Tag Archives: Guardians

13 Sep

cheers

It wasn’t all cupcakes and balloons for Konnor Pilkington on his 25th birthday, though the night did have a happy ending. The Mississippi State product from Pascagoula got the start for Cleveland against the Los Angels on Monday — in a game featured on MLB Network’s Clubhouse Edition — and he no-hit the Angels for 3 1/3 innings. But the big lefty, working with a lead, yielded two-run home runs to Matt Duffy and Mike Trout in consecutive innings that tied the score. Pilkington departed after the fifth and watched from the dugout as the Guardians rallied to win 5-4 in a tense game in which both managers were ejected. Cleveland increased its lead in the American League Central to 3 games. Pilkington, a rookie, has been called up eight different times from Triple-A Columbus yet has managed a fairly steady performance in his big league opportunities. Over 14 games, 10 starts, he has a 4.30 ERA and a 1-2 record. At Columbus, he is 2-4, 5.66. A third-round pick out of State by the Chicago White Sox in 2018, Pilkington was traded to Cleveland last summer. He and former Southern Miss pitchers Nick Sandlin and Kirk McCarty, also a rookie, have been contributors for what appears to be a playoff-bound club. P.S. The Dodgers became the first team to clinch a postseason berth by beating Arizona 6-0 on Monday. Former Mississippi Braves standout Freddie Freeman, in his first year in L.A., has been a driving force in the star-studded lineup. Not to be overlooked is the performance of another M-Braves alum, right-hander Evan Phillips. Phillips, who passed through Pearl in 2016-17, notched his 18th hold on Monday and trimmed his ERA to 1.33 in 55 appearances. He has six wins and two saves for the National League West behemoth.

31 Aug

international news

There was a bit of an “old home week” vibe Tuesday night at Huntington Park in Columbus, Ohio, where the host Clippers and the Iowa Cubs hooked up in a Triple-A International League game. Pitchers from each of Mississippi’s Big 3 Division I schools went to the mound: Former Ole Miss standout Wyatt Short started and posted a win for the I-Cubs; Mississippi State product Konnor Pilkington started and took the loss for Columbus; and ex-Southern Miss standout Kirk McCarty also worked for the Clippers, a Cleveland affiliate. (For the record, Delta State alum Trent Giambrone, an infielder, watched from the Iowa bench.) Short, a closer at UM and a reliever for most of his minor league career, made his third start and pitched a strong five innings in the I-Cubs’ 4-0 victory. The 5-foot-8 left-hander from Southaven is now 4-1 with a 3.67 ERA at Iowa in his sixth pro season. Wyatt has yet to get a big league call, unlike Pilkington and McCarty, both of whom have been up this year. Pilkington, a lefty from Pascagoula, yielded four hits, four walks and three runs with nine strikeouts in four innings, falling to 2-4, 5.66, with Columbus. He is 1-2, 4.17, in 12 MLB games this season. Hattiesburg native McCarty, a left-hander who has two big league wins for the Guardians, allowed one run in four innings Tuesday, trimming his ERA at Columbus to 3.58. … In an International League game at St. Paul, Minn., ex-USM star Matt Wallner and Taylorsville’s Billy Hamilton combined for four runs, four walks, two hits and a stolen base as Minnesota’s Triple-A club beat Omaha 10-6. The stolen base was the first for the veteran Hamilton in his second game with the Saints — and No. 402 in his minor league career. P.S. Several other former Ole Miss pitchers are in the news. Doug Nikhazy was promoted to Double-A Akron in the Cleveland system; he is slated to start Saturday. Taylor Broadway was traded to Boston from the Chicago White Sox to complete an earlier deal; the 2021 Rebels closer was pitching at Double-A Birmingham. Veteran big leaguer Mike Mayers, starting Tuesday for the Los Angeles Angels against the visiting New York Yankees, gave up three homers, including Aaron Judge’s No. 51, and took an L. Lance Lynn, 3-5, 5.00, for the White Sox but coming off one of his best starts, gets the ball tonight against Kansas City as the fading ChiSox try to stay in the playoff hunt.

12 Aug

wings of eagles

The Mississippi Braves ran into some stout pitching at Tennessee on Thursday night, the most effective of the three arms that shut them down belonging to former Southern Miss right-hander Walker Powell. In a 1-0 Smokies victory, Powell worked five innings in middle relief, yielding three hits and a walk while striking out seven. He got the win, improving to 3-2, 2.40 ERA, in seven games for the Chicago Cubs’ Double-A affiliate. On the year, at three different levels, the 6-foot-8 Powell is 10-2, 3.02. Signed by the Cubs as a non-drafted free agent out of the MLB Draft League last summer, Powell is one of 14 former USM pitchers currently in pro ball. Pitching has become a hallmark of the Golden Eagles program, and it showed in this year’s draft, with five USM pitchers getting picked. Another was signed as a non-drafted free agent. Ole Miss and Mississippi State have had higher profile draftees in recent years, but USM is producing its fair share. Nick Sandlin, a second-round pick by Cleveland in 2018, is the lone USM alum currently in the majors; he has a 2.51 ERA as a reliever for the first-place Guardians. Cody Carroll, drafted back in 2015, and Kirk McCarty, a 2017 draftee, also have pitched in the big leagues, though both are currently in Triple-A. McCarty has been up-and-down with Cleveland this season and has posted two wins. J.C. Keys is in Double-A in the Cincinnati system, and Ryan Och, Hunter Stanley and Jarod Wright are in A-ball. The 2022 crop of draftees includes Dalton Rogers (a third-round pick by Boston), Ben Ethridge, Garrett Ramsey, Landon Harper and Tyler Stuart. Hunter Riggins signed after the draft. Stuart is the only one of that group to debut, throwing one inning in rookie ball. P.S. Kudos to Ole Miss coach Mike Bianco, who got a well-deserved four-year contract extension. The school’s all-time winningest coach — and No. 3 all-time among SEC coaches — won the national championship this season along with his second batch of national coach of the year awards in three seasons. He may also finally have won over Ole Miss fans.

07 Aug

one door closes …

It was a hard fall for Bobby Bradley. Cleveland’s opening day first baseman, the Gulfport native was anchored to the bench by late April, outrighted to the minors in May and then released from Triple-A Columbus on Saturday. He was hitting .174 with seven homers and 30 RBIs — plus 74 strikeouts in 167 at-bats — for the Clippers. Guardians officials decided “maybe a change of scenery would be good for the kid,” Cleveland manager Terry Francona told cleveland.com. Bradley, just 26, figures to catch on somewhere. A lefty hitter with big power — 163 minor league homers since 2014 — he has some value. Drafted in the third round out of Harrison Central High, he rose fairly steadily in the Cleveland system. He debuted in the big leagues in 2019 and was Cleveland’s regular first baseman the latter half of 2021. But he hit just .208 with 16 homers last year and struck out way too much. P.S. Mike Mayers, veteran reliever out of Ole Miss, was brought back from the minors by the Los Angeles Angels and threw 3 1/3 shutout innings Saturday in the team’s loss to Seattle in Game 1 of a doubleheader. It was his first MLB appearance since May 25. He had a 5.40 ERA when he was designated for assignment. … Hayden Dunhurst, catcher for national champion Ole Miss this year, is 2-for-3 with a double, an RBI and three walks in his first two pro games. The sixth-round pick is playing for Kansas City’s Arizona Complex League team. … Former Madison Central (and current Stanford) star Braden Montgomery has been a key player for Yarmouth-Dennis in the Cape Cod League. Montgomery hit .250 with four homers and 19 RBIs and posted a 2.25 ERA in three pitching appearances in the regular season. He got the win in relief for the Y-D Red Sox in their CCBL playoff opener.

01 Aug

seize the day

Austin Riley wasn’t the only Mississippi product capping the month of July with a big day. In addition to DeSoto Central High alum Riley’s record-setting, walk-off double for Atlanta (see previous post), Corey Dickerson, Kirk McCarty, Hunter Renfroe, Kendall Graveman and Adam Frazier also earned some high-fives on Sunday. Dickerson, the ex-Meridian Community College star, produced the kind of game St. Louis was anticipating in his first season with the Cardinals: three hits, a homer (his fourth), two runs and three RBIs in a 5-0 win over Washington. Dickerson, who got off to a woeful start in 2022, is batting .226. McCarty, the rookie lefty out of Southern Miss, got his second MLB win, throwing 3 1/3 innings (one run) in middle relief for Cleveland in 5-3 victory against Tampa Bay. His first win came Tuesday at Boston. Mississippi State alum Renfroe, back in Boston with his new club Milwaukee, went 4-for-4 with his 19th homer in a 7-2 loss. He has six bombs in his last nine games and has raised his average to .254. Graveman, another ex-MSU standout, notched his 16th hold with a scoreless inning (the eighth) for the Chicago White Sox in a 4-1 defeat of Oakland. And MSU product Frazier, who had scuffled for many weeks with Seattle, went 2-for-4 with a run as the leadoff batter in a 3-2 loss to Houston. He is batting .353 in his last 19 games (.244 overall) for the resurgent Mariners. P.S. Former East Central Community College standout Tim Anderson continues to play for the White Sox while his three-game suspension from a Friday incident is under appeal. He is 3-for-8 in two wins. … The Los Angeles Dodgers have released ex-Ole Miss star Bobby Wahl, who had appeared in six games in Triple-A this year. He pitched in 17 big league games from 2017-20.

27 Jul

central casting

There is a three-team battle going on in the American League Central, and a bunch of Magnolia State products were on the frontlines Tuesday in three different skirmishes. Start in Boston, where former Southern Miss pitcher Kirk McCarty, making just his fourth big league appearance, delivered four shutout innings and got his first MLB win in Cleveland’s 8-3 victory at Fenway Park. “It’s special,” said McCarty, who in the last couple weeks was claimed on waivers by Baltimore and then reclaimed by the Guardians. The left-hander allowed just one hit and one walk while fanning four. He followed fellow former Golden Eagles star Nick Sandlin in what was a bullpen game for Cleveland. Sandlin, who has a 2.81 ERA, got the last two outs of the third inning. The Guardians (49-47) moved to within 2 1/2 games of first-place Minnesota (52-45) in the AL Central after the Twins lost at Milwaukee. The Brewers gave former Mississippi State star Ethan Small his second big league start, and it was a little rough, much like his first one back in May. Small yielded a leadoff home run to Byron Buxton, three more hits, four walks and two more runs in 3 2/3 innings. He has a 7.11 ERA in his two MLB games. However, the Brewers, the first-place team in the National League Central, rallied to win 7-6, aided by ex-State slugger Hunter Renfroe’s 17th home run. Meanwhile, the Chicago White Sox (49-48, 3 games back in the AL Central) kept pace with their third straight win, beating Colorado at Coors Field 2-1. Ex-State standout Kendall Graveman worked a scoreless eighth inning for Chicago, notching his 15th hold. East Central Community College alum Tim Anderson, the ChiSox’s All-Star shortstop, had a hand in all four of the double plays the team turned in that game. P.S. Props to former Mississippi Braves manager Brian Snitker for notching his 500th win with Atlanta on Tuesday. His club, the reigning World Series champion, has won four straight NL East titles. … South Panola High product Emaarion Boyd, one of the two prep players drafted (11th round) out of the state last week, reportedly has signed with Philadelphia. He is the seventh player of 23 drafted to sign, according to mlb.com (see previous posts).

24 Jul

a few atta boys

Austin Riley: The former DeSoto Central High star went 3-for-4 with his 28th home run, extending his hitting streak to 15 games, as Atlanta beat the Los Angeles Angels 7-2 on Saturday to pull within a half-game of the New York Mets in the National League East. “Hey, we’re coming for ’em,” Riley said with a grin in a postgame interview.
Brandon Woodruff: The Wheeler High and Mississippi State alum allowed one run on four hits with eight punchouts in six innings as NL Central leader Milwaukee beat Colorado 9-4. Woodruff is 8-3 with a 3.73 ERA.
Hunter Renfroe: The ex-State star from Crystal Springs homered for the second straight game, drove in three runs and scored twice in the Brewers’ win at toasty, enclosed American Family Field. “Good gosh it was hot, but we pulled it out. It was fun,” said Renfroe, who has 15 bombs on the season.
Lance Lynn: The Ole Miss product threw six shutout innings for the Chicago White Sox, yielding three hits and fanning six in a 5-4 win against Cleveland in an American League Central clash. Alas, Lynn got no decision because the bullpen blew a lead the ChiSox held when he departed.
Konnor Pilkington: The rookie from Pascagoula by way of MSU, facing off against Lynn in Game 2 of a twinbill, went five innings and allowed two runs, trimming his ERA to 4.17 in 12 games for the Guardians this season. He also got no decision.

23 Jul

a little rivalry

There’s a rivalry within the rivalry set for Chicago’s Guaranteed Rate Field tonight, a garnish to the main dish. When Cleveland takes on the White Sox in Game 2 of doubleheader between the American League Central foes, Mississippi State alum Konnor Pilkington will oppose Ole Miss product Lance Lynn as the starting pitchers. Talk about your studies in contrast. Pilkington is a rookie, 24, a left-hander making his 12th major league appearance with the Guardians. The White Sox’s Lynn is 33, a right-hander who has been in pro ball since 2008 and has pitched in 295 big league games, making two All-Star Game appearances and winning a World Series ring. Pilkington, who has been up-and-down from Triple-A all season with Cleveland, has a 4.02 career minor league ERA and has pitched relatively well for the Guardians: 1-2, 4.24. He went five innings against Chicago his last time out, on July 12, and allowed three earned runs in a loss. Lynn had knee surgery in the spring and has struggled at times since coming back. He is 1-3, 7.50, in seven starts. He has allowed 19 runs in his last three starts, eight in four innings in a loss against Cleveland on July 11. Normally a beast on the bump, Lynn is averaging just a shade over five innings per start. P.S. Ex-Ole Miss star Gunnar Hoglund, the 19th overall pick in the 2021 draft by Toronto, made his pro debut today with Oakland’s Arizona Complex League club. Hoglund, who had Tommy John surgery last year, worked two innings, allowing a hit and an unearned run with five strikeouts. The A’s acquired Hoglund from the Blue Jays in the Matt Chapman trade this spring.

15 Jul

going places

Promoted to Triple-A St. Paul by Minnesota, Matt Wallner went 0-for-4 in his debut with the Saints on Thursday. On Saturday, the former Southern Miss slugger will be in Los Angeles, where he is slated to play in the All-Star Futures Game at Dodger Stadium with other top prospects. In his last game at Double-A Wichita on Wednesday, Wallner, the Twins’ No. 8-rated prospect, put up a 4-for-4 with four RBIs and three runs. For the year at Wichita, he hit .299 with 21 homers, 64 RBIs and eight steals. The 6-foot-5, lefty-hitting outfielder leads all Twins players in homers in 2022 while also improving his plate discipline. In 278 at-bats in his first Double-A season, he had 107 strikeouts, 62 walks and a .436 on-base percentage. “Just trying to take my walks when I can and just try to be more selective on pitches to drive the ball more and hit for more power,” Wallner told mlb.com. “I think it’s helped the average, as well.” Wallner joins an impressive list of Mississippi products who have participated in the Futures Game, including Billy Hamilton, Hunter Renfroe, Nathaniel Lowe, Dakota Hudson and Ethan Small. P.S. USM product Kirk McCarty has been reclaimed by Cleveland off waivers from Baltimore, which claimed the rookie left-hander off waivers from the Guardians last week. McCarty is 0-2, 9.00 ERA, in three MLB games with Cleveland, which assigned him to Triple-A Columbus, where he has spent most of this season. … In keeping with the USM theme, former Golden Eagles star Reed Trimble, on the injured list (shoulder surgery) all season, was assigned to Baltimore’s Florida Complex League club, going 0-for-3 in his Thursday debut. Trimble was a second-round supplemental draft pick (65th overall) in 2021 and batted .200 with eight RBIs and 14 runs in 22 games in the low minors.

12 Jul

in other news

Yes, there were significant MLB games in places other than Atlanta on Monday night, and a couple of Mississippi products played significant roles in two of them. Corey Dickerson, the former Meridian Community College standout, gave St. Louis fans something to cheer about in a big win over Philadelphia. Ole Miss product Lance Lynn gave Chicago White Sox fans something to fret about in a tough loss at Cleveland. Dickerson, 0-for-6 in his first two games since coming off the injured list, went 2-for-3 with a home run and three RBIs in the Cardinals’ 6-1 victory. St. Louis is 2 games back of first-place Milwaukee in the National League Central. Third-place Philly fell 8 back of the New York Mets, who beat Atlanta 4-1, in the NL East. Dickerson, a career .280 hitter, hasn’t produced as expected in his first year with the Cardinals. He is now batting .196 with three homers and 15 RBIs in 41 games. Lynn, the 35-year-old vet coming off knee surgery, yielded eight runs in four-plus innings in the White Sox’s 8-4 loss to the Guardians, who moved 1 1/2 games ahead of Chicago in second place in the AL Central. A Cy Young Award finalist in 2021, Lynn fell to 1-2 with a 6.97 ERA in his seven starts. Though he reportedly wasn’t hit hard, he gave up five runs in the first inning and was charged with three more in the fifth. He faced 25 batters and 13 of them reached. The ChiSox, the defending division champs, are a disappointing 41-44. The Guardians are 42-42, 4 back of Minnesota. The White Sox and Guardians play a doubleheader today, with ex-Mississippi State standout Konnor Pilkington (1-1, 4.08) slated to start Game 2 for Cleveland. Southern Miss alum Nick Sandlin (3.32 ERA) figures to see duty out of the Guardians’ bullpen. P.S. Kudos to DeSoto Central High alum Austin Riley, whose 24th homer was the lone run the Braves produced against Max Scherzer and the Mets, and to USM’s Tanner Hall, who threw four shutout innings with seven strikeouts in Team USA’s 2-0 win over Cuba in a tournament in The Netherlands.