By Peyton Wesner
CINCINNATI---On November 19, 2012, the Miami Marlins obliterated their roster by shipping a bevy of veterans, including Jose Reyes, Mark Buehrle, and Josh Johnson, to Toronto for prospects Adeiny Hechavarria, Henderson Alvarez, Anthony Desclafani, and Justin Nicolino. The last two received by Miami faced off in the latter's Major League Debut this evening.
Tom Koehler was originally scheduled to start Saturday night's game against the Reds' Anthony Desclafani, but muscle spasms in his neck and back resulted in the promotion of the organization's third top prospect Justin Nicolino. Nicolino was 4-3 with an ERA of 2.87 in thirteen Triple-A starts for New Orleans and was seen by many to be ready for his call-up any day. It just happened that today was the day.
The task of pitching against the Reds would not be easy for the rookie as Cincinnati was coming in winners of three straight and starting all of their regulars. Nevertheless, Nicolino pitched very well Saturday night at Great American Ball Park by keeping runners out of scoring position and inducing double plays when the opposition reached base. A prime instance occurred in the bottom of the third inning as the Reds had runners on first and second, no outs with lead-off man Brandon Phillips at the plate. The left hander was able to get ahead in the count on the second baseman and throw him a 1-2 fastball that was hit to Hechavarria who started a 6-3 double play. Nicolino later walked back to the dugout with the score knotted at zero by retiring Joey Votto with a runner on third via the strikeout.
The Orlando, Florida, native getting out of his third inning jam without surrendering a run shifted momentum to the Marlins and in the top of the fourth it showed. The first to face DeSclafani in the inning was Derek Dietrich and he blasted a home run high into the right field bleachers for Miami's first run of the series and first hit of the game. With the homerun, the flood gates opened on Cincinnati starter and the Marlins took advantage. Next up was Christian Yelich who drilled a double to center prior to Giancarlo Stanton singling. After Marcell Ozuna flied out for out number one, production came from two unlikely sources: Justin Bour and J.T. Realmuto. Each was able to bring home one run apiece, which increased Miami's advantage to three heading to the home half of the fourth.
Run support was plentiful for Nicolino on Saturday as three innings later Derek Dietrich sent another ball to the right fielder bleachers for a home run, this time with one man on and off of Cincinnati's Manny Parra.
While the offense was clicking on all cylinders, the southpaw Nicolino continued to deal and was able to cause Bryan Peña and Eugenio Suarez to ground out into double plays in the fourth and seventh inning respectively to escape the innings unscathed.
Even though Justin Nicolino exited the game after seven innings, Cincinnati was still unable to plate any runs in the eighth against Carter Capps and the ninth against A.J. Ramos resulting in the Reds' winning streak coming to an end by scoring no runs in their fifth game of 2015.
Sunday in the rubber game, Cincinnati's manager Bryan Price will throw another rookie, Michael Lorenzen, against Miami's David Phelps. Both pitchers hope to continue personal winning streaks as Lorenzen tries to win consecutive starts for the first time in his career while Phelps looks for his third straight victory.
No comments:
Post a Comment