CarL1 Wilmington Blue Rocks

Rocks Rally Comes to a Halt at the Last Second, Drop Finale 4-3 to Dash

Published on June 15, 2016 under Carolina League (CarL1)
Wilmington Blue Rocks News Release


Wilmington, DE - With the Wilmington Blue Rocks (23-40) trying to complete their first sweep of the season, the offense was silent for eight innings before making noise in the ninth. Facing a 4-0 deficit they poured in three runs and had the tying run at third and winning run at second with just one out. However, the Blue Crew could not come up with the clutch hit and dropped the finale against the Winston-Salem Dash (26-40) 4-3. Zach Lovvorn's good pitching and bad luck continued as the righty notched yet another quality start by going seven innings and allowing one unearned run in a losing effort.

It did not initially look like Lovvorn was going to last long in the game though. The first two Dash batters reached when Hunter Jones and Mason Robbins began the night with a single and a double. Gerson Montilla quickly followed with a flyball to right to plate the first run of the game and give the Dash a 1-0 lead. It could have been more, but Nick Basto hit a one-hopper to third and Wander Franco cut down Robbins at home to keep the score at 1-0.

The boys from Frawley tried to cut into the lead and get men into scoring position in the second, third, and fourth innings, but went hitless in the crucial moment. Still down 1-0, the Rocks defense betrayed them in the fifth and led to the second run of the game for the Dash. Robert Pehl was unable to field a leadoff grounder to first and the Dash made it hurt with small ball. A groundout moved the runner over to second before a single and a fielder's choice pushed the run across to make it 2-0.

It stayed that way until the ninth inning when the Dash tacked on two more, which proved to be vital. The Rocks offense kept coming up empty, but Winston-Salem reliever Colin Klevin helped them out in the ninth. Austin Bailey and Robert Pehl got things going with back-to-back singles before Klevin hit Nick Dini to load the bases. The always patient Cody Jones, who had two doubles on the night, took four straight pitches out of the zone for the first Rocks run of the night. The hero of Tuesday night, Humberto Arteaga cut the deficit in half at 4-2 on a groundout and put runners at second and third with one out. Alfredo Escalera was then hit by a pitch to reload the bases and the Dash quickly turned to Danny Dopico to try and get the final two outs of the game. Dopico immediately threw a wild to make it a one run game and move the tying run to third and the go-ahead run into scoring position. However, Franco popped out to second and Hernandez grounded out to short to end the game.

Lovvorn drops to 0-7 on the year despite matching a career high in innings pitched and only allowing the one unearned run while Jordan Stephens moves to 2-7 and Dopico picks up his second save of the year. The Rocks head down to Carolina on Thursday to face the Mudcasts for a doubleheader starting at 5:00 p.m. The Blue Crew will play six games in the next four days and will toss RHP Corey Ray (1-2, 4.24) and LHP Colin Rodgers (2-4, 4.54) to start the series while the Mudcats will respond with RHP Raymar Navarro (4-1, 4.50) and a pitcher to be determined. Fans interested in listening to the game can tune in to WGLS-FM 89.7 or go to BlueRocks.com for all the game action.

Pebbles of Knowledge

There is bad luck and then there is the type of luck Wilmington Blue Rocks starter Zach Lovvorn has had this season. The righty has been the most consistent pitcher on the staff for the Rocks, but is still winless on the year and dropped to 0-7 on Wednesday night. Making the matter worse, he tied a career high in innings pitched by tossing seven frames while allowing just two runs (one earned). The native of Alabama did not walk a single batter and struck out six while lowering his ERA to 3.31. It was the fifth time in his last six starts he produced a quality outing. Run support has been the biggest culprit: overall this season his run support anytime he pitches is 1.09 and if he starts it is even lower, at .91.

It was not long ago when Alfredo Escalera was floundering at the plate, but the outfielder has turned things around in a hurry. The outfielder had yet another productive night at the plate on Wednesday. He went 1-for-4 and reached twice thanks to getting hit by a pitch in the ninth inning. The native of Puerto Rico has now hit safely in ten of his last 12 games while reaching in 11 of those affairs. In that span his average his jumped from .256 to .278 thanks to going 18-for-48 in the last 12 games. The three-hole hitter has racked up multiple hit games in six of those contests including two three-hit outings. He has scored five times, driving in six, in addition to collecting a home run, three doubles and also walking three times plus stealing a base.

The Rocks have had issues with runners in scoring position against the Dash. In the first game of their season series versus Winston-Salem, the Blue Crew went 3-for-9 with runners in scoring position. However, since that time, getting a hit with a runner at second and or third has been a difficult task. They went 0-for-21 to complete the series down in North Carolina and while Elier Hernandez did pick up an RBI single on Monday, they ended the game without a base knock in their next five attempts. Tuesday was worse, as they went 2-for-13, but the lowest point came in the series finale. On Wednesday night they went hitless in nine attempts with runners at second or third or both. They finish the first half 6-for-58 in the seven contests this season against the Dash.

Although the homestand did not end on a high note, it was the best time spent at the confines of Frawley Stadium this season by the Blue Rocks. They secured their first winning homestand of the year on Tuesday night in their 3-2 14 inning victory and ended their time at home 4-3. It was a series of comebacks for the Blue Crew. They had three come from behind victories during the seven games after coming into the two series with only four on the year. On Friday they scored four runs in the seventh against Salem when down 2-0 and went on to win 5-4 before turning a 1-0 deficit on Saturday into a 2-1 win against the Red Sox. They were not done. The Rocks clawed away at the Winston-Salem Dash on Tuesday evening and erased a 2-0 disadvantage with a single run in the seventh and another tally in the ninth before eventually snatching a win in the 14th inning.

They Said It

Blue Rocks Manager Jamie Quirk

"(Zach Lovvorn)'s been the hard luck guy all year obviously. He's thrown great his ERA is up there in the top ten pitchers in the league. There's always some guy in the rotation that doesn't get runs and he happens to be the guy but he pitched excellent tonight.

"It was important to get seven innings out of him tonight. It's probably more so important now with what we've got ahead of us. We're okay and we're rested, everybody should be good to go. It was important, not a necessity, more so for him than anything. Innings are always good out of the starters."

"I really thought we were going to get them there. We had the guys up we wanted with (Wander Franco) up there, just didn't get the fly ball deep enough. We made it interesting, we just have to find a way to score earlier in the game. Seventh, eighth, and ninth have been great but we have to find a way to have that same energy earlier in the game."

"(Jordan Stephen) was good but we also chased out of the zone a little bit. Obviously he's 2-7 but against us he's 2-0. We had a lot of chases and a lot of bad swings early in the game. We weren't patient and we weren't getting in good hitters counts, we were getting ourselves out. We didn't make him work, put it that way. He's got a good breaking ball and we just kept chasing it and once you do that he's going to keep throwing it."

Blue Rocks Starter Zach Lovvorn

"I was fortunate enough to get a few quick innings to allow me to go back out there for the seventh."

"I might have to sacrifice a glove or some cleats or something. It's frustrating but this kind of adversity is going to be good for me. I can either take it and let it bring me down or let it fuel my fire, which it has been, and go from there."

"I try to just forget about not having a win. It is kind of tough not having a win yet but I just keep pushing forward and don't let it get to you."

"I'm starting to figure some things out. I'm putting a lot of my pitches in the zone just saying, here it is either try to hit it or get yourself out. I'm commanding my pitches more often."

"(Winston-Salem)'s aggressiveness early is what kind of gets me, not saying I don't come out aggressive but they put the ball in play and make things happen. As the game goes on I move away from the bat a little more. They got a good bit of hits against me in the outing but I felt like maybe three or four were decently hit. I just have to keep pushing forward."

Check out the Wilmington Blue Rocks Statistics

Share: Facebook | Twitter/X | LinkedIn | Reddit | Email



Carolina League Stories from June 15, 2016


The opinions expressed in this release are those of the organization issuing it, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.

OurSports Central