Sunday Afternoon in Fredericksburg

After he was lit up for six runs in the series opener by Kannapolis, Brayan Romero seemed unlikely to do much better in the series finale. But that’s why they play the games.

Instead, the 23-y.o. held the Cannon Ballers to an unearned run on five singles and no walks over five innings as the FredNats prevailed, 4-1 to earn a series split.

While not overpowering, the 2021 IFA changed speeds and kept Kannapolis off balance, enough to strike out five – quite a bit for a pitcher who has averaged less than 7K/9IP in an era where a strikeout per inning has become merely average.

Offensively, Nate Rombach was able to convert a one-out walk by Nick “Power to the” Peoples into the tying run with an opposite-field double in the 2nd and launched a homer in the 8th for an insurance run. In between, Cristhian Vaquero delivered a pair of sacrifice flies to power the Fredericksburg offense.

The bullpen was even better than Romero, with Pablo Aldonis striking out five of six batters faced for his first hold of the season and Robert Cranz working around a leadoff single in the 9th to notch his organization-leading ninth save.

With the win, the FredNats improve to 5-4 in the second half, which is good enough for a tie for second place in the C.L. North. Following a day off tomorrow, it’s a split home-and-home series with the Shorebirds playing host Tuesday through Thursday and then Delmarva visits Fredericksburg over the 4th of July weekend