The Los Angeles Angels signaled that pitching reinforcements were coming their way when they promoted Reid Detmers and Chris Rodriguez to Triple-A Salt Lake. Despite the latter joining the big league bullpen earlier this season, he was demoted to Double-A to get reacquainted as a starter.
Detmers was the Angels’ first-round pick in the 2020 MLB Draft, and needed just 54.0 innings of work in Double-A before receiving the promotion to the Salt Lake Bees. And while it generally takes players a little while to adjust to a higher level, Detmers wasted no time flexing his muscles at the penultimate level before the big leagues.
The Angels’ pitcher gave six innings of work on Saturday for the Bees, allowing zero runs, zero walks, and only three hits. He struck out nine batters, including three in a near-immaculate first inning. Detmers spoke about his Triple-A debut, via Stephanie Sheehan of MLB.com:
“I felt good. I was a little anxious getting out there at first, but I felt like everything was working,” Detmers said. “Obviously, offspeed stuff was a little shaky at times, but it was there when I needed it, and that was the main thing. Just getting those quick outs and executing the pitches when I had to.”
“It was nice, actually,” Detmers said. “It was a lot of familiar faces, which helped out a lot. I wasn’t going into a clubhouse with a bunch of guys I didn’t know. It calmed me down a little bit, but at the same time, I didn’t really know what to expect.”
All nine of his strikeouts can be seen here, via MLB Pipeline:
Angels' Reid Detmers K's 9 in his Triple-A @SaltLakeBees debut! pic.twitter.com/W5R1cxP4DG
— MLB Pipeline (@MLBPipeline) July 25, 2021
Detmers has struck out 106 batters in just 60 innings of work this season at both levels. With Brandon Marsh now in the big leagues, Detmers easily becomes the Angels’ top prospect, and he has been skyrocketing up MLB prospect rankings in recent weeks.
It’s unclear exactly how much more time he’ll need before he gets the call to the Angels, but he’s looking to be the pro-ready prospect that he was advertised as when he was drafted.
Perry Minasian deciding on buying or selling at trade deadline
The Angels have a number of important decisions to make surrounding the MLB Trade Deadline, but only five days to do it. By July 30, they need to decide if they want to buy or sell, but general manager Perry Minasian may not take either approach. He said that he doesn’t classify the team as one or the other, but will simply see where the best deals are.