Davis’ effort rewarded at last
Noah Davis pitched like a winner in all but one of his first seven starts this season for the Dayton Dragons. But the W never appeared next to his name in the box score.
Wednesday at Day Air Ballpark was different. Davis pitched effectively again, but this time he was the winner. He got just enough run support and help from the bullpen in a 3-2 Dragons win over Fort Wayne.
Davis (1-4) allowed one hit and one walk over six innings and struck out seven, lower
ing his ERA to 3.35. He’s now had at least seven strikeouts in five starts and allowed one earned run in four starts.
“Noah was in control of the situation, and I’m happy for him because the last three or four outings he was working real hard and he never gets the W,” manager Jose Moreno said.
Davis, rated the Reds’ No. 15 prospect by Base- ball America, has shown why wins, especially when starters rarely pitch past the fifth or sixth innings, aren’t a good measure of how well a pitcher has thrown. The Dragons had won two of his starts. Both times he didn’t pitch the requisite five innings needed to earn the win. And three of his losses are by one run.
“I’m very surprised how he can control his emotion,” Moreno said of the 24-year- old from California. “He’s very mature, he knows what he’s doing. He knows that sometimes the outcome — the wins and losses — is not in his control. He just tries to do a really good job for us
and tries to keep the team close and get the W.”
The Dragons (22-16) won
their second straight game and have won six of their last eight to maintain their hold on first place in the High-A Central League East Division. The Dragons lead
Lake County (20-18) by two games.
The Dragons took a 1-0 lead in the second on Miguel Hernandez’s sacrifice fly. Hernandez extended his hitting streak to 10 games with a single in the fourth that precededan RBI single by Quin Cotton. Hernandez then scored on a balk for a 3-0 lead. He is batting .395 during the streak.
“He finds barrels even when he’s off-balance,” Moreno said of Hernandez. “He’s putting together real good at-bats for us in key situations. And defen- sively he’s played a very solid shortstop.”
Hernandez committed a fielding error in the fifth, but with two out and runners on first and second he went far to his right and made a difficult throw to first to end the inning. He made a crowd-pleasing leaping grab of a line drive in the sixth.
The TinCaps, who had four hits, scored single runs in the seventh and eighth against
Matt Gill. Francis Peguero finished the eighth with a grounder and pitched a per- fect ninth, striking out two, for his fourth save. He lowered his ERA to 0.73.
Tello back: Catcher Jose Tello was back in the lineup after returning from the injured list Tuesday. Tello singled on the first pitch he saw, reached on an error on the second pitch he saw and finished 1-for-4 with two runs. He replaced first base- man Bren Spillane, who was assigned to extended spring training in Arizona. Spillane, a third-round draft pick in 2018, batted .154 with two homers in 26 at-bats this season. In Dayton in 2019, he hit .207 with five homers in 213 at-bats.
Rotation change: Car- son Spiers starts today and replace Spencer Stockton, who is going to the bullpen. Spiers was a starter in low-A Daytona before joining the Dragons on May 26. Spiers, a non-drafted free agent signee from Clemson last year, pitched six scoreless innings in relief and allowed one hit June 8.
Attendance update: The Dragons are steadily draw- ing more fans since the park was opened to full capacity June 8. Wednesday’s game was the third-largest crowd and largest weeknight crowd at 5,863.