’ll have an on-camera pitching breakdown with one of many groups’ greatest pitching prospects that can be utilized in a future Pitching Lab story on MLB.com, so make sure to circle again for that.

Have a query for D-backs prospects Lawlar or Vukovich? Wondering how Owen White throws his breaking pitches? Let us know what questions you wish to be answered on Twitter @SamDykstraMiLB or @MLBPipeline, and we’ll get you solutions from the Texas panhandle.

Seein’ issues that I could by no means see once more

Amarillo has shortly turn into one of the hitter-friendly environments in the entire Minor Leagues, that means we may witness some actually crooked numbers come Thursday.

To show the purpose, take a look at final yr’s splits. Amarillo batters had a collective .396/.376/.511 slash line over 69 house video games final yr. They went deep 116 occasions (most within the Texas League) in that span for a price of 1.78 homers per sport at HODGETOWN. That dropped to 0.93 HR/G on the highway, the place they'd a way more mundane .258/.327/.396 line in 68 contests. Amarillo pitchers had a 7.46 ERA at house in 2022 and a 4.65 on the highway. Already this season, Amarillo has hosted a pair of 13-10 video games … inside two days of one another on April 12 and 14.

A mix of elevation and constant wind results in the funky numbers in Amarillo, and it is doable we may get a loopy rating on Thursday, particularly with the standard of hitters on show. Slugfests like these should be seen to be believed, so be sure you preserve it tuned into the published.

And I can’t wait to get on the highway once more.

As we’ve mentioned, that is simply the beginning of the Game of the Month collection for 2023. Last yr, we headed to Somerset, Altoona, Norfolk, Durham and New Hampshire. We’ll examine off Amarillo on Thursday, after which comes the favourite query of each Minor League highway journey – the place to subsequent?

Content Source: www.mlb.com