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Speaker 1: Happy Memorial Day, Marlins fans, Welcome to a new edition

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Speaker 1: of Big Fish Small Pod here on the Fish on

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Speaker 1: First Podcast channel, presented by MPT College Consulting. I'm Eli Sussman.

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Speaker 1: This Monday, just even as a holiday, like any other Monday,

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Speaker 1: going through my Marlins prospect spotlight, picking out a different

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Speaker 1: player from each of the Marlins full season affiliates. Who

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Speaker 1: is someone that is recently performing in a way that

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Speaker 1: has caught my attention and I think is worthy of

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Speaker 1: your attention if you want to have a really detailed

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Speaker 1: understanding of what's going on throughout the Marlins org, Let's

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Speaker 1: start with Triple A Jacksonville Griffin Conine. Very familiar name

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Speaker 1: should be Is Conine has been in this Marlins organization

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Speaker 1: for almost four four years, coming over from the Blue

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Speaker 1: Jays in the Jonathan vr trade back in twenty twenty.

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Speaker 1: Obviously the son of mister Marlin, awfully close to becoming

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Speaker 1: a Marlin himself at the major league level. Co nine

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Speaker 1: has been a streaky hitter, I would say, throughout his

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Speaker 1: entire Marlin's minor league career, and he is in the

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Speaker 1: middle of one of those hot streaks lately over the

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Speaker 1: last three series the last three weeks with Jacksonville Ops

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Speaker 1: of ten fifteen over one thousand OPS, with ten extra

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Speaker 1: base hits in those eighteen games. He settled in as

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Speaker 1: their everyday right fielder in Jacksonville. Occasional DH spots when

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Speaker 1: they want to get somebody else defensive reps, but that

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Speaker 1: is basically his full time home when he is in

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Speaker 1: the field, and he certainly has the arm strength that

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Speaker 1: you expect from a right fielder. Is overall slash line

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Speaker 1: this year two thirty seven, batting average, three forty nine

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Speaker 1: on base, four sixty six slugging. It's almost perfectly aligned

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Speaker 1: with what he's done throughout his minor league career, which

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Speaker 1: it is a very good slash line overall. And what

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Speaker 1: stands out to me overall this year also is how

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Speaker 1: he's performing against lefties As a left handed hitter. He's

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Speaker 1: someone at times who's really struggled went out of platoon advantage,

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Speaker 1: and this year it's been more competitive. I mean, his

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Speaker 1: batting average is a lot higher against lefties and righties

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Speaker 1: two seventy five. There's not much over the fence power

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Speaker 1: from that side. All that is coming against righties, but

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Speaker 1: still a slash line that gets him an ops right

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Speaker 1: around seven hundred against lefties, so that's promising compared to

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Speaker 1: at the end of last season when he was being

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Speaker 1: platooned pretty heavily in Jacksonville. The reason why he is

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Speaker 1: not a fish on first top thirty prospect, and you

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Speaker 1: know there has he hasn't really been in the spotlight

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Speaker 1: much at all recently, is because his persistent strikeout issues

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Speaker 1: throughout his whole career just leads to a lot of

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Speaker 1: pessimism about what he's going to look like against the

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Speaker 1: highest caliber of pitching if he has enough trouble putting

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Speaker 1: the bat on the ball in the minors. This year

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Speaker 1: strikeout rate twenty nine point eight percent, which is actually

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Speaker 1: his lowest since short season ball. It is still bad,

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Speaker 1: it's still significantly worse than the league average, but it's

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Speaker 1: a significant improvement compared to thirty eight point five percent

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Speaker 1: in his first taste of TRIPAA in twenty twenty three.

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Speaker 1: Somebody do keep an eye on moving forward. Even if

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Speaker 1: he's not a high priority guy, he is really building

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Speaker 1: a compelling case to at least get a taste of

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Speaker 1: the big leagues as a second generation Marlin. Moving down

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Speaker 1: to double A Pensacola Nathan Martarella. Of course, you don't

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Speaker 1: need a long memory to know that he was acquired

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Speaker 1: in the Luis Aarriz trade. By most people's accounting, the

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Speaker 1: third piece in that deal, and that is how we

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Speaker 1: have him ranked on fish On First. We have him

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Speaker 1: at the number nine prospect overall in this org after

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Speaker 1: coming over in that deal earlier this month. And I've

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Speaker 1: said in previous episodes of this that it's not only

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Speaker 1: going to be highlighting guys that are doing well, just

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Speaker 1: guys that are interesting for one reason or another. And

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Speaker 1: in Martarella's case, he has drawn my attention because of

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Speaker 1: how much he is slumping at the plate. Before getting

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Speaker 1: into that one to quickly notice, note that the surprising

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Speaker 1: part to me is how he's playing more left field

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Speaker 1: than first base through eighteen games in this organization, eleven

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Speaker 1: starts in left field versus seven at first base. For

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Speaker 1: a guy that moving forward eventually in the major leagues,

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Speaker 1: we think he's going to be pretty much only first

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Speaker 1: base DH But the Marlins, at least the way that

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Speaker 1: the Blue Waho's roster is assembled right now, getting him

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Speaker 1: a surprising amount of reps in the outfield. So he

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Speaker 1: got off to a decent start with his ORG during

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Speaker 1: that first series he played, and since then he has

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Speaker 1: really been in a deep slump. Three hits in his

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Speaker 1: last forty at bats for Martorella overall since the trade,

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Speaker 1: only two walks versus eighteen strikeouts. It's an awful ratio,

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Speaker 1: and it's shocking because he was at the double A

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Speaker 1: level with the Padres and he had nearly as many

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Speaker 1: walks as strikeouts before the trade, So that is eyebrow raising.

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Speaker 1: And what also sticks out he has the lowest ground

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Speaker 1: ball rate in the Marlins org. Guys with as much

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Speaker 1: playing time as him. He only hits it on the

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Speaker 1: ground about twenty five percent of the time, and he

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Speaker 1: also pulls the ball about as consistently as anybody. He

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Speaker 1: only goes to the opposite field seventeen percent of the time.

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Speaker 1: So you'd think that combination would lend itself to quite

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Speaker 1: a bit of slugging, and it hasn't. He still had

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Speaker 1: not hit a home run for this Marlins organization. He's

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Speaker 1: only driven in the two runs total in those eighteen games. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so really uh troubling start for Martorella so far, but

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Speaker 1: understandably he's gonna be playing every single day. They're moving

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Speaker 1: forward to shake out of it. I will keep you

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Speaker 1: updated on how he progresses moving forward, now going to

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Speaker 1: High A Beloite on the pitching side relief pitching side

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Speaker 1: right hinder Nigel Belgrave. He was a twenty twenty three

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Speaker 1: draft pick of the Marlins last year, and his performance

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Speaker 1: simply earns him a mention across both levels. He's been

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Speaker 1: terrific at preventing rounds a one point one one ERA

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Speaker 1: this season, roll points seventy four, whip in twenty four

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Speaker 1: in the third endings, which have been almost evenly split

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Speaker 1: between Jupiter and now High A Beloit. He really has

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Speaker 1: not skipped a beat since moving up. What stands out

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Speaker 1: most about Belgrave is his slider. I think you have

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Speaker 1: to give it at this point a seventy grade A

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Speaker 1: plus plus slider that Bellgrave has just a really unique

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Speaker 1: shape with how much it moves and how late it

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Speaker 1: moves in the low eighties. A nice differential between that

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Speaker 1: and his fastball at ninety two, ninety three, ninety four.

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Speaker 1: It's been awesome. It's been especially dominant against right handed hitters,

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Speaker 1: holding them to not just a one to oh seven

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Speaker 1: batting average, but a one to seven slugging He has

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Speaker 1: not given up a single extra base hit against a

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Speaker 1: right handed batter so far this season. With Belgrave, I

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Speaker 1: mentioned the whip. It's the combination of being unhittable and

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Speaker 1: also throwing strikes and having a standout secondary pitch. The

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Speaker 1: way that he has it checks all the boxes of

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Speaker 1: somebody that can move extremely quickly through this Marlins organization.

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Speaker 1: I would not be surprised at all if Belgrave finishes

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty four at the Double A level and if

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Speaker 1: he's somebody that maybe pushes for a non roster invite

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Speaker 1: to spring training next year as he really flies up

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Speaker 1: this Marlins farm system. So it's only a reliever, not

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Speaker 1: going to change your entire franchise, but still as a

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Speaker 1: guy that you got on the third day of the

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Speaker 1: draft made a relatively modest investment in it is extremely

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Speaker 1: encouraging what we're seeing from Nigel Belgrave and how that

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Speaker 1: potentially could translate to the highest levels of the miners

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Speaker 1: and in the not too distant future, even at the

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Speaker 1: major league level. We wrap up this show with low

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Speaker 1: a Jupiter outfielder Colby Shade. Like Belgrave, a twenty twenty

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Speaker 1: three Marlin's draft pick, he was taken a little bit

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Speaker 1: earlier than Belgrave was. He's been the everyday center fielder

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Speaker 1: for the Jupiter Hammerheads for most of the season. Early on,

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Speaker 1: they promote did Mark Coley the second Jake Delo, and

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Speaker 1: that has left them with a really thin outfield, so

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Speaker 1: Shade has stepped in as that every day center fieldser

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Speaker 1: are down there. This team as a whole, offensively, it

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Speaker 1: has been brutal to watch. We're not going to sugarcoat that.

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Speaker 1: It's hard to find a bright spot on this Jupiter team.

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Speaker 1: I touched on Ryan Ignafo a couple weeks ago, and

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Speaker 1: it's really him and Colby Shade that are doing the

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Speaker 1: heavy lifting at the plate offensively. With him, Shade has

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Speaker 1: his base running just really stood out as well, sixteen

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Speaker 1: steals and only caught one time, which made me realize

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Speaker 1: that Jupiter as a hole. They have stolen one hundred

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Speaker 1: and six bases in forty five games. That is far

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Speaker 1: and away more than any other low AID team. I

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Speaker 1: didn't have the time to look it up, but I

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Speaker 1: think that might be the highest total in all of

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Speaker 1: the miners so far this year. It's a big reason

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Speaker 1: why they are outperforming their run differential and out forming

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Speaker 1: their talent level to be frank and honest, and he

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Speaker 1: is a right at the forefront of that. Two home

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Speaker 1: runs so far this year while playing almost every day

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Speaker 1: in one hundred and fifty played appearances. That doesn't sound

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Speaker 1: like much, but it is tied for the team lead.

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Speaker 1: Nobody on Jupiter is more than two home runs so

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Speaker 1: far this season. Yeah, so that has been a pretty

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Speaker 1: brutal I can't promise more uplifting stories when we go

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Speaker 1: to other Jupiter prospects on the Spotlight in future weeks,

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Speaker 1: but at least for now Colby Shade. He is holding

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Speaker 1: it down as a center fielder, so I expect him

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Speaker 1: to be at that level for most of this year,

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Speaker 1: but potentially by the end move himself up to beloit

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Speaker 1: if he keeps performing as this well rounded player for

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Speaker 1: the Hammerheads. Griffin Conine, Nathan Martarella, Nigel Belgrave, and Colby Shade.

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Speaker 1: Those are the prospects in the spotlight this week here

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Speaker 1: on Big Fish Small Pod once again wishing you guys

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Speaker 1: a happy Memorial Day. From the Fish on first podcast channel.

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Speaker 1: We're presented by MPT College Consulting. Check them out Mptcollegeconsulting

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Speaker 1: dot com to learn more about their services and schedule

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Speaker 1: a free consultation. Hope you enjoy the rest of our

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Speaker 1: coverage this week. Still a whole lot in store for you.

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Speaker 1: Want fish on first dot com. We appreciate the support.

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Speaker 1: Go fish