Cleveland Indians Minor League Player of the Week: April 14 - April 20

It was a tight race last week, but 2016 fifth-round draft pick Conner Capel, the only prep position player from last year’s draft to make the full-season Lake County club, walked away with POTW honors after earning 35 percent of the vote.

Without further ado, here are the Tribe's top performers from the past week:

Emmanuel Tapia (A, 1B) - .421/.450/.737

A 21-year old slugger out of the Dominican Republic, Tapia got off to a very slow start in his first taste of full season ball, batting will below the Mendoza line, but that all changed this past week.

Tapia blasted of with a multi-hit game and a home run, then exploded on Tuesday's 17-5 win with a 4-4 game and another home run. It seems he's really starting to settle in now.

Jose Medina (A, Util) - .455/.500/1.090

It's not often that one game is good enough to earn someone a player of the week nomination but utility man Jose Medina had such an insane game, one he'll probably never be able replicate again the rest of his career, that he more than qualified.

Medina had four hits, three of them home runs and the other a double, all in the same game. That's almost Chisenhall-esque. He only had one hit in his other two games combined but his stats for the week are still skewed off the charts.

Shane Bieber (A, RHP) - 1.50 ERA, 9.8 K/9, 1.08 WHIP

Fans might be coming down with a case of Bieber fever of the 2016 fourth round draft pick can continue pitching as well as he's been.

Bieber set a career high with 11 strikeouts earlier this past week in just six innings of work while giving up one run.

He had a similar yet vastly different performance last night, lasting six innings and giving up just one run, but only struck out two while dancing around nine hits allowed.

Bieber throws a ton of strikes, so he'll be susceptible to giving up a good chunk of hits, but he makes up for it by not walking batters, as he had zero walks in both starts combined.

Dorssys Paulino (AA, OF) - .450/.476/.750

Once considered a top 100 overall prospect in the major leagues, Dorssys Paulino lost a ton of his luster after he stalled out repeatedly in A-ball.

Paulino was promoted randomly mid-season 2015 and something finally clicked as he started hitting again. His power showed up this past week with a pair of home runs.

Despite being in the system for what feels like forever, Paulino is still just 22 years old and is currently torching opposing pitchers in Double-A. He could have some value yet.

Tyler Krieger (AA, 2B) - .444/.473/.667

A 2014 fourth round draft pick, Tyler Krieger made up for lost time with a great 2016 season and after beginning 2015 in Single-A Lake County, he debuted this year with Double-A Akron, and he’s continuing to absolutely rake.

Over the course of four games for Akron this past week, Krieger went 8-18 at the dish with a home run, a double while scoring four runs and knocking in three. He’s going to force the Tribe brass to make some tough decisions in the next two years if he can continue to pound baseballs at anything even close to this rate.

Erik Kratz (AAA, C) - .583/.583/1.500

Erik Kratz, a 36-year old journeyman catcher, only played three games for Columbus this past week, but boy were those games insanely impressive. Kratz racked up seven hits in 12 at bats, five for extra bases including three home runs, one in each game he played this past week for the Clippers, good for an unbelievable 1.500 slugging percentage.

Kratz has spent time in the major leagues in each of the past six seasons, so if he can keep hitting anywhere even close to this and if Yan Gomes and Roberto Perez keep struggling offensively, he might earn some playing time on the big league clup

Previous Winners

Conner Capel (Week of 4/6-4/13)