Marlins prospect updates: Yiddi Cappe off to fast start. So are Nasim Nunez, Peyton Burdick
Yiddi Cappe’s second season in the Miami Marlins organization was one filled with changes and adjustments.
The infielder was playing state-side for the first time in his career after signing for $3.5 million and playing the 2021 season with the Marlins’ Dominican Summer League team. He was facing tougher pitchers. And, for the final two months after being moved up to Class A Jupiter, he experienced playing games at night — and in front of fans — for the first time.
“It was exciting just to see these new things,” Cappe, who turned 20 last September, said late last season.
The excitement didn’t impact his results. Cappe posted a .290 batting average with a .766 on-base-plus-slugging mark in 67 games between the Florida Complex League and Class A last season with 12 doubles, nine home runs, 40 RBI, 41 runs scored and 13 stolen bases.
And Cappe, ranked as Miami’s 7th overall prospect by MLB Pipeline, has picked up where he left off last year.
Through nine games with the High A Beloit Sky Carp, Cappe is hitting .294 with a .934 OPS, two home runs, three doubles, a triple, nine RBI and six runs scored. He already has four multi-hit games and has either reached base or driven in a run in eight of nine outings.
Cappe was a late signer compared to other international signees. He defected from Cuba in late 2018 and wasn’t cleared by MLB to be signed until well after most teams had committed their bonus pool allotments for the 2019-2020 cycle. So he waited a year and signed with the Marlins in January 2021.
“I think overall just the maturity,” said Hector Crespo, the Marlins’ director of minor-league operations, said at the end of last season. “I think [in 2021], he kind of put some pressure on himself. [In 2022], he kind of settled into who he really was. His at-bats were great, defensively he got so much better. But that guy can just hit. I was a little worried about him being thrown into Low-A, but he went out there and just did what he did. ... A guy that’s gotten better both on and off the field, so really happy with that.”
Nasim Nunez power stroke
Shortstop Nasim Nunez entered this season, his fourth in pro ball and his first full year with the Double A Pensacola Blue Wahoos after playing the final 38 games in 2022 at that level, with just two career home runs in 816 at-bats.
Through 33 at-bats and nine games this year, Nunez has already matched that total. The 22-year-old switch-hitter swatted a pair of home runs this week with the Blue Wahoos and has a hit in seven of nine games this year. Nunez, Miami’s No. 21 overall prospect, has also drawn six walks, stolen two bases and scored seven runs.
A sleeper in the Double A rotation
The headliners of the Blue Wahoos’ rotation understandably are right-handed pitcher Eury Perez and left-handed pitcher Dax Fulton, two of Miami’s prized prospects.
But through two starts, it’s the No. 3 pitcher in that rotation — crafty left-handed pitcher Patrick Monteverde — that has been turning heads.
Monteverde, Miami’s eighth-round pick out of Texas Tech in the 2021 MLB Draft, has tossed 13 scoreless innings so far with Pensacola, allowing just two hits and two walks while striking out 19 of the 42 batters he has faced.
Monteverde, ranked as the 30th prospect in Miami’s system, has a four-pitch mix, using two fastballs (a four-seam and a two-seam) that sit between 89-92 mph, a low 80s changeup and a low 80s slider. Since his stuff isn’t particularly overpowering, he has to rely on changing speeds, working both sides of the plate and precise location to get effective results.
He has done that through his first two starts.
Burdick bombs
Peyton Burdick continues to rake early in the minor-league season. The Marlins’ outfielder, who made his MLB debut last season, has swatted seven home runs through his first 14 games, one shy of the minor-league league entering the week.
Eleven of Burdick’s 20 hits so far have been extra-base hits — he also has four doubles — and he has a .351 batting average, .422 on-base percentage, .789 slugging slash line to go along with 15 RBI and 15 runs scored.
This and that
▪ Outfielder Jerar Encarnacion has six multi-hit games and 17 RBI through 13 games played with Triple A Jacksonville.
▪ Infielder Xavier Edwards, regularly Triple A Jacksonville’s leadoff hitter and Miami’s No. 12 overall prospect, has a .350 batting average and has safely reached base in all 11 games he has played.
▪ Paul McIntosh’s hot start at the plate continues for Pensacola — he has a .910 OPS, three home runs and 11 RBI in 30 at-bats. But the catcher is also getting reps at another position. He has started two of eight games in left field, a position he played just three times in his minor-league career before this season.
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