
Scores, news, and notes from around the Detroit Tigers’ farm system for Saturday, August 2, 2025.
St. Paul Saints 10, Toledo Mud Hens 4 (box )
Toledo had one of those games where you know where the Mud Hens are going to lose, but not by how much. It ended up being a 10-4 loss to the St. Paul Saints Saturday night.
Pitching was a problem, the night after all four levels saw a decent start. Keider Montero gave up eight earned runs, including a pair of three-run frames to open the game. The contact was loud early off Montero. St. Paul tripled twice in the first, and he hit a batter. A three-run homer in the second came before the first out of the inning.
Montero threw a 1-2-3 third inning, but another triple in the fourth meant a seventh run. A walk and a hit batter got him pulled before he could record an out in the fifth. Tyler Mattison took over and immediately traded a run (Montero’s eighth) for a double play.
Tyler Mattison comes in with 2 on and 0 out and gets a ground ball that Jace Jung and Trey Sweeney turn into a very nice double play. pic.twitter.com/3tyTch0foU
— Tigers ML Report (@tigersMLreport) August 3, 2025
Alex Lange got the sixth and gave up a solo homer to make it 9-0, and Wilkel Hernandez saw the leadoff man double and score in the seventh. Meanwhile, Toledo’s offense hadn’t done much. The Mud Hens were no-hit until the sixth, when Tomas Nido singled to open the frame.
Scraping together four runs, two in each of the final two frames, hardly put a dent into the deficit. Still, it’s good to see Akil Baddoo, Nido and Gage Workman get to the bullpen for doubles.
2RBI single for Jace Jung pic.twitter.com/1GpDE7eWId
— Toledo Mud Hens (@MudHens) August 3, 2025
The bottom line is you can’t show up and play two decent innings and expect to win a ball game. Montero isn’t the guy you want to see getting torched, but the bullpen was a bit easier to stomach. Lange is still shaky, but Hernandez went three complete with just the one earned run.
Jung: 1-5, 2 RBI, 2K
Baddoo: 1-3, 2B (16), BB, K
Nido: 2-3, 2B (2), 2 R
Montero (L, 2-4): 4.0 IP, 6 H, 8 R, 8 ER, 2 BB, 4 K; 86 pitches (43 strikes)
F/10: Erie SeaWolves 6, Akron RubberDucks 5 (box )
Erie had the game won at 5-2 for most of the evening, but a game-tying, three-run homer from Travis Bazzana in the ninth forced extra innings. Jake Holton drove in the game-winner in the 10th to make things right, though.
Kevin McGonigle scored on Holton’s 10th-inning groundout to win it, but he also got the SeaWolves on the board in the fourth with a two-run homer to tie the game.
Kevin McGonigle ties the game for Erie with a 2-run blast to right. It’s his 2nd home run with the SeaWolves, and his 9th overall this year. pic.twitter.com/1J5mkt0a4e
— Tigers ML Report (@tigersMLreport) August 3, 2025
Akron plated two against starter Carlos Pena in the third, but he was otherwise pretty good. Seven hits sounds like a lot, but that’s only true if a bunch of runs score. He also struck out seven and walked just one.
Eliezer Alfonzo gave the SeaWolves the lead with a two-run double later in the fourth, scoring Roberto Campos and Holton. Erie got things going again in the fifth with two singles and a walk, but only one run materialized on a groundout from McGonigle.
Eliezer Alfonzo puts Erie up 4-2 with a double into the right corner. He gets thrown out trying for a triple, though. pic.twitter.com/t0hrEQQvCM
— Tigers ML Report (@tigersMLreport) August 3, 2025
Pena pitched through the fifth, turning things over to Trevin Michael in the sixth. Michael put together a strong, three-inning hold, allowing just one hit. Tanner Kohlepp earned the win despite blowing the save. Ryan Boyer converted the second opportunity of the night after Erie went back up in the 10th.
Clark: 1-3, 2 BB
McGonigle: 1-5, HR (2), 2 R, 3 RBI, K
Liranzo: 1-4, R, BB
Pena: 5.0 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, BB, 7 K; 99 pitches (65 strikes)
Dayton Dragons 5, West Michigan Whitecaps 2 (box )
Six of the seven runs in West Michigan’s 5-2 loss to Dayton Saturday night came in the middle third.
The Whitecaps were limited to just two runs on eight hits. The first scored on an Andrew Jenkins sacrifice fly in the fourth, and Jenkins doubled in the other during the sixth. For an 8-hit day, that’s fairly uneventful, but John Peck did have a nice three-hit day, scoring both runs, amidst all the frustration. Brett Callahan also had a double.
Andrew Jenkins drives a double to right center and John Peck scores from 1st to make it a 4-2 Dayton lead. pic.twitter.com/4PIQ0vinN5
— Tigers ML Report (@tigersMLreport) August 3, 2025
West Michigan’s pitching wasn’t terrible. Hayden Minton took the loss after working 4.1 innings of two-run ball. Minton gave up a leadoff double and a two-out walk in the first, but he locked in for 10 straight outs after that. Asking him to come back out for the fifth was too much, though.
Carter Graham and Ariel Almonte went back-to-back big flies off Minton, forcing the Whitecaps to the bullpen. Joe Adametz was first out, working through the sixth. Adametz got tagged for a two-run homer in the sixth, doubling Dayton’s scoring total.
Marco Jimenez went six up, six down over the next two innings, but Haden Erbe allowed an insurance run in the ninth.
A 0-for-8 day at the plate with runners in scoring position doomed West Michigan in this one, although Jimenez and Peck had standout performances.
Peck: 3-3, 2B (20), 2 R, BB
Jenkins: 1-3, 2B (16), RBI
Minton (L, 3-2): 4.1 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, BB, 3 K; 77 pitches (52 strikes)
Tampa Tarpons 8, Lakeland Flying Tigers 3 (box )
Rounding out the day with a fairly one-sided loss are the Lakeland Flying Tigers, who lost 8-3 against the Tampa Tarpons.
Lakeland answered an early run in the first inning, scoring on a Ricardo Hurtado base hit, but that was it until the ninth. The Flying Tigers didn’t have another hit until the fourth, and Hurtado was the only player to record more than one knock. Carson Rucker scored in the ninth after reaching on an error, but it had little to no effect on the outcome.
Ricardo Hurtado with a nice piece of hitting on this sharp grounder to right that scores Zach MacDonald and ties the game. pic.twitter.com/X3d75rnkyc
— Tigers ML Report (@tigersMLreport) August 2, 2025
Lakeland only used three pitchers, Wilmer Flores, Eric Silva and Kelvis Salcedo. Flores threw one inning on a rehab assignment, giving up a solo homer and with his velocity in the low 90’s, and Silva threw the next five innings.
Wilmer Flores gave up a home run on his first pitch, but then got the next 3 batters out in order. No whiffs and the velocity is down, but we’ll worry about that later. Just good to see him back on the mound. pic.twitter.com/ErozIt8ZG1
— Tigers ML Report (@tigersMLreport) August 2, 2025
Silva gave up a run in the fourth and sixth, but the big inning came in the fifth. Tampa had five hits in the inning, including a three-run homer to bust it wide open 7-1. Silva was just out there to eat innings, regardless of what happened on the scoreboard.
The score didn’t really matter when Salcedo came in to make his first Single-A appearance. His job was to stop any bleeding and find his footing at a new level, and Salcedo excelled. He was mostly fastball (13) and cutter (12) with a couple of changeups (5) — no hits allowed through three innings.
The cutter has a really strong spin rate and generates good swing and miss (six whiffs, seven swings), and Salcedo ran his fastball up to 98.5 mph, averaging 97 mph. A more defined secondary might be needed at the higher levels of the minors, but Salcedo has plenty of time to develop at just 19 years old.
Remember the name Kelvis Salcedo. The 19-year-old made his Low-A debut tonight with 3 scoreless, hitless innings (1BB/5K). His fastball sat at 97 and he threw some very nice cutters and changeups. ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/eeKP6R5WGJ
— Tigers ML Report (@tigersMLreport) August 3, 2025
Rucker: 1-4, R, K
Strong: 0-4, K
Silva (L, 0-2): 5.0 IP, 8 H, 7 R, 7 ER, BB, K; 66 pitches (45 strikes)
Salcedo: 3.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, BB, 5 K; 33 pitches (22 strikes)