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CarL1 Wilmington Blue Rocks

Rocks Still Unable to Crack Potomac Nationals at Home, Fall 5-2

April 22, 2016 - Carolina League (CarL1)
Wilmington Blue Rocks News Release


Wilmington, DE - The Wilmington Blue Rocks (6-10) appear unable to figure out the Potomac Nationals (9-7) when the two play at Frawley Stadium. The two teams have battled six times on the riverfront in the early portion of the 2016 season, but the Blue Crew has dropped all six of the contests after dropping Friday night's game 5-2.

The P-Nats quickly jumped out in front in the top of the first inning and never looked back. Andrew Stevenson doubled to begin the festivities on Friday night and moved to third on a double to right-center by Osvaldo Abreu. Stevenson had to wait to see if right-fielder Roman Collins was going to make the catch and therefore could only move up the 90 feet to third. Rocks starter Colin Rodgers (1-1) got Jose Marmolejos to pop out to short for the first out of the inning, but threw a wild pitch immediately after to plate the first run of the game for Potomac. He escaped further damage by inducing two more innings to get out of the inning.

The Rocks offense stalled in the first couple of frames against starter Luis Reyes and the P-Nats made it count in the top of the third. Rodgers appeared headed towards an easy frame when he got the first batter to fly out to center, but Stevenson singled to put a man on first with one out. Abreau followed with his own single and Marmolejos once again popped out for the second out of the third inning. However, Raudy Read jumped over the first pitch of the at bat and doubled into the right-center field gap to push the P-Nats ahead 3-0. They continued their two out hitting when Drew Ward singled to right-center on a 3-2 count for the Nationals four run lead.

Reyes continued to keep the Rocks off of the board through the first five innings before the big bat of Ryan O'Hearn once again provided the offense. Reyes retired the first two batters of the sixth, but Humberto Areaga stopped that streak with a hot to short that bounced off of the glove of Abreu and allowed the inning to continue. O'Hearn stepped into the left handed batters box and pulverized the first pitch of the at bat 40 feet over the right-field wall to cut the deficit down to 4-2. Austin Bailey doubled in the next at bat, but the rally ended when Alfredo Escalera flew out to right.

Derek Gordon replaced Rodgers in the seventh inning and got the final two out soft the frame to strand an inherited runner. However, Gordon went back out in the eighth inning and got out number one with a groundout to third. He struck out the next batter, but the pitch got away from Chad Johnson and runners ended up on the corners with one out when Bryan Mejia singled to right. With the runners at the corners, P-Nats manager Tripp Keister called for Dale Carey to lay down a safety squeeze and he pushed a bunt perfectly down the first base line to provide another insurance run and make the score 5-2. The Rocks were unable to muster any more offense the rest of the way, ceding game three of the series 5-2.

Rodgers allowed four runs through the first three innings, and although he settled down to go 6.1 for the longest outing of any Blue Rocks starter this season, he took the loss to fall to 1-1. Reyes was awarded the win for six innings of two run baseball and Koda Glover pitched the ninth for his second save of the year. The teams are back at it Saturday night at 7:05 when the Blue Rocks will send Zach Lovvorn (0-3, 5.54) against Phillips Valdez (2-1, 7.36).

Pebbles of Knowledge

Home is not where the wins are for the Wilmington Blue Rocks. The Rocks have won just one of the ten games played at home with the Potomac Nationals being their biggest victimizer. The P-Nats are currently 6-0 against the Blue Crew at Frawley Stadium. They swept the Blue Rocks in the first three games of the season and have now won the first three games of the current five game, four day homestand. Scoring first was once again the problem as the home team fell behind 1-0 before they got their chance at the plate. They Rocks have now fallen behind in every game they have played at home against the P-Nats and have not come back to win in any of them.

In a game where the Blue Rocks reached base just eight times on six hits and two walks, runners were obviously at a premium, but they were erased almost as soon as they got on base. Coming into Friday night's game the Rocks had grounded into no more than two double plays in one game. They shattered that record on Friday by doubling it, grounding into four separate double plays. The Blue Crew arms have done their fair share of erasing runners once they get on base. Colin Rodgers was able to spin two double play balls, but Derek Gordon relieved him and decided he did not need any of his fielders help to clear the basepaths. Gordon allowed a single to Andrew Stevenson in the top of the ninth inning, but Gordon picked off the speedy Stevenson, the fourth time Stevenson has been picked off at Frawley this year, the sixth P-Nat to get picked off and the tenth total pickoff for the Blue Rocks staff.

Eight was not so great for the Blue Crew bats as both Humberto Arteaga and Ryan Toups saw their hit streaks snap at eight games on Thursday night. Ryan O'Hearn though had no problem getting past the crazy eight, and he did so in a big way. O'Hearn crushed a two-run home run to right for his lone hit of the game and extend his streak to nine games. O'Hearn is now 14-for-35 (.400) during the nine-game streak with five home runs (two inside the park home runs), three doubles, 12 RBI and nine runs scored.

O'Hearn's big swing cleared the bases and made the score 4-2 and Brandon Downes decided he wanted to try and jump start a rally of his own and extend his on-base streak. Downes doubled over Dale Carey's head in left field to push his on-base streak to 13 games. Downes is now 13-for-51 (.255) with a home run, five doubles, six runs scored, four RBI and a team leading seven walked during that span.

They Said It

Blue Rocks Managers Jamie Quirk

"Well actually it was very good that he (Colin Rodgers) kept in the game and gave us a chance, getting into that seventh inning. I thought he really only made one bad pitch, and that was to their catcher (Raudy) Read for that double to right-center field. Really that was the only bad pitch he made and that was more just a bad pitch selection, but other than that I thought he did a very good job."

"No, there's no secret formula for cutting down on those double play balls. We don't have a lot of guys hot right now. We were swinging the bats good on the road and then we come back home and we're struggling a little bit offensively, getting shutout in the second game (Thursday Night), and then two runs (Friday night). (Ryan) O'Hearn hit a big home run, but there is really nothing we can do. We just got to keep swinging the bat, but we hit a lot of balls Friday right at some people and didn't have some luck there. We just have to keep going after it."

"You have your core players who are pretty much going to play every game. I try to give them a day here and there. Elier (Hernandez) had played pretty much every single inning of every single game up until Friday night so we started off giving him the night off. The situation arose where they brought in a lefty and it was a good time to get him an at bat. Here and there you'll see guys getting a day off, getting some rest. (Alfredo) Escalera was out yesterday in one of the games. You've got 12 guys who are going to play so we just pick times where we think they're going to need a rest."

"He's a good player (Brandon Downes). He's adjusting to High-A ball and doing a very good job. He's kinda keeping afloat, which is nice. Finding a way to get a hit, finding a walk, doing some things to just get on base for the team. He hasn't even gotten hot yet. When he gets hot, it'll be nice to see and right now he's holding his own until he gets hot."

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