The Knights lost 12-9 to Gwinnett on Sunday, but Jake Burger and Seby Zavala hit two-run homers and Zack Burdi looked strong — early — in his first appearance of the season.
Jimmy Lambert made his second start of the season but was pulled after 1.2 innings and just 37 pitches as the Knights continue to be cautious with his return from Tommy John surgery. Five relievers followed including Kyle Kubat (2 ER over 4.1 innings), Tyler Johnson (2 ER over 0.1 innings), Hunter Schryver (1 ER in 1.2 innings), Zack Burdi (3 ER in 1.1 innings), and Tanner Banks (0 ER in 0.2 innings).
Burdi made his much-anticipated 2021 debut, showing a fastball that sat 98, and good control. Burdi retired all three batters he faced in the 9th, with two strikeouts, before losing the strike zone in the 10th with three walks.
Week in Review — Hitting
Gwinnett was possibly the worst possible opponent for the Knights’ young hitters to face right out of the gate. The Stripers feature one of if not the best pitching staff in the league, with several arms with MLB experience.
Nor were the Stripers on such restrictive pitch counts like so many Knights. While Charlotte manager Wes Helms was calling to the bullpen for several guys making their Triple-A debut, Gwinnett was able to turn to quality starters like Bryce Wilson, Kyle Wright, Kyle Muller and Tucker Davidson, along with veteran relievers like Sean Newcomb, Victor Arano, Chasen Bradford, Jesse Chavez, Nate Jones, Chris Martin and Edgar Santana.
As a result, the Knights hit just .227, with eight home runs and 28 RBIs for the six-game series.
“These guys haven’t played in a while,” Helms said of the young hitters that dominate his line-up. “Gwinnett came out, they are a good team.”
Week In Review — Pitching
The Knights’ pitching staff was doomed to fail in its first six-game homestand of the season. And it pretty much did.
Both Jimmy Lambert and Jonathan Stiever were on very limited pitch counts, such that Lambert didn’t get out of the second inning in either of his starts, and Stiever pitched just three innings in his start. Add a start in which Felix Paulino only recorded two outs, two extra inning games and an opponent that featured several talented major league hitters that punished pitchers for mistakes, and the result was an over-worked bullpen that got beat up pretty bad.
Gwinnett hit .288 for the series, with 54 RBIs and 15 home runs in the six games against the Knights.
Prospect Watch
Gavin Sheets looked terrific, squaring up a lot of balls and looking very confident at the plate. Sheets was 8-26 (.308), with one home run, two doubles, seven RBIs, two walks and eight strikeouts.
“Sheets had a good first series,” Helms said of his star slugger. “He sees what Triple-A is doing to him, he’ll make the adjustments on how they are attacking him, especially lefty on lefty. He is going to be a big RBI guy.”
The Gavin Sheets outfield experiment also began this week. Sheets started three games in right field, with no miscues and one nice catch on a ball hit in the right field corner.
Jake Burger also made a successful return to the field after essentially a three-year absence. Like Sheets, he squared up multiple balls and looked locked in at the plate, despite hitting just 1-for-12 for the week. That one hit was a home run. But he hit two other balls to the warning track and only struck out once.
Burger was removed from Opening Day in the fourth inning after feeling tightness in his quad when running the bases. He then missed the next three games as the team takes an understandably cautious approach with him.
Seby Zavala appeared in five of the six games, and swung the bat well, going 7-for-22 (.318), with two home runs, three doubles, two walks and 11 strikeouts. Zavala also had a good week defensively behind the plate.
Blake Rutherford’s adjustment to Triple-A started slowly last week, going 4-for-21 with one home run, one double, three walks and eight strikeouts. “Rutherford will make the adjustments on how he is being pitched,” Helms said. “He came in today (Sunday) and got a big RBI for us in the last inning.”
“These guys just have to play and adjust to how they are being pitched,” Helms said of his young hitters. “They need to face this level of competition, these studs on the mound. You’ll see those guys get better and better each series this year.”
Meanwhile, among others, Joel Booker looked over-matched at the plate at times against a talented Gwinnett pitching staff. Yet he still impressed in so many other ways. He had perhaps the top defensive play of the week, stretching out to snare a sinking line drive in the outfield. He is the fastest player on the team, and may be the team’s best bunter.
Luis Gonzalez remains on the IL, but is likely to come off this week.
On the mound, Jonathan Stiever turned in one of the best performances of the week, tossing three innings of one-hit ball, with four strikeouts. Helms said he pulled Stiever at the top of the fourth because the righty had to throw a lot of pitches in the third inning.
Jimmy Lambert also looked healthy in his return to the mound, with excellent velocity, in two obviously abbreviated starts — he was pulled in the second inning in both games as the team exercises extreme caution with him. Likewise, Zack Burdi was dominant in his first inning of the week, though he lost his ability to throw strikes in his second inning and had to be removed.
Among others, it was a nice first week for Kyle Kubat, Tanner Banks and Hunter Schryver while Tyler Johnson and Tayron Guerrero struggled with command.
A Look Ahead
The Norfolk Tides (Orioles) come to town for six games this week in what should be a much more competitive series. While last week’s opponent, Gwinnett, carries multiple veterans to provide emergency depth for a competitive major league club, the Orioles are rebuilding and its Triple-A affiliate is filled with prospects.
But Helms and pitching coach Matt Zaleski will still be quite careful with the staff in week two of the season as the players continue to build arm strength, so it could be another challenging week as caution and prudence take precedence over wins and losses.
If one or more starters is knocked out early and/or if there are one or more extra inning games, especially in the game before or after Jimmy Lambert pitches, given his short leash, it could be another long week for the pitching staff. Helms and Zaleski will likely turn to Mike Wright and Matt Tomshaw to eat a lot of innings in their starts, regardless of the results.
Reinforcements to the team arrive this week, including outfielders Nick Williams and Luis Gonzalez (probably) and pitcher Alex McRae. “Williams and Gonzalez are two big bats for us,” Helms said, “and give me more options on the bench.”
Overview/Outlook
It was a brutal week. Players were playing multiple games for the first time in years. Several Knights were making their Triple-A debuts. The opponent was knee-deep in MLB veterans.
And players and coaches were learning and adjusting, often on the fly, to a lot of Covid precautions that complicated so many team activities. While the coaches were fully vaccinated, the players received their second vaccines just last weekend, so the team was especially cautious because the players are not yet fully protected.
For example, even something as simple as a post-game interview was challenging. Although Helms, the players and the media were in the same ballpark, all interviews had to be done by Zoom in accordance with MLB guidelines.
But Helms believes in his players, and they clearly enjoy playing for him. “On the positive side,” Helms said, “the guys battled all week. Not one time did I see the players stop battling even as we were getting our tails kicked. That’s huge for me. If I see that, then I’m fine.”
It will help that the Knights are home for this week as well. They now know what to expect, how to do what they need to do to prepare — and what they need to work on.
“We’ll make a game plan on Tuesday,” Helms explained. “There’s a lot of things we need to work on on the hitting side, on the pitching side and defensive side.”
In addition to individual adjustments that his hitters need to make, he said the team will address address hitting with two strikes, as well as “situational hitting, with runner on second or third and less than two outs. Those things are huge when you are trying to piece together a big inning.
“On the pitching side,” Helms said, “we need to continue to work on location. And stick to the game plan. Those are the little things that add up over a series. If you work on those and get better at it, you start to see the team do better each game.”
Photo credit: Sean Williams/FutureSox
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