Tuesday, October 7, 2008

Hughes Dominates in AFL Opener

Phil Hughes started the Arizona Fall League opener for the Peoria Javelinas in their 10-3 victory over the Surprise Rafters. He dominated the Rafters in five innings of work allowed no runs on just one hit, walked five and struck out seven. He threw 86 pitches, 49 of them for strikes. As you can tell by his high walk total he was a little wild, but that's probably because he hasn't started since Sept. 24th in Toronto, and all in all it was a good start. Here's the box score and the recap.

"It was good. It's been a little bit since my last start, so I'm trying to work out a little bit of rust," Hughes said.

"The walks were a result of not being out there in a while. My fastball command wasn't what I would've liked it to have been, but you expect that after not having stepped on the mound in a game situation. My breaking ball was working and, when I got ahead, everything seemed to fall into place."

Austin Jackson also had a good game; he went 2-for-4 with a triple and four RBI. And infielder Kevin Russo went 0-for-3 with a walk, a stolen base, and a run scored.

7 Comments:

Mike said...

He better "dominate". He's supposed to be a major league pitcher. I would be very concerned if he couldn't handle minor leaguers.

Greg Cohen said...

True.

Anonymous said...

How come you wern't like this in the beinging? Good job.

Greg Cohen said...

Yea I know we all wanted more from Hughes this year, but his rib injury, plus all the pressure killed him this year. Next year should be very different. I still think Hughes can be a very good MLB pitcher.

Anonymous said...

You're right. He is only 21 years old and I think that he can be a very great pitcher.

Anonymous said...

Austin Jackson seemed to have a good day as well. When he gets called up, he better be worth somthing to the team.

Greg Cohen said...

They're looking at Jackson as their starting center fielder in 2010.