Photo: Malcom Nunez (Springfield Cardinals)
I am once again pleased to select The Cardinal Nation’s Player of the Month. This article covers play during June across the entire system, including the FCL and DSL levels and will not only highlight the winner, but also a group of runners up.
A trio of prospects in the St. Louis Cardinals system separated themselves from the rest of the pack with OPSes above 1.000,, but one player outclassed the rest. This was not a particularly close decision, but each of the nine finalists this month are worth highlighting.
As a reminder, this is NOT the “Pitcher of the Month Among Top Prospects”. Every player in the system has an equal chance, with only their performance during the month used to differentiate the best of the best. Age and level, which are key prospect considerations, are not factors here.
Guidelines
To qualify, a player must have had at least 50 plate appearances in June. To make the list of finalists an OPS over .900 was required, a much higher mark than last month (.900). A list of nine qualified batters with OPSes above .900 is quite impressive and it’s a sign of the overall strength of the organizational lineups this past month.
Every level is represented except for the FCL affiliate of the Cardinals, as even one DSL player was a finalist. Springfield was the most represented, with three players heading the S-Cards lineup last month.
Four of the nine players on this list earned promotions, in large part due to their strong performances in June.
We will take two views of the data. The first look will be at rate stats, followed by counting stats. Names are listed in the same sequence in both tables, in descending OPS order. Leaders are bolded.
Rate Stats – Finalists
| Hitter | Team | AVG | OBP | SLG | OPS |
| Malcom Nunez | Springfield | .381 | .454 | .726 | 1.180 |
| Maycol Justo | DSL Cardinals | .339 | .383 | .661 | 1.044 |
| Moises Gomez | Springfield/Memphis | .301 | .404 | .615 | 1.019 |
| Jonah Davis | Springfield | .233 | .327 | .651 | .978 |
| Conner Capel | Memphis | .279 | .456 | .515 | .971 |
| L.J. Jones | Peoria | .330 | .410 | .557 | .967 |
| Alec Burleson | Memphis | .358 | .402 | .547 | .949 |
| Mike Antico | Peoria | .315 | .398 | .546 | .944 |
| Brady Whalen | Palm Beach | .306 | .422 | .506 | .928 |
After taking a look at the rate stats, it should be clear why Malcom Nunez is worthy of TCN’s Player of the Month honor. He led all finalists in batting average, slugging percentage, and OPS, and he did it by a wide margin for each statistic.
Interestingly, Conner Capel, who ‘only’ had the fifth best OPS, took the OBP crown and prevented Nunez from achieving a clean sweep of the rate stats.
It’s worth highlighting our sole rookie-ball finalist – Maycol Justo. He tallied the second best OPS largely due to having the second highest slugging and despite the fact that he was one of only three finalists with an OBP below .400 for the month.
That last part is impressive, too, since it shows that these finalists did more than crush baseballs. They also got on base and racked up hits and walks.
I also want to point out that the 4th place finisher in OPS batted just .233. That’s incredible, and by incredible, I mean incredibly weird, because as you will see below, 7 of Jonah Davis’ 10 hits went for extra bases.
His power is what carried him into the top half of finalists, because his batting average and on-base percentage were both last by a mile. This was a bounce back month for the minor league free agent signing as he still has a season wRC+ of just 75 despite the strong month.
No list of finalists would be complete without Moises Gomez’s name on it, as the breakout prospect was one of three finalists with an OPS above 1.000. His month was weirdly impressive, but I’ll save that surprise for later in the article.
Now, before continuing into the counting stats section, I want to highlight the sole Palm Beach finalist, Brady Whalen. Palm Beach is a tough hitting environment which is why Palm Beach hitters typically have worse numbers than hitters at other levels. So, a Beach Bird OPSing over .900 is no mean feat.
Counting Stats – Finalists
| Hitter | Team | G | AB | R | H | 2B | 3B | HR | RBI | BB | K | SB | CS |
| Malcom Nunez | Springfield | 23 | 84 | 19 | 32 | 2 | 0 | 9 | 27 | 12 | 21 | 1 | 2 |
| Maycol Justo | DSL Cardinals | 13 | 56 | 11 | 19 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 16 | 3 | 21 | 1 | 1 |
| Moises Gomez | Memphis/Springfield | 23 | 83 | 16 | 25 | 8 | 0 | 6 | 15 | 14 | 43 | 2 | 2 |
| Jonah Davis | Springfield | 15 | 43 | 10 | 10 | 1 | 1 | 5 | 14 | 5 | 22 | 1 | 0 |
| Conner Capel | Memphis | 20 | 68 | 15 | 19 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 9 | 21 | 10 | 6 | 4 |
| L.J. Jones | Peoria | 23 | 88 | 13 | 29 | 11 | 0 | 3 | 16 | 10 | 17 | 0 | 0 |
| Alec Burleson | Memphis | 24 | 95 | 10 | 34 | 3 | 0 | 5 | 20 | 9 | 13 | 0 | 0 |
| Mike Antico | Peoria | 26 | 108 | 21 | 34 | 13 | 0 | 4 | 19 | 13 | 24 | 14 | 0 |
| Brady Whalen | Palm Beach | 24 | 85 | 12 | 26 | 6 | 1 | 3 | 11 | 13 | 18 | 0 | 0 |
When it comes to the counting stats, it’s Mike Antico who steals the show. The former Peoria leadoff man, and now Springfield leadoff man, played the most games and took the most at-bats, which is partially why he led in most categories. Regardless, his 13 doubles in a month is quite impressive, but perhaps not as impressive as his perfect 14-0 record on stolen bases. He was a prototypical leadoff man in June. He got on base often and put himself in scoring position often.
Antico did not take sole possession of first place in hits because Alec Burleson tied him despite taking 13 fewer at-bats. The Memphis outfielder has done nothing but hit this year and that trend certainly continued in June. While the 23-year-old had a fantastic month, it was nothing out of the ordinary for him as his lowest OPS in a single month this season is a whopping .936 (April).
While Antico’s 13 doubles were impressive, Peoria’s L.J. Jones clubbed 11 in 20 fewer at-bats. That’s good for second place amongst finalists, making him the only other finalists with double digit doubles.
Our Player of the Month Malcom Nunez led in home runs this month, as he smacked nine balls over the fence. That certainly helped him lead all finalists in RBI too. He was a major run producer in Springfield last month and actually tripled his home run output from the first two months of the season, while more than doubling his RBI output. June was definitely a transformative month for the 21-year-old, who is over three years younger than his average competition.
Now, I told you that Moises Gomez’s month was weirdly impressive and that’s because, as you can see in the above table, he struck out an incredible 43 times. That means that he struck out in 43% of his trips to the plate in June, but somehow managed 25 hits. When you add in his 14 walks, and a hit-by-pitch, that means he only made 16 batted ball outs. He actually had more hits than batted ball outs last month! I told you it was a crazy way of finding production.
While I’m talking about strikeouts, Conner Capel contrasts really well with Gomez. The outfielder, who now plays in St. Louis, fanned just 10 times last month, which was the fewest among finalists. He also walked 21 times, meaning that he walked more than twice as often as he struck out. That’s almost the complete opposite of Gomez.
However, it doesn’t matter how the production comes. It just matters that it comes if a player wants to be a finalist for the Player of the Month award.
TCN’s June Player of the Month – Malcolm Nunez
Malcom Nunez joined the Cardinals organization on July 2, 2018 when he signed for a reported signing bonus of $300,000. He proceeded to dominate the Dominican Summer League en route to winning the triple crown and immediately placing himself on the prospect radar, making his debut on TCN’s list at number 10 in 2019. He’s been a fixture on the list ever since and was most recently ranked 22nd in our June re-ranking.
The corner defender stumbled a bit in 2019, hitting just above a league average level in rookie ball and struggling immensely with his first taste of full season ball. The lost 2020 season meant that he never got the chance to repeat Single-A. Instead, he jumped straight to High-A in 2021 and more than held his own with a 121 wRC+.
He was promoted to Double-A after just 35 games and came back down to earth, performing at a rate about 9% below the league average. He’s been much better in his second go-around, showing more power and better plate discipline, and he now holds a 113 wRC+ and .821 OPS on the season.
June was really the coming out party for Nunez as he only posted a .679 OPS in April and an even worse .636 OPS in May. Now he needs to prove that his June production is closer to the norm than his April and May production.
How May’s Winner Fared in June
Another month has passed and Jordan Walker refuses to slow down. Well, I guess you could call his measly .871 June OPS ‘slowing down’ if you compare it to his .996 OPS in May. Since he finished with an OPS below .900 he missed the cut and wasn’t a finalist in June.
He still crushed 11 extra base hits, 3 home runs, while walking 10 times and stealing 4 bases. It was another month where Walker showed that he can do everything – hit for average (.300), hit for power (.200 ISO), take walks, and add value on the basepaths.
Walker has yet to finish a month with under an .800 OPS this season. The 20-year-old and soon-to-be TCN’s top ranked prospect has kept up a torrid pace all year while handling every challenge that has been thrown at him.
For the year, Walker has a .904 OPS, 11.8% walk rate, 20.9% strikeout rate, and 134 wRC+, all while being over 4 years younger than the average Double-A player. It wouldn’t be a surprise to see him back on the list of finalists at the end of July.
Related Articles
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…And we have now finished ours.
The Cardinal Nation’s June 2022 Pitcher of the Month – Alex Cornwell
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