March 9th Game(s)

 The Guardians played two games today.   The first was their regularly scheduled game and the second was a "B" game.   B games happen all the time but what was significant about this one is that Shane Bieber was scheduled to pitch for the Guardians today and pitcher, sort of instead, in the B game in Peoria, AZ.

So, no results how Shane or the rest of the Guardians (Zunino, Lavastida as the DH and a bunch of minor leaguers) did in the B game but, in the "A" game, here are the results:

PITCHING

Hunter Gaddis started and wasn't sharp in the first inning, giving up 4 hits and 2 runs and it seemed like he was leaving a lot of pitches up against a very depleted Padres lineup that had Austin Nola, who normally hits 8th for the Padres during the regular season, hitting 3rd. He got the bottom of the order out n the second but gave up 2 hits in the 3rd.  Five of the nine outs he recorded were in the air to go with 3 Ks.

Clase followed Gaddis and  worked a scoreless inning giving up a walk and a hit.  He should have probably been out of the inning but Ramirez had to double clutch on his throw to second so no double play could be turned.

Pilkington was next in what has become standared for Francona, starter-high leverage reliever-starter sequence.and, like Gaddis, struggled in his first and third inning of work, giving up 4 runs including a dinger, although a misplay by Quinn on a line drive added an extra runner he had to deal with.  Mikolajchak relieved and allowed two inherited runners to score before getting the side out.  A couple of Mikolajchak's fastballs registered at 97 and 96 mph on the gun which is encouraging for him.

Herrin followed and had a clean inning hitting 96 although he did give up hard contact to the 3rd batter he faced.

Bilious finished the game giving up a walk and he got a K while working his fastball mostly at 91 and 92.

HITTERS

We finally had a guy get 2 hits but it was Zac Collins who might not even break camp in the Guardians' system if he doesn't accept a spot in Columbus (or Akron). 

Fry had an infield smash that ate up the SS for a hit and worked a walk.

In a totally unexpected result Juan Brito took a 4 pitch walk.  In fact, he took 5 pitches in a row in the game until he swung at the 6th and ended the game on a groundball up the middle.

Angel Martinez smoked a ball leading off the 8th to center field but it died on the track.  He, along with Tena, got RBI line drive hits in the 9th but our rally died on Brito's groundout with Pries, who had ripped a line drive out to left in his previous AB,  on deck.

The other notable offensive play was when Naylor tried to score on a potential wild ptich that only went about 10 feet to the side of the catcher who fed it to the pitcher covering.  You gotta love the hustle by Naylor who had just gone from 1st to 3rd with a belly flop slide on a hit by Collins.  Note that Naylor also hustled his way to first base in the second and was safe on what looked like a bad call by the first base umpire as Michael Wacha dropped a throw by the first baseman but appeared to keep his foot on the base before Naylor got there.

Jose, Rosario, Arias and Naylor also had hits with Arias' hit being a line drive to the opposite field which he follwed with a K and a broken bat popup to second.  The stat that I have seen that has Arias having all but two of exhibition hits over the years being singles (execpt for 2 double) is a little concerning.  He just didn't look like he was driving the ball today.

So, another game without a lot of highlights by the Guardians.  No one, except for Collins really helped themselves significantly in terms of making the team.  The great thing was that all the guys who pitched actually have a legitimate chance to make the regular season roster so it was good to see those guys perform to varying degrees of success.

On to Milwaukee tomorrow.  Hopefully we get good reports from Peoria on Beiber and Zunino and the rest of the guys.