Red Sox minor lines: And the system goes cold

Portland L 5-6

Andrew Benintendi: 0-4, K, SB

Aaron Wilkerson: 5 IP, 6 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 2 K
Williams Jerez: 2 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 1 K, 1 HR
Luis Ysla: 1 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 0 K

Salem L 3-5

Yoan Moncada: 0-3
Mauricio Dubon: 1-4
Nick Longhi: 0-4, K

Yankory Pimentel: 2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 2 K

Greenville L 2-3

Joseph Monge: 0-5, 2 K
Josh Ockimey: 0-3, 3 K
Austin Rei: 1-4

Roniel Raudes: 6 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 8 K

Well, that's a 2-for-27 day for the guys we're following as a whole. Ouch.

It's been a bit slow for a while now, really. Andrew Benintendi, obviously, is struggling to adjust to Double-A, where the curveballs flow freely. Deprived of his brother-in-bash, Yoan Moncada has seen his OPS drop 25 points over the last five games (though really for him it's less a question of playing poorly and more one of not living up to the extremely high bar he's set for himself). Rafael Devers still can't get it going, and Josh Ockimey is 5-for-29 in his last 10 games.

Obviously the pitching has had it's own problems too, with a plague of walks sweeping through the system. Roniel Raudes provides a brief reprieve from that today, thankfully, and is one of the few pitchers in the system having a purely positive year.

I don't mean to be doom-and-gloom here. It's just that Boston has one of baseball's strongest systems, and the first month-and-a-half of the year suggested they had more than just their top-4 guys to show off. It's unusual for such a well-stocked system would go through such a cold period all at once, but it does happen. We just have to hope that it doesn't last long.