Inside The Dodgers

Dodgers to Promote Prospect Acquired in Gavin Lux Trade

The Stockton Ports and the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes line up on the field at the start of the Ports’ home opener at the Stockton Ballpark in downtown Stockton on Apr. 8, 2025.
The Stockton Ports and the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes line up on the field at the start of the Ports’ home opener at the Stockton Ballpark in downtown Stockton on Apr. 8, 2025. | CLIFFORD OTO/THE STOCKTON RECORD / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

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Mike Sirota's first stint in Southern California did not last long. His next might not be far away, either.

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Sirota is being promoted from Class-A Rancho Cucamonga to advanced Class-A Great Lakes. Bruce Kuntz was first to report the news Tuesday on Twitter/X:

Sirota began the week as the California League leader in home runs (7), slugging percentage (.687) and OPS (1.130), while ranking second in batting average (.354), and fourth in runs scored (26) and OBP (.443).

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The Dodgers acquired Sirota from Cincinnati in the January trade that sent Gavin Lux to the Reds.

Sirota was ranked as the No. 14 prospect in the Reds system by MLB Pipeline at the time of the trade. Initially drafted by the Dodgers in the 16th round of the 2021 MLB Draft, he opted to play collegiately at Northeastern instead.

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In his three years with the Huskies, Sirota slashed .324/.457/.576 with 29 home runs and 111 RBIs. He set the school record for the most runs scored in a season (73) and most walks in a single season (59), a record once held by former major league first baseman Carlos Peña.

Cincinnati used its third-round draft pick on Sirota in the 2024 draft. He did not appear in a minor league game for a Reds affiliate after his college campaign ended, so his blistering April performance in Rancho Cucamonga marked the beginning of Sirota's professional career.

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Now he'll head to Great Lakes a month away from his 22nd birthday, a strong upward trajectory for a mostly unknown prospect.

Sirota's great uncle, Whitey Ford, won six World Series with the Yankees in the 1950s and ’60s and was selected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1974.

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“I grew up hanging around him and that side of the family a lot,” Sirota told NGM Magazine in March 2024. “I was always over at his house during the summer especially. We were very close.”

Ironically, Ford helped steer a young Sirota toward batting before he passed away in 2020.

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“He made sure that I kept a bat in my hands because he didn't want me to pitch because he messed up his shoulder,” Sirota told MLB.com in July 2024. “He made sure my mom kept the lacrosse stick out of my hand too.”

The choices seem to be paying off for Sirota. So too does the Dodgers' persistence in re-acquiring him over the winter.

For more Dodgers news, visit Dodgers on SI.


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J.P. Hoornstra
J.P. HOORNSTRA

J.P. Hoornstra is an On SI Contributor. A veteran of 20 years of sports coverage for daily newspapers in California, J.P. covered MLB, the Los Angeles Dodgers, and the Los Angeles Angels (occasionally of Anaheim) from 2012-23 for the Southern California News Group. His first book, The 50 Greatest Dodgers Games of All-Time, published in 2015. In 2016, he won an Associated Press Sports Editors award for breaking news coverage. He once recorded a keyboard solo on the same album as two of the original Doors.

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