First-rounder Keoni Cavaco of Cedar Rapids Kernels hits the reset button

CEDAR RAPIDS — It’s called the Development List. For Keoni Cavaco, it might as well have just been called the Regroup List.

That’s essentially what the Cedar Rapids Kernels infielder did in late June and early July. He took some time off and tried to reset his 2023 season.

“I went home for a little bit, then went down to Florida,” Cavaco said Tuesday, prior to his team’s 12-9 win over Lansing at Veterans Memorial Stadium. “I just tried to simplify everything. Took some time off from thinking too much and then just worked on my swing.”

Any active, non-injured player can be placed on the Development List in minor league baseball. He can continue to be with his team, take batting practice, do fielding and throwing work, even serve as a base coach for games.

But he can’t play.

Guys on the Development List must remain there for at least seven days and must be reinstated to a club’s roster immediately at the conclusion of the season. A first-round draft pick of the parent Minnesota Twins in 2019, 13th overall, Cavaco really struggled the first three months for the Kernels and didn’t appear to be getting out of that struggle cycle.

So the Twins put him on the Development List on June 20. As Cavaco said, he went home to California for a couple of days to spend time with his family and get away from the game.

He was assigned July 7 to the Rookie-level Florida Complex League to get some games in, then sent back July 20 to Cedar Rapids.

“A positive thing, for sure,” Cavaco said. “I didn’t really feel the best about (how I was able to) perform this year. Just taking those three or four weeks off, not having to go out there and worry about playing, working on my swing was huge.”

Cavaco, 22, said the emphasis for him has been basic, starting with making more contact.

“Having low flight on my balls. Keeping everything more simple. Stop being more steep in my swing,” he said.

He had a hit in each of his first four games back with the Kernels. His batting average still is just .180 in 41 games overall for C.R., but he definitely is feeling better about things, and that’s a start.

The pressure on a first-rounder whose signing bonus was $4.05 million can be crushing when he’s not performing. Cavaco has felt a lot of that so far in his career, which thus far hasn’t lived up to expectations.

“But it’s something I can do,” he said. “I have to take it one day at a time. It’s just baseball, the same sport I’ve been playing since I was a kid. I’ve just got to keep playing and stop worrying about stuff so much.”

The Kernels are 59-38 overall, 18-12 in the Midwest League’s second half. They scored seven runs in the second inning in this high-scoring affair.

Noah Miller, Jorel Ortega and Misael Urbina each had two hits for C.R. Jacob Wilson, the parent Oakland Athletics’ first-round draft pick last month (sixth overall) played his first game for Lansing, doubling, being hit by a pitch and walking in three plate appearances before being removed from the game, which was planned.

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