around the horn
The matchup of the National League’s third-leading hitter against the pitcher with the loop’s third-best ERA — who just happened to be teammates eight years ago at Mississippi State — went to the latter on Friday night in Milwaukee. So did the game. Brandon Woodruff retired Adam Frazier in three at-bats while working seven strong innings in the Brewers’ 7-4 win over Pittsburgh. Woodruff is 5-2 with a 1.53 ERA for the Brewers, tied for first in the NL Central with Chicago. Frazier’s average dipped to .328 after an 0-for-4 for the last-place Pirates. … Cleveland’s decision to give Bobby Bradley another big league opportunity is looking like a shrewd move. The former Harrison Central High standout, looking fitter than ever, hit his second homer in the Indians’ 7-0 win against Seattle and is batting .462 with six RBIs in four games. … Ocean Springs native Garrett Crochet threw two scoreless innings, fanning three, to notch his sixth hold in the Chicago White Sox’s 5-4 win against Detroit. Crochet’s ERA is 0.44, and the flame-throwing lefty has 25 K’s in 20 1/3 innings. … Down in Double-A, the Mississippi Braves lost their manager — Wyatt Toregas resigned unexpectedly (no reason given in the press release) — and then lost in 10 innings at Biloxi. The M-Braves had won four straight. … Also in the Double-A South, former Southern Miss star Chuckie Robinson homered in Chattanooga’s 1-0 win vs. Pensacola. Robinson, batting .269 with two bombs, was behind the plate for Cincinnati mega-prospect Hunter Greene’s fifth win. … MSU product Brent Rooker homered for the second straight game for Triple-A St. Paul and now has nine homers on the season. He is batting .237 with 16 RBIs as he works toward a recall to Minnesota. … Ex-Ole Miss standout Parker Caracci picked up his fourth save and trimmed his ERA to 1.50 over 13 games for High-A Vancouver in Colorado’s system. … On the college front, Ole Miss fell into a hole at Arizona, yielding four home runs and failing to score after the first inning in a 9-3 loss in Game 1 of the Tucson Super Regional. Mississippi State hosts Notre Dame today in Game 1 of that best-of-3 super regional.