When the White Sox promoted Christian Oppor from Kannapolis to Winston-Salem, they made room in the Dash rotation by sending Seth Keener back to Low-A.
Oppor made his Dash debut in Brooklyn against the Cyclones, where he made it through three scoreless innings on 52 pitches despite walking a batter in every frame. His line took a turn in the fourth, when he reached his pitch limit on Ronald Hernandez's weak grounder to the left side. Arxy Hernandez tried to cut off the ball and throw the ball to first in one motion, but he failed on the pickup part of it, and that left the bases loaded with still two outs. Frankeli Arias then entered and allowed all three inherited runners to score on a walk and a two-run single.
That ending put the worst possible spin on Oppor's debut:
- With luck: 4 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 4 BB, 3 K
- Without it: 3.2 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 4 BB, 3 K
As for Keener, he turned in five innings of two-run ball at Kannapolis on Wednesday, but that's something he did plenty of last year, so you won't be able to judge progress from the box scores.
Gwinnett 7, Charlotte 4
- Austin Slater singled and struck out twice.
- Korey Lee was 1-for-5 with two strikeouts.
- Mike Tauchman, 0-for-4 with two strikeouts.
- Kyle Teel was 1-for-3 with a walk.
- Colson Montgomery avoided striking out in a Triple-A game for the first time this season while going 1-for-4 with a double.
- Wikelman González: 1 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 0 K, 1 WP, 16 of 27 pitches for strikes.
Birmingham 1, Chattanooga 0
- Rikuu Nishida went 0-for-3 with a sac bunt.
- William Bergolla, 0-for-4.
- Wilfred Veras and Ryan Galanie both were 0-for-3 with a strikeout.
- DJ Gladney homered, walked and struck out.
- Jacob Gonzalez was 0-for-3 with two strikeouts.
- Riley Gowens: 6 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K, 48 of 67 pitches for strikes.
- Grant Taylor in relief: 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, 10 of 17 pitches for strikes.
Brooklyn 7, Winston-Salem 2
- Jeral Perez was 0-for-3 with a walk and a strikeout.
- Braden Montgomery went 1-for-3 with his fourth High-A homer and a walk.
- Samuel Zavala went 0-for-3 with a walk and two strikeouts. He was also caught stealing.
- Christian Oppor's Dash debut: 3.2 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 4 BB, 3 K, 46 of 79 pitches for strikes.
Highlights:
*Montgomery's blast:
Kannapolis 14, Hickory 3
- Caleb Bonemer was 0-for-4 with a walk, sac fly and three strikeouts.
- Lyle Miller-Green went 0-for-4 with a sac fly and two strikeouts.
- George Wolkow, 2-for-5 with his second homer and a strikeout.
- Ryan Burrowes homered, singled, walked thrice and stole a base.
- Abraham Nuñez went 1-for-3 with two walks and a strikeout.
- Seth Keener's return to Low-A: 5 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 5 K, 1 WP, 49 of 77 pitches for strikes.
Highlights:
*The camera work on Wolkow's homer leaves it entirely up to the imagination with regards to how far it went.
