Mike Kaffee
Hurricanes Baseball Reporter
[email protected]
The Canes coming off of a 13-11 victory against FAU Saturday returned to the Light today for the final tune-up session before the Orange and Green World Series starting Wednesday. Eight innings on intra-squad action without even a hint of inclement weather. Four pitchers on tap each throwing 4 innings apiece. Overall, it looks like things are coming together from a defensive standpoint as well as our hitters fine-tuning their hitting skills. Although no home runs during this session, we did see 8 hits for extra bases to include two triples (Dario Gomez, CJ Kayfus). No one specifically stood out among the 4 pitchers to have a clear advantage over the others. Still for the most part they showed marked improvement from the last time I watched them. CJ Kayfus and Dario Gomez are still restricted to hitting only. Noticed a possible new injury as Ben Chestnutt who pitched yesterday against FAU favored his, I believe left leg walking back to the dugout after observing behind the home plate seating. Might have been just a cramp. From what I could see, everyone else seems to appear healthy as we wind down the preseason.
Brian (younger brother) Walters to Andrew and Rafe Schlesinger paired off against each other for the opening 4 innings. Brian made quick work of the first three batters faced sending them down in order to include one strikeout. Unlike the first, the second inning did not go as well. He opened and closed the inning with a pair of strikeouts, but squeezed in between gave up back-to-back doubles to Edgardo Villegas and CJ Kayfus(RBI). Third inning bounced back going 3up/3down tossing in a strikeout to end the inning. Brian’s 4th, he showed signs of tiring as he started to become a bit careless. After the initial out, is where the problems started generating. Hit by pitch to Zach Levenson, advancing to second on a wild throw to 1st (E1) on an APO, followed by back-to-back singles by Jason Torres and Adrian Dominquez (RBI) putting runners on the corners. WP advanced Adrian to second. CJ Jones 5th and final batter of the inning hits a grounder to second and throws Torres out at the plate to end the inning.
Unlike Brian, Rafe got off to a very shaky start with four of the first five batters reaching first safely. Jacoby Long opened the inning with a walk, followed up with an RBI double by Renzo Gonzalez for the initial run for today’s scrimmage. Yoyo notched up another RBI single to left, but got tagged out going into second 7-5-3. Fourth batter Lorenzo Carrier walked, and stole second but ended there with Ian Farrow, being the 5th batter, flying out to center. No score for the remaining 3 innings on the mound, but had some drama getting there. In the second. opened by with striking out Jason Torres. Then things started getting interesting. E4 (Blake Cyr) puts Adrian Dominguez on first. JD Jones singles to right, advancing Adrian to third, but Jones is thrown out trying to advance to second on a 7-5-3 put out. Kaden Martin, batting 4th, walks, and advances to second on a PB. With runners on 2nd and 3rd, Dorian pops up to short to end the inning. Rafe continued getting himself into a jam with a one-out triple by Dario Gomez into the RF corner. With a man on 3rd, one out gets Edgardo to strike out and CJ Kayfus fly out to left. The final inning was a whole lot less stressful only having to face 3 batters after striking out Renzo Gonzalez, walking Yoyo who is thrown out stealing second and ending his day with a routine 5-3 ground out.
Sebastian Perez and Brian Fry were handed the rock for their 4 innings on the mound. Sebastian was the only one of our pitchers to see goose eggs across the board. Not only not having anyone score on him, but he was definitely the sharpest of the four pitching today. He jumps toward the top of my charts in freshman relievers. In the 5th, after an initial walk to Carlos Perez, Blake Cyr hits into a 6-4-3 DP. 6th 3up/3down. 7th, E4 (Cyr) and Adrian Dominguez walking had runners on 1st and 2nd. Adrian picked off at 1st (2-3) and with Torres on second, Perez strikes out Jones and Martin. Final inning, it was 1,2,3 but Gino let Edgardo have his final swing of the bat collecting a single. Think Gino lost count of the number of outs since it was quick in coming
Lastly, Ryan Fry completed the day with 4 innings. On his last outing, I was not complimentary of his performance in stating Fry got fried. Today was definitely an improvement, but still has a body of work ahead of him. It really started off in almost the worst possible fashion with a lead-off triple by Kaden Martin, who I felt got a generous call from the ump sliding into third. Dorian Gonzalez tried to bunt him unsuccessfully being thrown out 2-3. 4-3 ground out failed to advance Kaden and Zach popping out to the catcher left Kaden stranded on third from his opening triple. Again in the 6th, Ryan once again gave up another triple (CJ Kayfus) but this time with 2 outs. With runs knocking on the door in the initial two innings, misfortunes found it way with a run in each of his last two innings. The 7th coming on back-to-back doubles by Yoyo and Lorenzo Carrier and the 8th back-to-back opening singles (Dorian Gonzalez,Gaby Gutierrez) putting runners on the corners and Zach completing the procession with a SF to center.
A mixed bag in pitching today with an offense beginning to come into its own. The Offensive Player of the Day I gave to CJ Kayfus for his 2-3 performance at the plate with a double and a triple collecting an RBI for his effort. Two others with multiple hits: Yoyo 2-2 (double, RBI) and Jason Torres 2-4. Additionally, collecting extra-base hits were Renzo Gonzalez(double,RBI); Lorenzo Carrier (double,RBI); Kaden Martin(triple).
Preseason winding down as earlier stated with the Fall Classic Orange and Green World Series followed the following Saturday with Scout Day ending the 2022 Fall preseason. They resume in middle of Jan for opening day 17 Feb against Penn State (tentative). The Alumni Game is a week prior. Still, plenty of baseball ahead with the World Series starting Wed at, right now 3PM. Will update if necessary.
