Twins prospect Simeon Woods Richardson off to a perfect start for Wichita Wind Surge
At the ripe age of 21, Wichita Wind Surge starting pitcher Simeon Woods Richardson sometimes feels like a veteran in minor league baseball.
He was only 17 when he became a professional baseball player after being drafted 48th overall by the New York Mets in the 2018 MLB Draft.
In the five years since, Woods Richardson has dealt with the frustrations of adjusting to a higher level of baseball, experienced the whirlwind of being included in two major trades at the MLB level and won a silver medal with Team USA at the Tokyo Olympics.
Woods Richardson believes all of those experiences have prepared him for what has been a dominant start to the 2022 season in Wichita. In fact, the 6-foot-3 right-hander leads every level of the minors with 16⅔ scoreless innings — a perfect 0.00 ERA spread across three starts for the Wind Surge.
“I’m just trying to stay in the moment the best I can,” said Woods Richardson, who tossed six more scoreless innings in Wednesday’s win over Midland. “It’s hard to do with my career and how fast-paced everything is, but just staying in the moment. (Rankings) are nice, but at the end of the day, I expect so much more from myself than other people.”
Woods Richardson is currently ranked as the No. 8 prospect in the Minnesota Twins’ farm system by MLB.com. Many scouting reports describe him as an extreme strike thrower, which was backed up by his ratio of 11.7 strikeouts per 9 innings in the 169 innings before he came to Wichita.
But in his three starts this season, Woods Richardson has just 14 strikeouts in 16-plus innings (7.6 strikeouts per 9 innings). He believes he is showcasing his ability to record outs without relying on making batters miss constantly.
“Honestly, I’m throwing the same stuff, it’s just my command is way better,” Woods Richardson said. “For me right now, it’s about repeating it and seeing how consistent I can get. That’s the biggest thing for me, consistency.”
No starting pitcher has been more consistent than Woods Richardson this season. After throwing 5⅔ scoreless innings in his season-opening start against Tulsa on April 9, he followed that up with no earned runs in five innings against Northwest Arkansas on April 15 and his most recent gem against Midland on Wednesday.
Woods Richardson has logged the most innings for a Wichita pitching staff that leads the Texas League in earned run average, which has been the backbone of the team’s 7-game winning streak continued with a 15-1 victory over Midland on Thursday. After an 0-5 start, the Wind Surge (7-5) are just one game out of the top spot in the Texas League North Double-A standings.
“It feels good because that means all of my hard work I’ve been putting in is actually paying off,” Woods Richardson said. “But I can’t do anything unless I have eight great guys around me doing the same thing. When those guys want to run through a brick wall for you and have great energy in the locker room and want to win and play like they want to win, that makes my job a whole lot easier.”
Two experiences have also helped instill Woods Richardson with confidence.
The first was when he was included on the Team USA Olympic roster and was able to spend time with former major-league pitchers like Scott Kazmir, Edwin Jackson and David Robertson.
“That was a once-in-a-lifetime experience,” Woods Richardson said. “The biggest thing for me was being able to pick guys’ brain. We had guys who had thrown no-hitters, guys that played 17 years in the big leagues. Then you had guys like me, who haven’t even started yet. We had time to sit down and be like, ‘Hey man, what is this? What is that?’ You can just talk baseball with them and I wanted to be a sponge.”
Because Woods Richardson was not included on the Twins’ 40-man roster, the second experience arose when he was able to travel to spring training in Fort Myers, Florida early and receive extended time and feedback from coaches in the Twins’ organization during the MLB lockout. He appeared in one spring training game, tossing two scoreless innings with two strikeouts.
Woods Richardson said the mentality he established down in Florida during spring training is the one that has carried over to Wichita. He hopes that same mentality can earn him a promotion to the major leagues with the Twins at some point this season.
“It was so nice down at spring training because I could focus on just one thing every day,” Woods Richardson said. “I could take that one thing and work at it all day. I was able to simplify it and that was huge. Now my main focus is on staying consistent. How can I repeat the same arm delivery and repeat what I’m feeling every day? That’s big for what I’m doing right now.”
This story was originally published April 22, 2022 at 6:00 AM.
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