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May 27 Game Notes: Iowa vs. St. Paul

May 27, 2021 - International League (IL)
Iowa Cubs News Release


IOWA CUBS (9-9) vs ST. PAUL SAINTS (9-11)

Thursday - 7:08 PM - Principal Park - Des Moines, IA

RHP Adrian Sampson (0-0, 7.94) vs. RHP Jhoan Duran (0-0, 3.00)

TONIGHT'S GAME: The I-Cubs look to break their season-long four game losing streak tonight against St. Paul. The Saints will send out top prospect, righty Jhoan Duran to the mound to face off against Adrian Sampson for Iowa in game three of six between the two teams.

QUALITY KOHL: Despite taking the loss, Kohl Stewart recorded his second straight quality start this season in yesterday's game. Stewart tossed six innings, allowing three earned runs on just five hits. He allowed one free pass and struck out six Saints batters. With two quality starts in his last two outings, the righty is now responsible for half of the I-Cubs' four quality starts this season. Stewart has allowed no more than five hits in all four of his starts and has tossed at least five innings in each outing this year.

SOUTHPAW STRUGGLES CONTINUE: Iowa continues to struggle against left-handed pitchers, now 0-3 on the year when facing a lefty. Yesterday, Charlie Barnes took the hill for St. Paul and threw seven innings on one-run ball against Iowa, completely shutting down their offense. The I-Cubs are hitting just .200 (47-for-244) against lefties, compared to .259 (111-for-429) against righties. In just under half of the at-bats, Iowa has over three times the amount of doubles against righties (28) than they do against lefties (9) and nearly triple the amount of runs batted in when facing a righty (75) compared to facing a lefty (27).

GET BACK ON TRACK: After winning four straight games to move to 9-5, the I-Cubs have now lost four straight games, falling back to .500. The script for Iowa has completely flipped since Saturday, May 22. On their four-game win streak from May 16 to May 21, Iowa outscored their opponents by 22 runs. May 22 started the four-game skid and since then, the I-Cubs have been outscored by 20 runs. Iowa's pitching staff had not given up more than six runs in a game this season, before they gave up eight (five in the ninth inning) to Omaha on Friday night. Since that game, they have surrendered seven or more runs in three of their last four games.

ON-BASE MACHINE: Sergio Alcántara recorded two more hits yesterday against St. Paul, giving him 20 hits in the 18 games he has played for Iowa this year. With the two hits, the infielder extended his hitting streak to a season-long eight games, tying the longest hitting streak for the team this year, set by Abiatal Avelino on May 5-May 14. Alcantara has been all you could ask for as a leadoff hitter, owning a high batting average and getting on base anyway he can for the middle of the lineup. The infielder ranks in the top-ten in the Triple-A East in three key categories. He owns a .364 (20-for-55) batting average (7th), has walked 15 times (2nd) and has an on-base percentage of .500 (2nd).

RYAN IS DEALING: Kyle Ryan threw 1.2 scoreless innings yesterday, while striking out three batters and allowed just one batter to reach base via a free pass. Ryan played three games with Chicago from April 23 to May 5. Over that span, the lefty threw 2.2 innings, allowing one run on five hits while walking two and striking out two batters. After getting designated for assignment on May 7, Ryan was outrighted and joined Iowa on May 11. Since then, he has played in five games with the I-Cubs and has yet to allow a run to score. Ryan has tossed 6.2 innings, allowing just one hit and one walk. He has struck out nine batters in his five appearances and opponents are hitting just .050 with a .30 WHIP against him.

TOP ARM: Jhoan Duran gets the ball for St. Paul tonight, set to make just his second career start at Triple-A. Duran, the Minnesota Twins No. 5 ranked prospect according to MLB.com, threw 63 pitches over three innings of work in his Triple-A debut against Indianapolis on Saturday. He gave up one earned run on four hits, while allowing just one walk and striking out six batters. The righty was originally signed to a minor league contract by Arizona on February 11, 2015. Duran was acquired by the Twins on July 27, 2018, as one of three prospects they received when they traded infielder Eduardo Escobar to Arizona.

AGAINST ST. PAUL: The I-Cubs and Saints meet for game three of a six-game set at Principal Park. St. Paul has taken the first two games of the series and now leads the overall series 5-3 over Iowa. Even though St. Paul has the leg-up in the win-loss column for the season series, the two teams have each scored exactly 40 total runs in the eight games played. When the two teams met at CHS Field for six games, the I-Cubs outscored the Saints 31-19 and now, at Principal Park, where they have lost both games played so far, have been outscored 21-9 by St. Paul.

SHORT HOPS: With their fourth straight loss, Iowa fell to 9-9 and out of second place in the standings. Sitting in third place, they are 2.5 games back of Omaha and 1.5 back of Indianapolis...Vance Vizcaino recorded two hits in his first Triple-A start yesterday, the outfielder is hitting .600 (3-for-5) in his first two games with Iowa.

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