Guest Post

Hello all who read, as you know from reading the last post, there is no TY baseball until next Tuesday. Very sad, but how lucky are you to get a great breakdown of the Charleston RiverDogs game that happened this afternoon against the Lakewood BlueClaws? Doreen went to the game this morning and was gracious enough to share her experience and do a guest post on her recap of the game, with pictures :)

So without further ado, here is Tales From Tampa's first guest post:

Last season was the first time I went to minor league game by myself.  I went to Lakewood to see the Charleston River Dogs play the Blue Claws and was treated to an amazing pitching performance by Graham Stoneburner.  At the time, I really didn’t have any particular players to watch, so it was a good opportunity to take it all in in a very general way.

I enjoyed my solo trip to the ballpark so much that as soon as the Trenton Thunder and Lakewood Blue Claws schedules came out the first thing I did was to mark my calendar with the morning starts.   I was hoping the River Dogs would be included, and they were, to my delight. 

Today’s starting pitcher for the River Dogs was Zach Nuding.  I knew nothing about him, and had read his name only once in passing.  But unlike last season, this year I had a short list of players I wanted to see:  Slade Heathcott, J.R. Murphy and Gary Sanchez.  I had wanted to see Sanchez catch, but he DH’d this game with Murphy doing the honors behind the plate.  None of these players disappointed, and I also came away with some curiosity on Ramon Flores and the three pitchers used in this game, Nuding, Kahnle and Barreda.

It was a well-played game.  No errors, no one looking like they didn’t belong on a professional ballfield. 

Nuding pitched a very solid six innings.  He showed signs of tiring in the seventh inning, in which he surrendered 4 hits and one run, but completed the inning.

Zach Nuding throwing his first pitch of the game

The Blue Claws could not tee up against Nuding, though he only struck out 2, one in the 5^th and the second in the 7^th.  He did not walk anyone.  He was very efficient and economical. Most of his outs were fly balls (some deep, but not problematic) and pop ups.  He really had the game in hand.  He threw mostly upper 80’s, but hit an occasional 90-91.  Lakewood has a box out in right-center field with the radar readings.  I have no idea how accurate they are.  They showed him hitting 95 once in the 7^th, his last inning, but his fastest to that point was 92 back in the 4^th.

Nuding throws well, but obviously, he’s not overpowering.  He did not throw a lot of pitches, either, until that 7^th inning.  Unlike his earlier innings, the balls hit off him were hard hit line drives.

At the very least, Nuding made me curious to find out more about him.  On first blush, he seems to be an extreme fly ball pitcher, who can handcuff batters with his stuff, who is not overpowering, but gets outs in an economical fashion.

Tommy Kahnle

He was relieved by Thomas Kahnle, who definitely threw some hard stuff.  He was consistently in the low to mid-90s.  He went to some deep counts, but only walked one.  His motion didn’t seem very smooth.  He didn’t impress me except for being able to hit 94 and 95.  Again, I’d like to find out more about this guy. 

Manny Barreda pitched the ninth.   He is small like the other Manny - Banuelos, but right-handed.  He had a smooth motion with a long stride.  Low 90s upper 80s and looked like he had some breaking stuff.  He had a 1-2-3 ninth that was easy except for his first batter, who had a six-pitch at-bat.

Manny Barreda

Nuding gave Heathcott a lot of work out in center field.  5 chances in 5 innings.  4 were routine high fly balls to center, but one required a diving catch, and Heathcott did a good job, looked good and in control.  Looked like he had no problem tracking the ball.   Heathcott had two hits in today’s game.  One was a solid double in the first inning.  The second hit fell between the infielders on the left side of the infield for a single. However, he was caught stealing by a lot – in fact, in was tagged out standing up about 2/3 of the way there.   He also walked once.

Slade Heathcott batting

Heathcott on 2nd after hitting a double

Murphy didn’t have anything out of the ordinary to do behind the plate today.  He looks fine there, but he really is not built like a catcher. Offensively, he was solid. He had a first inning double which drove in Heathcott with Charleston’s first run.  He got two more singles to round out his day.

JR Murphy Catching

Sanchez only had one hit today, and struck out twice. But he hit a loooooong foul ball to left field that I think the kids are still chasing down.  He grounded out twice, hitting the ball hard each time.  By the way, if I didn’t know Sanchez was a teenager still, I wouldn’t believe you if you told me he was, based on his build.  He’s really quite nicely filled out.  He was the DH today.

Gary Sanchez 

Jose Mojica is the shortshop.  He came up in the 4^th with the bases loaded and one out. He had a hard-hit line drive double driving in two runs. He’s a skinny kid, and I was impressed he hit the ball as hard as he did in that situation.  I didn’t expect much there.

Jose Mojica

Flores, the left fielder, impressed me as a guy who may have some speed.

The Riverdogs broke through in the 4^th inning and I was not surprised.  The Blue Claws’ starting pitcher, Jesse Biddle, was throwing a ton of pitches, and I knew it was just a matter of time. .  It was a great inning, where they batted around – 5 runs on 5 hits and 2 walks.

Bases loaded with Riverdogs

After the 4^th, the game was pretty uneventful until Nuding tired in the 7^th.  The game was always well in hand. 

There was one really heads-up play in the bottom of the 7^th.  The Blue Claws had a runner on 1^st.  The next batter hit a line drive single to left center, and the runner going from first to second overran second base.  Flores, the left fielder, threw the ball to second baseman (Anderson Feliz), who tagged the runner before he could get back. 

There was a play at the plate the same inning, and the ball got past Murphy, but Nuding nicely backed up the play and held the runner at third base, preventing a second run from scoring.

And for the minor-league purists, the most important news of the day, Mr. Egg was the winner in the Egg, Pork Roll and Cheese Race Around the Bases!!

Charleston Wins!!

Final Score: RiverDogs - 6 / BlueClaws  - 2

I am looking forward to next week, when I go to see the Trenton Thunder play Breakfast Baseball!!


Well I hope you enjoyed the first guest post on my blog. If any of you go to a Yankees minor league game and want to guest post, just let me know. And a big thanks to Doreen for sharing her game recap on here.