Minor League Player of the Day: Brayden Smith

The Cardinal Chronicle
Minor League Player of the Day: Brayden Smith
St. Louis, MO
By Ray Mileur

Brayden Smith helped turn a bad first inning into a Palm Beach runaway.

Smith is The Cardinal Chronicle’s Minor League Player of the Day after going 3-for-4 with two home runs and five RBIs in the Cardinals’ 16-6 win over the Bradenton Marauders on Tuesday night.

Palm Beach fell behind 5-0 in the top of the first inning.

Smith started the answer almost immediately.

In the bottom of the first, he hit a two-run home run to cut the deficit to 5-2 and give the Cardinals some life before the game had a chance to get away. That swing mattered. When a club falls behind by five runs early, the next few innings usually decide whether the night becomes a fight or a loss that gets written off quickly.

Smith made it a fight.

Then he kept going.

In the fourth inning, Smith led off with his second home run of the game, his sixth of the season. That swing helped start the inning that fully changed the game. Matthew Miura walked, Ian Petrutz followed with a two-run homer to tie it, Yordalin Peña tripled, and Alex Birge doubled him home to give Palm Beach the lead.

By then, the Cardinals had erased the entire five-run hole.

In the fifth, Palm Beach blew the game open with an eight-run inning, and Smith added another RBI with a sacrifice fly. That gave him five RBIs on the night and capped one of his best games of the season.

That is run production.

That is timing.

That is a player helping change the direction of a game.

The final line says plenty by itself: three hits, two home runs and five RBIs. But the situation gives it more weight. Smith did not do his damage in a game Palm Beach controlled from the beginning. He helped the Cardinals climb out of an early mess and then helped turn the game into a blowout.

That is the difference between a good box score and an impact game.

Matt Koperniak deserves strong mention after driving in three runs for Memphis, including a two-run single in the 10th inning of the Redbirds’ 8-3 win over Jacksonville. Leo Bernal and Ramón Mendoza each had three hits for Memphis, and Jesús Báez deserves mention after going 2-for-4 in his Double-A debut for Springfield.

But Smith had the biggest offensive line of the day.

Two home runs.

Five RBIs.

A comeback win.

That earns the honor.

Old School Take

There are nights when one swing changes the mood.

Brayden Smith gave Palm Beach two of them.

The Cardinals were down 5-0 in the first inning, and Smith helped drag them right back into the game. Then he homered again, drove in five runs total, and helped turn a rough start into a 16-6 win.

That is impact.

That is why Brayden Smith is The Cardinal Chronicle Minor League Player of the Day.

The Cardinal Chronicle, in association with Gateway Sports & MiLB Today
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Photo Credit: Brayden Smith, Palm Beach Cardinals |  MLB