Nelson Cruz, Minnesota Twins - Nelson Cruz was outstanding again going 4-for-5 at the plate with a pair of homeruns. This was Cruz's second multi-homer game in the month of August and he's up to 32 homers for the season. Cruz has been unbelievable this year slashing .301/.390/.665 at 39 years old and he has a career high hard hit rate of 54.9% and a ridiculous 22% barrel rate which is in the top 1% of the league. His 94 MPH average exit velocity also ranks in the top 1% of the league.
Cavan Biggio, Toronto Blue Jays - Cavan Biggio hit his 10th homer of the season, and it is his second homer in the last three days. Biggio is only hitting .215 but he's demonstrating some absurd plate discipline with a 16.5% walk rate. Biggio also swiped his 9th bag of the year on Tuesday and has yet to be caught stealing at the major league level. Biggio has a FB% of 48% but his barrel% is at 9.6% which is leading to a lot of fly outs which is part of what is keeping his average so low. You'll take the elite plate discipline though and hope that the rest will work itself out.
Dylan Cease, Chicago White Sox - Dylan Cease picked up his second win throwing 5.0 innings with seven hits allowed but just two runs scored and he struck out six batters in the outing. The two runs allowed are Cease's lowest total in the majors this year and he now has six strikeouts in back to back games. Cease gave up a homer in this outing just as he has in every start and he's allowing 1.64 HR/9, something he's definitely going to need to improve on (even if the balls might have something to do with it). He did show some improvement with his command in the outing with just one walk, and that's the second time the year that he's done that. Cease is showing flashes of his immense potential, but we are also seeing the issues that he's struggled with along with it.
Jorge Soler, Kansas City Royals - Jorge Soler hit homers 30 and 31 on Tuesday while reaching base four times thanks to a pair of walks. Soler has really taken the leap this season to display why he had such elite prospect potential coming up as he ranks in the top 3% of the league in barrel% and his 91.9 average exit velocity ranks in the top 7% of the league. With Soler's hard contact rates it would appear that he's been unlucky to an extent to only be running a .253 batting average, but he's hit just 19% of his balls that were registered as line drives. With over 80% of his batted balls being fly balls or grounders it makes sense that his average would be on the lower end of the spectrum.
Kolby Allard, Texas Rangers - Kolby Allard is going to be called up by the Rangers on Friday to make his first start of the 2019 season. Allard saw a few starts last season with the Braves, but underwhelmed and ultimately was passed on the organizational depth chart by other arms and the team moved him at the trade deadline. Allard has seen a velocity jump this season compared to where he was the last few years, but he's still been touched up a bit in AAA and he has to face a powerful Brewers lineup in Miller Park for his return to the bigs. There's some talent here, but I'm avoiding this first start if I can.
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