Another bad day on the mound for Norfolk, but Henderson and Mayo had multiple hits on the day, and Heston Kjerstad keeps hitting Low-A pitching.
Triple-A: Lehigh Valley (Phillies) 10, Norfolk Tides 4
Going forward, we will hope for a lot better for DL Hall than 3.1 innings and 7 earned runs. Sunday’s contest started well enough, with GUNNAR HENDERSON (2-for-4) blasting off for a two-run home run ahead of a Dylan Harris RBI groundout and a Terrin Vavra RBI single. Jordan Westburg had a quiet 0-for-4 day, but Henderson is carrying a silly 1.124 OPS at this level.
The bad news: staked to a 4-0 lead, Hall allowed three consecutive hits to put the score at 4-2, and his fourth inning was just crappy: Hall walked two in a row, got a pop-out and then allowed a three-run home run. Then he walked two more and Cameron Bishop allowed everybody in. By the end of the fourth, Norfolk was in an execrable 9-4 hole. Sorry, DL Hall. It’d be good to cut down on the walks (five).
Double-A: Erie (Tigers) 12, Bowie Baysox 5
Oof. Another Sunday game, another starter belly flop: Garrett Stallings went 3.1 innings and allowed… erm, 10 earned runs on 11 hits and three home runs. It went down like this: with two outs in the first inning, Stallings (2-7, 10.08 ERA) allowed a single, walk, single, single, and then a single. 3-0 Erie. Then he gave up a single, homer and homer in the second. 6-0 Erie. In the fourth, he allowed a single, double, double and a home run. In total, 10 runs. Not a great day.
I guess the best that can be said is that, down 10-0, Bowie hitters refused to go quietly and still put up five runs. J.D. Mundy plated two on a two-run home run. In the sixth, Bowie loaded the bases on a HBP and two singles, and Chris Cespedes drove in one with a fielder’s choice and Mundy another on a sac fly. A.J. Graffanino homered in the ninth. That, plus a two-run double allowed by reliever Clayton McGinness, is how you end up with a 12-5 loss on Sunday. Best to move on…
High-A: Aberdeen IronBirds 9, Wilmington (Nationals) 3
That’s more like it: Jean Pinto (4.22 ERA) continued a trend in the right direction with four scoreless innings and five strikeouts. Houston Roth followed him and allowed three runs in three innings, but it wasn’t enough of a buzzkill to stop these IronBirds.
IronBirds hitters spread out 13 hits, and everybody reached once. Four IronBirds went deep: Coby Mayo, who had three hits, Connor Norby, with a two-run dinger in the seventh, and Isaac Bellony and Collin Burns, who each homered in the seventh (it was a seven-run seventh). A rehabbing Yusniel Díaz singled and scored.
Low-A: Lynchburg (Guardians) 6, Delmarva Shorebirds 4
A collective of Shorebirds pitchers got trounced, with Ryan Long somehow walking five in just 2.1 innings and allowing two to score. Angel Vargas threw 1.2 innings and allowed three runs. Alejandro Méndez threw three and allowed one run on three hits. The 18-year-old Yaqui Rivera threw two scoreless innings and struck out three. Hey, Yaqui!
Noelberth Romero supplied the bulk of the Shorebirds runs, with an RBI groundout and a two-run blast that scored Heston Kjerstad in the bottom of the seventh. As for that guy, he went 2-for-4 with a double, and carries a .422 average and 1.081 OPS. I wouldn’t expect to see him in Low-A for much longer…