A’s No. 1 prospect Soderstrom headlines Lugnuts’ 2022 roster

LANSING, Mich. – No April fooling: The Oakland Athletics’ No. 1 prospect, catcher Tyler Soderstrom, will headline the Lansing Lugnuts’ 30-player Opening Day roster, the Nuts announced Friday.

Soderstrom, 20, is rated the No. 56 overall prospect in baseball after batting .309/.390/.568 in 57 games for the Low-A Stockton Ports in 2021 and appearing in the MLB Futures Game. The son of former San Franciso Giants pitcher Steve Soderstrom, he was selected 26th overall in 2020 from Turlock High School (Turlock, Calif.).

Tyler Soderstrom is one of five of MLB Pipeline’s Top 30 Athletics prospects on the Lugnuts’ roster, joining 19-year-old outfielder Brayan Buelvas (No. 10), the youngest player on the team; 19-year-old Euribiel Ángeles (No. 11), pitcher Joey Estes (No. 19), first baseman/outfielder Lawrence Butler (No. 21); and pitcher Jeff Criswell (No. 22).

Both Butler and Criswell were members of the 2021 Lugnuts, with Butler named the final 2021 High-A Player of the Week after hitting 11-for-22 with two walks in the season’s final six games. The duo is part of a contingent of 12 Nuts returning from last season, accompanying outfielders Lazaro Armenteros, Austin Beck and Jonny Butler; infielders Brett Harris, Patrick McColl and Drew Swift; catcher Jared McDonald;and pitchers Osvaldo Berrios, Stevie Emanuels and David Leal.

Announced on the same day as the World Cup Draw, the 2022 Lugnuts will include players representing Colombia (Buelvas), Brazil (outfielder Gabriel Maciel), Panama (infielder Joshwan Wright), Cuba (Armenteros and pitcher Diego Granado) and Venezuela (pitcher Angello Infante), as well as 14 states and Puerto Rico (Berrios).

The starting rotation is expected to comprise Estes, who was acquired from Atlanta in a four-player package for Matt Olson; Criswell, a native of Portage, Mich., who pitched at the University of Michigan; Emanuels, the A’s fifth-round pick in 2020; southpaw Hogan Harris, Oakland’s third-round selection in 2018; Grant Holman, taken by the A’s in the sixth round in 2021; and Jake Walkinshaw, a 36th-round draftee from Southern New Hampshire in 2019 who ascended to become the ace of Stockton’s rotation by the end of 2021.

Berrios, Granado, Infante and Leal are expected to join fellow 2021 Ports Edward Baram, Joe DeMers, Trayson Kubo, Daniel Martinez and Yale product Kumar Nambiar in the Lugnuts’ bullpen.

The roster includes three catchers in Soderstrom, McDonald and Matt Cross, who played at three different levels in 2021 and bashed a home run over 460 feet with Stockton.

Ángeles (acquired via trade with San Diego shortly before the season for Sean Manaea), Harris, McColl, Swift and Wright are joined in the infield by Jack Winkler, drafted in the tenth round in 2021 from San Francisco.

Lastly, the six Lugnuts who will share outfield duties – Armenteros, Beck, Buelvas, the two Butlers and Maciel – will supply both power and speed, led by Lawrence Butler’s combined 29 steals and 19 home runs in 2021. The switch-hitting Maciel, selected from the Twins in the Rule 5 MiLB draft, only hit two home runs with Cedar Rapids in 2021, but one was a walk-off grand slam against a man who is now his teammate in David Leal.

Headed by first-year manager Phil Pohl, who served as Athletics bullpen catcher from 2016-2021, the 2022 Lugnuts will open up play at Jackson® Field™ against the Michigan State Spartans on Wednesday, April 6, in the Crosstown Showdown presented by Delta Dental, followed by Opening Day on Friday, April 8.

Tickets are available for purchase at the stadium box office, online at lansinglugnuts.com and by calling (517) 485-4500.

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