A snapshot almost 4 weeks in

Cleveland

• Bullpen solid as ever
• Starters going deep into games and giving us quality starts and/or a good chance to win
• Santana, Encarnacion, catchers not in tune yet.  Lindor and Ramirez smokin' it

Columbus

• Starting pitching
• Gonzalez, Naquin, Diaz not letting demotions get them down, giving us GREAT depth
• Zimmer looks like he might be ready by July
• Urshela may have something left in the tank given great BB/AB and good K/B rate.
• Starting pitching, outside of Clevinger who has been good, has looked surprisingly bad to abysmal.
• Bullpen has OK depth of homegrown guys, many of whom have been to Cleveland.   I just like that better than rent-a-guy depth.  It just makes me feel better about the player development system.

Akron

• Mejia has been as or more than advertised.
• Allen has been as advertised, Krieger a little surprising
• Papi may be better than I thought as he is hitting this well, this late into the season for maybe the first time
• Chang, Bradley struggling
• Peoples, Lugo and Merryweather - I think there may be something there that wasn't there before.
• Relievers, especially Hill, may have some upside

Lynchburg

• Sam Haggerty, what the heck?   You can't stop him, all you can hope to do is contain him.  No way would I have predicted this kind of start.  He just looks like he is a boy among men in this league....and he is not that old for the league, either, especially as a college guy.
• I would have never guessed that this team would have so many guys hitting above .250 at this point with arguably the three best position player prospects on the team, Calica, Castro, Salters and Marabell, not reaching that level yet.
• Thomas Pannone, what the heck, part deux?  His numbers (WHIP, K/IP) are just eye-popping. He is not THAT old for this level.
• McKenzie, Esparza and Chiang also look really good so far.  
• Bullpen may have some guys (e.g. Linares) who may break on the scene this year. 

Lake County

• Jury still out on whether any hitting prospects exist on this team.  Disappointing start for Gabe Mejia
• Starting pitching not as dominant as I would have expected although only the Aiken/Garza piggyback and Juan Hillman has been really concerning so far, with Hillman just looking like his mechanics have deserted him.  The rest are just not as dominating as I thought there would be.
• The bullpen has made me smile.  Guys pitching as good as possible with 5 guys with ERAs of under 3.

Indians have not hit their stride yet but are doing OK.   Minor league teams are predictably struggling given the talent on those teams.  Still, most of the prospects on these teams are doing well and we have as many surprises as disappointments at this point and that is a GOOD thing.