Minor League Ball Gameday: Friday, March 23rd, 2018

Hello everyone and welcome to the Minor League Ball Gameday discussion thread for Friday, March 23rd, 2018. Here are some items worthy of discussion and attention on the final day of the work week.

****We mentioned Baltimore Orioles catching prospect Chance Sisco in yesterday’s gameday. He had another fine performance on Thursday, going 2-for-3 with a double, a home run, and four RBI. He’s now at .419/.471/.839 on the spring.

****Oakland Athletics prospect Sheldon Neuse has been on a hot streak lately, going 8-for-15 in his last five games and hitting .314/.386/.667 on the spring. A reader asked for my opinion on Neuse and I am working on a full profile for him.

****Another hot prospect is Ryan McMahon of the Colorado Rockies, 4-for-8 with two doubles and a homer in his last five games, hitting .344/.385/.574 overall and looking like the favorite to win the first base job.

****Hopefully McMahon can lock down his job and avoid the fate of Arizona Diamondbacks first base prospect Christian Walker, who hit .302/.388/.605 this spring but was sent back to minor league camp earlier this week.

Drafted from the University of South Carolina by the Orioles in the fourth round in 2012, Walker has been an effective Triple-A slugger since 2014 (including a .309/.382/.597 line for Reno last year) and went 3-for-12 with two homers and a double last year in brief action for the Diamondbacks.

Unfortunately Walker has been trapped behind expensive veterans (Chris Davis in Baltimore, Paul Goldschmidt in Arizona) for his entire career. At age 26 (27 next week) he is about to tip from “decent prospect who needs a chance” to “useful farmhand/depth chart fodder/Quadruple-A slugger.”