The other player to make his Major League debut this year was pretty special. Maikel Garcia became the first member of the Royals’ farm system to make his way from Columbia to the show. The 22-year-old played for the Fireflies last season and has bounced between the Majors and Omaha since making his debut July 15 in Toronto. In seven games at the big league level, Garcia has kept his contact-first mentality at the plate, going 7-for-20 with one double. Garcia has entered the conversation of regularly joining the talented, young infield that the Royals have.
While not yet at the Majors, young phenom, Ronnie Mauricio has been on an absolute tear this season with the Binghamton Rumble Ponies. The shortstop has added some muscle, which has allowed him to add a lot of power while still in his early 20s. The Dominican native turned 21 the first week of the season and for the second straight year, he has launched 20 homers. This year, in 13 less games played than last year (95 in 2022 so far) he has clubbed 21 bombs while driving in 69 RBI. Last year, 100 of the 108 games Mauricio played were in Brooklyn in Advanced-A. Mauricio is on pace to play 100+ games for the thing-consecutive year, he has swiped a career-high 14 bases and has a chance to be named an Eastern League All-Star or even Player of the Year this season. He currently ranks 7th in homers and doubles in the circuit and has the second-most RBI in the Eastern League, trailing just Quincy Nieporte of the Erie Seawolves. Mauricio has 96 total hits, which is 30 shy of his career-high 126, which he had in 116 games in Columbia in 2019. One final update to add to the list is a player who has been in the Majors for a few years, but is now experiencing an incredible amount of success: Andres Gimenez. Gimenez became the first former Fireflies player to earn MLB All-Star honors this year for his work with the Cleveland Guardians. After getting the nod to start the game at second base, he made an incredible play behind the bag at second during the Summer Classic for fans to see just how talented he is. Gimenez has played a career-high 102 games this season for Cleveland and is hitting above .300 (.307) for the first time in his career since he was in the Dominican Summer League in 2016. He played 92 games for the Fireflies in 2017 (primarily at shortstop) and he hit .265 at the plate. The infielder has launched a career-high 12 homers this season. Gimenez has also been hailed as one of the most clutch players in baseball this season. He has 17 hits in late and close games this season, which is the sixth-most in the Majors. Andrew Benintendi leads the circuit with 20-such hits. There are certainly a lot of positive things going on for current and former Fireflies. For all of the most up-to-date news on Fireflies players, visit ColumbiaFireflies.com.
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