Tag Archives: phillies

18 Oct

it happened one october, take 6

On this date in 2009, Meridian Community College product Cliff Lee tossed eight dominant innings for Philadelphia against Los Angeles in Game 3 of the National League Championship Series. In an 11-0 victory at Citizens Bank Park that put the Phillies up 2-1 in games, lefty Lee allowed three hits (all singles) and no walks and struck out 10. He also got a hit. The Phillies would win the series in five games and go on to face — and fall to — the New York Yankees in the World Series. Lee — a 143-game winner and four-time All-Star over 13 seasons — went 4-0 in that ’09 postseason and was 7-3 all-time in October but never claimed a ring.

07 Aug

caught up in middle

Games aren’t always saved in the ninth inning. Middle relievers frequently work on the razor’s edge. Drew Pomeranz, the 36-year-old left-hander out of Ole Miss, faced such a situation on Wednesday with the Chicago Cubs. He came on in the sixth with the Cubs holding a one-run lead, a runner on base, two outs and the dangerous Elly De La Cruz up for Cincinnati. Pomeranz struck him out on four pitches. And his job was done. Rookie starter Cade Horton would get the win. Pomeranz was credited with a hold, his ninth in 38 appearances, and reduced his ERA to 1.97. He also has a save and two wins on his 2025 ledger. The Cubs used three more relievers, added on some runs and won 6-1 at Wrigley Field. Take 2: In Washington, Konnor Pilkington, the ex-Mississippi State standout, got the call in the fifth inning, two on, one out and the Nationals locked in a scoreless battle with the A’s. Pilkington struck out Nick Kurtz, pitched around Brent Rooker and got J.J. Bleday on a ground ball to end the inning. The lefty went back out for the sixth and gave up a tie-breaking solo homer to Tyler Soderstrom — the first he has allowed in eight appearances — before getting two outs and departing for another reliever. The Nationals tied the score in the bottom of the sixth and went on to win 2-1 via a walk-off hit. Pilkington, called up just last month, has been an effective pitcher in clutch situations though he has no wins, saves or holds. He has inherited seven baserunners and not allowed one to score in his 7 2/3 innings of work; he has put up a 2.35 ERA for a last-place team. P.S. Ole Miss alum Nick Fortes got his first hit — a home run — in his sixth game for Tampa Bay since joining the club in a trade on July 29. The Rays, with Fortes behind the plate, beat the Los Angeles Angels 5-4. … Philadelphia has claimed UM product Jacob Waguespack off waivers from Tampa Bay and assigned the right-hander to Triple-A Lehigh Valley. He has been on the injured list since late May. Waguespack, who has a 5.11 ERA in 31 career MLB games, had pitched well (0.46) in the minors this year.

10 Jul

land of giants

Fueled by a pair of former Mississippi prep stars, the San Jose Giants are the behemoth of the California League. Niko Mazza, former Madison-Ridgeland Academy star, allowed one run over six innings and Dakota Jordan, ex-Jackson Academy standout, hit his ninth home run to power San Jose to a 3-1 win over Fresno on Wednesday night. The Low-Class A Giants are 13-4 in the second half, the best record in the loop, and won the first-half title in the CL North with a 42-24 mark, also a league-best. Mazza, an eighth-round draft pick in 2024 out of Southern Miss, is 3-2 with a 2.36 ERA in 14 starts this season. The right-hander, the MAIS 5A player of the year in 2021 at MRA, won nine games, including a regional complete game, for the Sun Belt champion Golden Eagles in 2024. Jordan is on a real tear. He is riding a nine-game hit streak during which he has blasted four homers and on the year is batting .302 with a league-leading 67 RBIs plus 60 runs and 27 steals. He was the state’s Gatorade player of the year at JA in 2022 and was the Ferriss Trophy winner at Mississippi State in 2024. San Francisco got him in the fourth round of last summer’s draft, potentially a major steal. P.S. Tim Elko was recalled by the Chicago White Sox on Wednesday and went 0-for-3 (three strikeouts) in a 2-1 win against Toronto. The Ole Miss alum is just 9-for-61 with four homers in his big league time but is batting .315 with 16 homers in Triple-A. … Austin Riley, Nathaniel Lowe and Matt Wallner all homered in MLB games on Wednesday, closing in a bit on all-Mississippi home run derby leader Brent Rooker, who hit his 19th for the A’s on Tuesday. Riley has 14 clouts for Atlanta, Lowe 14 for Washington and Wallner nine (in just 51 games) for Minnesota. … On this date in 1979, ex-MSU star Del Unser tied a major league record with a home run in a third straight pinch-hit appearance. Unser, playing for Philadelphia, connected for a three-run walk-off bomb against San Diego’s Rollie Fingers to tie the record set by Lee Lacy in 1978. A noted pinch hitter, Unser posted a .356 career OBP in that role over 15 major league seasons.

04 Jul

taste of home

The Mud Monsters aren’t the only ones coming home to Mississippi today. Tyreque Reed, a Magnolia State native, is on the roster of the Washington Wild Things, who are visiting Trustmark Park this weekend for a Frontier League series. Reed, 28, who starred at Houlka High and Itawamba Community College before launching his pro career, is the Wild Things’ cleanup batter and certainly a hitter to keep an eye on this weekend. He won the FL batting title last year with a .341 average for a Washington club that posted the indy league’s best record. Currently, Reed is hitting .240 with 10 homers and 46 RBIs. In 2017 at ICC, the right-handed hitting Reed batted a ridiculous .504 with 15 homers and 15 doubles. He played in both the Texas and Boston systems in affiliated ball, batting .268 with 64 homers in 374 games and reaching the Double-A level with the Red Sox in 2021. He missed much of the ’22 and ’23 seasons with injuries. (Of note: Madison Central High alum Regi Grace began this season with Washington but is now pitching in Mexico.) Washington is 26-22, first in the FL’s Midwest Conference Central Division. The Mud Monsters, fourth in the Midwest West, are 23-25 but coming in hot, having won three straight at Evansville. Kyle Booker, a DeSoto Central product, went 3-for-5 with two RBIs in Thursday’s win and is batting .303. Travis Holt leads the club in homers and RBIs with seven and 29. P.S. Former Meridian CC standout Cliff Lee was in the news on Thursday. Zack Wheeler, named the National League’s pitcher of the month for June, became the first Philadelphia Phillies pitcher since Lee to win two monthly awards. Wheeler also won in May of 2022. Lee, one of the most underrated pitchers of recent times, won twice in 2011, going 5-0 with a sub-0.50 ERA in both June and August. The left-hander, a four-time All-Star, also won two POMs with Cleveland in 2008, when he won the Cy Young Award, and another with Seattle in 2010. He went 143-91 with a 3.52 ERA for his career. … Ex-Ole Miss star Doug Nikhazy was recalled (again) from Triple-A by Cleveland on Thursday but did not pitch. His only MLB appearance to date was his rocky debut on April 26. … Mel Rojas Jr., who played for the Mississippi Braves in 2016, has set the Korean Baseball Organization career record for homers by a foreign player. He hit No. 175 on Thursday for the KT Wiz.

30 Apr

brought low

In need of a big hit in a clutch spot, Nathaniel Lowe delivered a huge one for Washington on Tuesday night. A short time later, his star turn was upstaged by a Philadelphia rally, Lowe brought low. The Phillies beat the visiting Nationals 7-6 in a wild affair at Citizens Bank Park. Lowe, the Mississippi State alum in his first season with the Nationals, was in a 2-for-27 funk when he blasted a two-strike, two-out, go-ahead three-run homer in the top of the ninth against Philly closer Orion Kerkering. In the bottom half, the Phillies rallied for two runs and the win against Nats closer Kyle Finnegan. The winning run crossed on a wild pitch. “That’s the roller coaster that we sign up for,” Lowe said in an mlb.com article. Washington traded for Lowe in the off-season, hoping his power bat — 78 bombs in four years with Texas — would boost a team that had posted four straight losing seasons. He has had some big knocks. The lefty-hitting first baseman is batting .245 with six homers and a team-best 23 RBIs — and the 2025 Nats (13-17) have been more competitive, Tuesday’s gut-punch notwithstanding. P.S. Former Southern Miss star Dustin Dickerson is hitting .353 in 10 games for Triple-A Omaha since Kansas City promoted the shortstop in his third pro season. … Braden Montgomery went 1-for-3 with two walks, an RBI and a run in his first game with High-Class A Winston-Salem in the Chicago White Sox system. The ex-Madison Central High standout, a first-round draftee in 2024, was hitting .304 with three homers and 19 RBIs at Low-A Kannapolis. … The fields are set for next week’s NJCAA Division II Region 23 sub-regionals. Pearl River Community College, the MACCC champ, will host Mississippi Gulf Coast, Northeast, Meridian and Northwest, with state runner-up East Central hosting Jones, Copiah-Lincoln, Holmes and Southwest. Meridian and Northwest will meet in a play-in game at Poplarville, and Holmes and Southwest will do the same in Decatur.

12 Apr

on this date

Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia officially opened on this date in 2004, and Bobby Abreu, the former Jackson Generals standout playing for the Phillies that year, hit the first home run there. Abreu, who played in Jackson in 1994, had a flair for home runs. He hit 16 for the Gens in ’94 and 288 in an MLB career that has gained Hall of Fame attention. He put up nine 20-homer seasons, two of them 30-homer campaigns. He won the All-Star Game Home Run Derby in 2005 with a performance that fans and media still buzz about. The homer he belted on April 12, 2004, against Cincinnati’s Paul Wilson came in a year in which he would win a Silver Slugger award. Alas, the crowd at Citizens Bank, which has become one of the majors’ most raucous venues, didn’t have a lot to roar about that day. Abreu’s bomb was the only run the home team scored in a 4-1 loss.

23 Dec

it’s a challenge

The new task for Nathaniel Lowe, who has a World Series ring, a Silver Slugger award and a Gold Glove on his resume, is to help the lowly Washington Nationals climb back into contention in the stacked National League East. The ex-Mississippi State slugger was traded Sunday from Texas to the Nationals for left-hander Robert Garcia. A lefty-hitting first baseman, Lowe had some very good years with Texas after moving there from Tampa Bay. He batted .274 with 78 home runs in four years as a regular with the Rangers, who won the 2023 world championship. Lowe, 29, hit .302 with 27 bombs in his Silver Slugger season of 2022 but faded a bit the last two years, batting just .265 with 16 homers in 2024. The Nats, who have had five straight losing seasons, were in desperate need of a first baseman, while Texas had recently acquired Jake Burger, another power-hitting first baseman, from Miami. … In another deal involving the NL East, ex-South Panola High star Emaarion Boyd, Philadelphia’s No. 23 prospect, was shipped to Miami along with another prospect for major league pitcher Jesus Luzardo and a minor leaguer. Boyd, a speedy outfielder, played at the High-Class A level last season, hitting .239 with 24 steals. An 11th-round pick by the Phillies in 2022, Boyd has a .256 career average and 91 bags in his fledgling pro career. P.S. Former Ole Miss catcher Cooper Johnson, who played in Double-A last season, has been invited to big league spring training by Texas. Johnson hit .235 with 14 homers at Double-A Frisco in 2024; he was originally drafted by Detroit in 2019.

18 Nov

totally random

Today’s subject: Ike Pearson. Context is of the utmost importance when considering the career of Pearson, a Grenada native who pitched in six big league seasons between 1939-48. The right-hander’s record was 13-50, his career ERA 4.83. Not so good. But note that in his prime years — 1939-42 — he had the misfortune to pitch for a Philadelphia Phillies club that finished last in the National League each season. Pearson had a promising debut, throwing 3 1/3 shutout innings against the defending league champion Chicago Cubs on June 6, 1939. He finished that year 2-13 with a 5.76 ERA. In 1941, on a Phillies team that went 43-111-1 — one of the worst teams of all-time — Pearson did a creditable job. He won four games. He saved six others, ranking fourth in the league. His ERA of 3.57 was best on the staff. He made 10 starts and finished 30 games, which led the NL. He also led the league in hit batsmen with eight. Pearson served in the Marine Corps from 1943-45, returning to baseball in ’46 to pitch in five games for the Phils, still a losing team. He finished his MLB career in 1948 with the Chicago White Sox, going 2-3, 4.92, for yet another last-place team. An alumnus of Ole Miss and Mississippi Delta Community College, Pearson died in 1995.

12 Oct

take notice

Pegged by MLB Pipeline as one of the sleepers to watch in the Arizona Fall League, former Southern Miss standout Landon Harper registered an eye-opening performance on Friday. Pitching for Peoria, Harper tossed three scoreless innings in middle relief, allowing three hits and a walk with six strikeouts in his first AFL appearance. Harper isn’t on Atlanta’s list of Top 30 prospects, but the Meridian native’s showing for the Double-A Mississippi Braves this summer was impressive enough to earn a coveted fall league assignment. He posted a 1.41 ERA in 22 games, including five starts, and had a stretch of 14 straight appearances without allowing an earned run shortly after his late May promotion from A-ball. MLB Pipeline notes that command (of several pitches) is his best tool. He had 40 strikeouts and nine walks in 51 innings for the M-Braves and has walked just 27 batters in 161 1/3 pro innings. Harper is a Northeast Lauderdale High and Pearl River Community College alum who posted 12 saves for a 47-win USM team in 2022. The 6-foot-1 right-hander was drafted by Atlanta in the 14th round in ’22. … Other AFL “sleepers” with Mississippi ties include Ole Miss product Dylan DeLucia (Cleveland); ex-Mississippi State standout Jackson Fristoe (New York Yankees); and 2024 MSU alum David Mershon (Los Angeles Angels). P.S. Postseason flashback: On this date in 1980, ex-State star Del Unser scored the game-winning run in the 10th inning as Philadelphia beat Houston 8-7 in the deciding fifth game of a wild National League Championship Series that featured four extra-inning games. The Phillies would go on to win their first World Series against Kansas City.

24 Sep

philly flashback

The last time the Philadelphia Phillies celebrated a division championship was 13 years ago, when the club’s “Sports Illustrated Five” featured a pair of Mississippi junior college alumni. The Phillies beat the Chicago Cubs 6-2 on Monday night to claim their first National League East crown since 2011. That was the year that ex-Meridian Community College star Cliff Lee and former Holmes CC standout Roy Oswalt were members of a stellar rotation that appeared on the cover of SI’s preseason issue. Lee went 17-8 with a 2.40 ERA and Oswalt 9-10, 3.69, as the Phillies rolled to a 102-60 finish. Roy Halladay (a 19-game winner), Cole Hamels and Vance Worley rounded out the starting five, and Ryan Howard, Chase Utley and Jimmy Rollins powered the offense. Alas, Philly lost in the NL Division Series to St. Louis (and a rookie right-hander named Lance Lynn). The lone Mississippi connection with the 2024 Phillies is veteran infield coach Bobby Dickerson, the Laurel native who has been on the staff for the last three seasons. P.S. Drake Baldwin, who played for the Mississippi Braves in 2024, and Jacob Misiorowksi, who pitched for Biloxi this season, were named minor league players of the year in their respective organizations by Baseball America. Atlanta prospect Baldwin, a catcher, hit .244 with four homers in 52 games for the Double-A M-Braves before finishing the season at Triple-A, where he belted 12 more bombs. Milwaukee prospect Misiorowski was 3-4 with a 3.50 ERA for the Double-A Shuckers; he struck out 127 batters in 97 1/3 innings, including time in Triple-A.