Dodgers top prospect Josue De Paula has become major league stretch-run contributor over the last week and a half. But that followed a wonderful season in Double-A Tulsa, and on Monday he was named Texas League MVP.
De Paula with the Drillers hit .303/.401/.547 with a 145 wRC+, 27 home runs, 37 doubles, 106 runs scored, 104 RBI, and 31 stolen bases in 124 games. He set career highs across the board, including more than doubling his previous marks for home runs (previous high of 12) and extra-base hits (66, up from 30).
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He led the league in runs scored, RBI, hits, doubles, and was in top five in the league in OPS, slugging percentage, on-base percentage, batting average, home runs, stolen bases, total bases (274), and extra-base hits.
Also on Monday, Baseball America named De Paula as the Dodgers minor league player of the year.
De Paula hasn’t stopped producing since getting his first call-up to the majors, reaching base 18 times in 38 trips to the plate with his 10 walks more than doubling his four strikeouts, hitting .286/.474/.500 with three doubles and a home run in his first 10 games in the majors.
The Dodgers were loaded with outfield prospects this year, and the entire Texas League All-Star outfield were Tulsa Drillers, with Zyhir Hope — traded on August 2 to the Detroit Tigers in the Tarik Skubal deal — and Mike Sirota joining De Paula. Other Tulsa All-Stars were infielder Jake Gelof at designated hitter plus relief pitcher Nick Robertson.
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Eric Wedge was named Texas League manager of the year, the fifth Tulsa Drillers manager to capture the award, and the first since Tim Ireland in 2002 when Tulsa was a Texas Rangers affiliate. This honor comes 19 years after Wedge won American League manager of the year with Cleveland in 2007.
So far a Dodgers minor leaguer has won Most Valuable Player at all three full-season levels, with De Paula joining High-A Great Lakes outfielder Charles Davalan in the Midwest League and Class-A first baseman Ontario Easton Shelton in the California League. Whenever the Triple-A awards are announced, James Tibbs III has a good shot at winning Pacific Coast League MVP.
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