Potomac Returns To Mills Cup Finals
Potomac past Frederick by a 10-3 score and a return trip to the Mills Cup Finals
Four big innings on offense and four innings of solid bullpen work were the, um, keys to beating Frederick as Potomac would go on to 10-3 win and return to Carolina League’s Mills Cup championship for the second time in three seasons.
Seven batters would combine for 11 hits, led by Chris Curran who tripled and singled twice for a 3-for-4 night, finishing the series at 7-for-12. Bill Rhinehart would drive in three for the second straight night, his six RBIs leading the team in the series. Potomac would score twice in the second, twice in the third, and three times in the fourth to build a 7-1 lead through four innings.
Marcos Frias would go five-plus innings to log the win, charged with three runs on six hits and two walks while striking out three. The first man out of the bullpen, Carlos Martinez, was greeted with a single to load the bases with no outs in the sixth, and then gave up a double, but Chris Curran and Jose Lozada combined to gun out the last runner by a healthy margin to get the first out. Martinez struck out the next batter and got a tapper back to the mound to end the inning, the lead cut to 7-3.
Potomac’s response would come in the bottom of the seventh, plating three runs on two hits and a groundout and took advantage of three walks — the seventh, eighth and ninth that the Keys would issue — to stretch the lead to 10-3.
Zach Dials and Rob Wort would follow Martinez, each tossing a scoreless inning to seal the deal. For the series, the bullpen would pitch 15⅔ innings, allow four runs, one earned, on 18 hits and three walks, and strike out 11.
As expected, the P-Nats’ opponent will be the Winston-Salem Dash. The double-half winner swept the Kinston Indians in the other half of the playoff bracket and will host Potomac for Games 1 and 2 on Monday and Tuesday. The series finishes at Potomac, resuming for Game 3 on Thursday, with Games 4 and 5 (if necessary) slated for Friday and Saturday.
Good news about the P-Nats. Sad that Harrisburg’s series had to end on two bad home losses. Thompson’s been a waste of a rotation spot for awhile, the offense was inconsistent, and it was a lot to expect Tatusko and Roark to be nails the whole way through. Roark came up real small today.
For Norris and Moore, the beat rolls on. Wonder how we’ll get enough pitching to beat the Dash. Danny Rosenbaum, you’re on notice.
Tell the truth, Sue, halfway through the season, did you see the PNats in this position? I sure didn’t. But the steamroller continues, with the only burp being that awful start by Rosenbaum.
All through the year, when Frias was stinkin’ up the joint, I kept telling myself “he’s only 21, he’s only 21”. Ths is a great indicator that he’s ready to take the next step, the pressure of the playoffs many times tells the tale.
Souldrummer, you’re dead on, paging Mr. Rosenbaum, paging Mr. Rosenbaum!
Absolutely not. I was comparing this season to ’07 but without the hope of getting any callups from Hagerstown. Pitching, I felt, wasn’t the issue – it was the lack of offense.
I was right that the problem was a lack of offense, but couldn’t have guessed the combination of Moore turning into a microwave, Rooney getting pushed down and returning to form by getting to play every day, and Rhinehart breaking out of a funk would all happen simultaneously.
And I was wrong about the callups. They came slower than any of us wanted, but Rosenbaum, Holder and Wort meshed well with the carousel of A++ pitchers while Lyons, Nicol shored up the poor defense we’d had at 3B/SS.
Souldrummer and Mark L: 9 guys take the field and 9 guys go up to bat. It rarely rests solely on the pitcher. Having a pitcher warm up, then wait 45 minutes to throw in a game is far from an ideal situation. Fielding needs to be sharp and bats need to be alive to win games.