Top prospect Skenes has ‘bad outing’ in Double-A debut
Altoona Curve
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All eyes were on Altoona Saturday as the Curve took down the Akron RubberDucks with a walk-off 9-8 win in front of a record-setting crowd of 10,164 people at PNG Field.
Fans from far and wide packed the park to see the first overall pick of the 2023 Draft, RHP Paul Skenes make his Double-A debut.
It was a short-lived first start as Skenes went ª of an inning where he walked two and allowed three hits. He did manage two strikeouts despite dealing with command issues.
"His stuff is elite," Altoona manager Callix Crabbe said. "I thought it was probably trying to be a little too fine."
It was Skenes' first bad outing as a professional and only the third time dating back to his time at Louisiana State this year that he allowed more than four runs in a start.
For Skenes though, he's not considering his outing anything more than simply a bad outing.
"A bad outing is just a bad outing. It's just baseball," Skenes said. "Obviously I want to go out there and win and pitch as best as I can every outing and I'm going to do everything to prepare to do that."
Skenes gave up some soft contact hits and coupled with two walks, it made for an anticlimactic debut as he was pulled with two outs in the first inning.
"The beautiful thing is it's never as bad as it seems, and it's never as good as it seems," Skenes said. "Looking at the outcome today wasn't probably the best stuff and it wasn't the best execution but you know, they hit three balls through the infield under 90 miles an hour and nine times out of 10 I feel like those are outs."
The next time Skenes will toe the rubber is Friday in Erie, an opportunity to learn from his first Double-A experience.
"It's an opportunity to grow and go out there work on stuff for the next five days and go out and compete again in six days," Skenes said. "That's kind of the way I've looked at it through life, not just baseball, but it's an opportunity I'm going to come out better because of it."
Comeback Curve
While Skenes did not have his best stuff, the offense more than picked up the slack against the RubberDucks as they plated two in the home half of the first inning.
The Curve scored three in the second inning to take their first lead of the night.
Joe Perez and Matt Gorski paced the Altoona offense with three hits a piece and accounting for five of the Curve's nine runs. The 5-4 lead held up until the seventh when Akron plated three runs off Sean Sullivan.
Much like the first inning, Altoona responded in the home half as they scored two runs courtesy of Perez's two-run homer.
The RubberDucks scored a run in the eighth inning off Tyler Samaniego, but were unable to add to the lead in the final frame to set up late game heroics from the Curve.
In the ninth, Gorski doubled home Tsung-Che Cheng, who led off the inning by doubling. Perez singled to move Gorski to third, then it was an intentional walk to Matt Fraizer that forced the bases loaded with no outs.
Akron got Andres Alvarez to strike out and Connor Scott to pop out which set the stage for Bins.
Bins lined the 1-0 offering off the pitcher for the RubberDucks, Davis Sharpe. The ball ricocheted toward the foul line as Gorski sprinted home and the throw was not close, which sealed the deal and gave the Curve the walk-off win.
Fraizer stays hot
Matt Fraizer extended his hit-streak to 10 games with his RBI double in the first inning Saturday. Fraizer finished with a 2-for-4 night at the plate, an RBI and a walk.
On Sunday, Fraizer continued his streak with a 1-for-4 performance to push it to 11 games.
Skenes' schedule
At this time, Skenes is slated to remain in Altoona through the end of the Double-A regular season.
Pirates general manager Ben Cherington stated as much on his weekly radio show saying the plan is for him to stay with the Curve "for now."
That currently gets him three more starts with Altoona. Following his current schedule, he is expected to pitch Friday when the Curve play at Erie.
After that, he'd line up to pitch Thursday, Sept. 7 at PNG Field against Harrisburg and his former LSU teammate Dylan Crews.
It would not be completely out of the realm of possibility that he pitches in Indianapolis after the regular season in Altoona ends as its season runs an extra week.
Sunday scaries
On Sunday, the Curve scored first with a run in the second inning, but it went down hill after a grand slam in the third by Akron.
From there, the Altoona offense failed to muster much production outside of a run in the fifth inning. The RubberDucks plated two runs a piece in the seventh and eighth inning to give them a 9-2 advantage which remained through the final inning.
Next up
Altoona travels to Erie for the penultimate road series of the season. The Curve will return home to face the Harrisburg Senators next week.