The Minnesota Twins have named AAA Rochester Red Wings outfielder Jake Cave and AAA Rochester Red Wings right-handed pitcher Sean Poppen as Twins minor league Player and Pitcher of the Week.
Jake Cave as we all know has spent a good portion of the 2019 season with the Twins. Since being optioned from Minnesota in mid-May, the 26-year old Cave has played in 27 games for the Red Wings, hitting .294 (32-for-109) with 11 doubles, two triples, three home runs, 21 RBI and a .861 OPS. In eight games for the Red Wings this week, Cave hit .417 (15-for-36) with seven doubles, two triples, one home run and nine RBI, which included a four-double game on Thursday at Syracuse.
Jake Cave was originally a 2011 6th round pick by the New York Yankees and was selected by the Reds in the December 2015 Rule 5 draft but was returned to the NYY in April 2016. The Yankees then traded Cave to the Twins for minor leaguer Luis Gil on March 16, 2018.
Sean Poppen a 25-year old right-handed pitcher started two games this week for the Red Wings, going 1-0, 0.75 ERA (12.0 IP, 1 ER) with five walks and 13 strikeouts. Poppen was promoted to Rochester on May 26 and has appeared in four games and started three of them and has a 3-0 record with a 1.57 ERA with 25 strikeouts in 23 innings and has allowed just 14 hits in 23 innings. The numbers he has put up in Rochester are much better then the numbers he put up in AA Pensacola where he was 2-3 with a 4.40 ERA and a .275 average against.
Poppen, 6’3″ was selected by the Twins in the 19th round of the 2016 First-Year Player Draft out of Harvard and is in his fourth pro ball season.