Tribe pitching prospect bringing heat for Captains

Captains pitcher Daniel Espino stared in toward home plate and catcher Angel Lopez at Classic Park on Aug. 14.

It was the top of the fifth inning in the opener of a doubleheader against the West Michigan Whitecaps.

Espino, a 20-year-old righthander from Panama with a fastball that sits in the mid90s and often registers 100 mph on the radar gun, was facing West Michigan designated hitter Ray Rivera.

Two innings earlier, the left-handed batting Rivera had turned on a 97 mph fastball from Espino and driven the ball well beyond the wall in right-center field to give the Whitecaps a 1-0 lead.

This time, Espino won the battle, firing a 98 mph fastball past the 6-foot6, 220-pound Rivera for a swinging third strike and the first out of the inning.

“He took me deep in that first at-bat when I left a fastball on the middle of the plate. This is professional baseball. You make a mistake, and they will hit it a long way,” Espino said in a postgame interview outside the Lake County clubhouse.

“The next time, I got him,” Espino added, smiling. “That’s the beauty of the sport and why I love this game.”

The home run by Reyes was the only hit surrendered by Espino in a 2-0 loss to the Whitecaps. In an otherwise impressive outing that covered five innings, Espino notched 11 strikeouts while surrendering one walk.

Selected by the Indians with the 24th overall pick in the 2019 draft, Espino is ranked by mlb.com as the sixth-best prospect in the Indians’ organization.

In six starts for the HighA Captains since being promoted from the LowA Lynchburg (Va.) Hillcats on July 12, the 6-foot2, 205-pound Espino is 1-4 with a 4.50 ERA.

Those relatively mundane numbers belie the promise being shown by Espino in his second professional season. Using a pitch mix that includes a four-seam fastball, slider, curve and changeup, he’s posted 120 strikeouts against 35 walks in 16 combined starts covering 70 2/3 innings.

He recorded his first win as a Captains Aug. 21 against the Dayton Dragons, striking out 10 while yielding one hit in five innings.

“I have a lot of confidence in my fastball, but I love all of my pitches,” he said.

Espino’s journey to Eastlake began in Panama, where he grew up as the youngest of three sons of Danilo and Xiomara Espino.

His father is a physician who has earned plaudits for his treatment of patients with diabetes. Xiomara Espino was a an accomplished athlete and competitive softball player.

To hear Espino tell the story, from an early age he knew what he wanted to do with his life.

At 3, while watching his older brother Eduardo’s team play a youth baseball game, he donned the catcher’s gear between innings and was ready to run out on the field and join the bigger boys.

When he was 10, with the blessing of his parents, he left Panama and moved to Miami to live with a family friend, play organized baseball and get a taste of stateside culture.

“I couldn’t hit at all, but I played shortstop and my defense was really good,” Espino said. “I believed I would one day be in the major leagues.”

Although he moved back to Panama after one year in Florida, Espino returned four years later to attend a baseball summer camp in Albany, Ga. He subsequently enrolled at Georgia Premier Academy, a prep school that in addition to academics has a highlyregarded baseball program geared to developing players for the college and professional levels.

By the time he was in Georgia Premier Academy, Espino had given up playing in the field to focus on pitching. He credited head coach Gene Reynolds and pitching coach Gary Cates with honing his baseball talents. They also encouraged him to take care of school work and polish his command of the English language.

“I wasn’t thinking about getting drafted by a bigleague club,” Espino said. “I was trusting in the process, trusting in God.”

Espino knew the Indians were high on him when they brought him to Cleveland in late May 2019, one week prior to the first-year player draft.

“They showed me around the city and the ballpark. It was pretty exciting,” Espino said.

Shortly after the Indians made him the first Panamanian ever to be taken in the first round, Espino agreed to a $2.5 signing bonus and began his professional career with rookie-league Arizona.

When the 2020 minorleague season was cancelled due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, the Indians assigned Espino to the alternate site team stationed at Classic Park.

“It was only three months, but it was great to be around a lot of major leaguers and Triple-A guys,” Espino said. “I got to pick their brains and see how they went about their business. I learned a lot about the city and about the grind of coming to the ballpark every day to get in your work.”

There was some thought Espino, given his draft status and experience at the alternate site, would open the 2021 season with Lake County. He was assigned to Lynchburg instead.

“I only think about what I can control,” he said. “The front office knows what they are doing. They have a plan. It didn’t matter where I was. This is a beautiful game, and I am blessed to be playing it.”

Espino is determined to maintain that grounded attitude now that he’s with the Captains and one step closer toward his hoped-for debut in a Cleveland uniform.

“Everybody has goals. Getting to the big leagues has been my dream since I was a boy,” he said.

“I stay humble and think about what I can do to get better today. When the time comes, I will be ready. Nothing can stop me.”