Starting off strong
Montgomery sharp in first MLB action
Jordan Montgomery had four hours to think about the biggest start of his life. The rookie left-hander arrived at Yankee Stadium at 9 a.m. Wednesday, drank a few cups of coffee, ate breakfast, and pondered “how awesome” his afternoon was going to be as he prepared to face the Rays in his major league debut.
“You get in this locker room, you get in this stadium, you’re around all these guys, it’s something I’ll never forget,” the 24year-old native of Sumter, S.C., said.
The more he thought about it, however, the more nervous he got. Montgomery said he hadn’t felt that way since pitching in the College World Series his freshman year at South Carolina.
“Usually I like getting to the field early on [starting] days, just so I can settle in, and kind of relax,” Montgomery said. “But it was a little tense today.” He didn’t show it. Mixing four pitches to both sides of the plate, the 6-foot-6 lefty was at his best when in trouble. Giving up a long home run didn’t rattle him, neither did facing Yankees killer Evan Longoria with men on base.
While his final numbers weren’t necessarily memorable — he worked 4 2/3 innings, struck out seven, allowed five hits, walked two and gave up two earned runs — Montgomery kept the Yankees in the game until the offense finally came through in the later innings, powering their way to an 8-4 victory.
Most importantly, he limited the damage, showing the composure, poise and pitch unpredictability that impressed the Yankees.
Afterwards, manager Joe Girardi said Montgomery, a major spring-training surprise who beat out the likes of Chad Green and Luis Cessa to get the first crack at the No. 5 starter role, will get another turn in the rotation.
“He looks like someone who can help us for quite some time,” general manager Brian Cashman said.
Montgomery, the team’s fourth-round pick in the 2014 draft, was at his best when in trouble.
In both the third and fourth innings, he stranded two runners. He struck out Evan Longoria and Rickie Weeks Jr., who had homered off him in the first inning, to get out of the first jam, and then retired Peter Bourjos to end the second one. In the fifth inning, Montgomery was touched up for a leadoff double by Steven Souza Jr., but rebounded to strike out Kevin Kiermaier and Longoria, before being taken out.
“I noticed especially last year catching him in [Triple-A Scranton Wilkes/ Barre], he always takes it to another level when he’s in a little bit of trouble,” said catcher Kyle Higashioka, who made his first major league start.
Weeks made Montgomery pay for one major mistake — he hit a thigh-high 2-2 fastball that got too much of the plate for a long two-run homer in the first inning, but it didn’t shake the young left-hander. He retired the next five hitters.
“That’s something I learned at South Carolina,” said Montgomery, who thew 89 pitches, 61 for strikes. “You can’t let that kind of stuff snowball.”