Two Met minor league teams both won on Labor Day in win or
go home games and now live to play another day.
While Brooklyn has fought for the division lead all season
long, Syracuse was as many as 10 games out after the International League
All-Star game. However, as the pitching
for the Major League Mets stabilized after the All-Star break, so did Syracuse’s
as they rode the best second half pitching to the best second half record.
In yesterday’s 8-4 win over Rochester (box),
Harol Gonzalez improved to 6-0 giving up just one run on a home run, 4 hits, no
walks over 5 innings. Harol lowered his
ERA to 2.68 and continued to show he could handle AAA after his promotion from
AA.
I was thinking that Harol could go longer but apparently the
original plan was to have Harol pitch 4 innings and then have Chris Mazza for
4. Mazza came in the sixth and pitched
two scoreless innings. Adonis Uceta and
Tim Peterson closed the game out.
Syracuse scored single runs in the first, second, fifth, and
sixth, before breaking out with 4 runs in the seventh. Aaron Altherr led the attack with a 3 for 4
day and 4 RBIs. Arismenday Alcantara
added a home run and Jason Krizan had two doubles. Jed Lowrie played 5 innings at second base
and is expected to stay with the team through the playoffs.
Since Scranton/Wilkes-Barre lost to Buffalo, 5-3, Syracuse
now plays the tie braking game at 1 today at Scranton/Wilkes-Barre with Ervin Santana scheduled to start.
According to Lindsey
Kramer on Syracuse.com, the winner of that game travels to wildcard winner
Durham for games one and two of the best-of-5 series Wednesday and Thursday. If Syracuse qualifies for that series, it
will host game three on Friday and four and five, if necessary, on Saturday and
Sunday.
Pitching and timely hitting helps Brooklyn to a 4-1 win (box).
24-year-old West Islip, NY native, Frank Valentino, picked
the right time to have one of his best games of the year. Frank pitched 5.1
innings giving up just one hit, two walks, and one run, with 9 strikeouts. The Cyclones bullpen, Nick MacDonald, Hunter
Parsons, and Reyson Santos, then added 3.2 innings of shutout baseball with 7
strikeouts of their own.
With the game scoreless in the third, Brooklyn rallied. Jake Ortega and Antoine Duplantis
singled. Wilmer Reyes (2 for 3 with a
walk on the day) then doubled in Ortega and Jake Ritter then doubled in
Duplantis and Reyes. Brooklyn added a
run in the fourth when Robinson Cano’s hard grounder to first with the bases
loaded scored Brett Baty.
While Brooklyn won, Aberdeen beat Hudson Valley beat 1-0. This gave Brooklyn a first-place tie with the
Rays’ Hudson Valley Renegades. Since,
the Cyclones won the season series against them, Brooklyn is the division
winner and the first seed in the New York Penn league playoffs. They will play Wednesday at Hudson Valley,
Thursday in Brooklyn, and Friday in Brooklyn if necessary.
3 comments:
Your recaps are the bomb.
I cant wait until I get you press passes for AAA AA and LOW-A teams and we get one these every morning.
Excellent update.
Harol Gonzalez was 1-16 last year, 12-4 this year. Never say die.
Get Lowrie up to the big show after the one game run off. We need him.
Robbie can come back, too. Let the kids play for the title.
Also, hats off to undrafted Frank Valentino, from nearby (to me) West Islip. That was a heckuva start.
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