Baby Bomber Recap 6/18/16: Drew Finley and Josh Roeder throw 10-inning no-hitter

Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders: W 7-1 vs. Gwinnett Braves

Luis Severino was in vintage form on the very same night he was honored with a Scranton bobblehead. He dominated the Braves from start to finish, going 8 1/3 innings on 104 pitches while allowing just three hits, one run, and three walks (which were reportedly caused by a tight strike zone). Severino struck out five batters and was still hitting 98 mph in the ninth inning. His Triple-A ERA is now down to 2.52 and he sure seems just about ready to return to the Yankees rotation whenever they want to recall him.

Meanwhile, the Scranton offense absolutely ravaged starter Chris Ellis. He didn’t even make it out of the first inning, as they plated five runs, highlighted by a two-run, opposite-field wallop from Aaron Judge. Tyler Austin doubled home Gary Sanchez (who doubled himself), a sacrifice fly scored Jake Cave, and a bases-loaded walk clinched the fifth run, driving Ellis from the game. Judge manufactured another run in the second when after a walk, he stole second, moved to third on a bad throw, and scored on a fly ball from Sanchez. The big right fielder is now hitting .249/.332/.419 on the season. The final run scored when Sanchez roped his second double of the game in the eighth and Cave tripled him in. Each has an OPS well over .800.

Double-A Trenton Thunder: W 4-3 vs. Binghamton Mets

On most other nights, Dietrich Enns’ outing would have received top billing. The 25-year-old southpaw has been tremendous this year, and he kept the good vibes rolling by twirling seven innings of one-hit shutout ball. Enns yielded just two walks while striking out seven B-Mets on 98 pitches. He now has a 1.77 ERA on the year in 13 starts between Trenton and Scranton. Decent.

Staked to a 2-0 lead thanks to a two-run double from Miguel Andujar, Enns turned the game over to Cale Coshow in the eighth with the confidence that he would also keep up his good 2016 vibes. Although he allowed two hits and a walk, the three runs allowed were not entirely Coshow’s fault—they were unearned since Michael O’Neill misplayed a ball in center for an error that scored two, and an error on a later play by Cito Culver plated a third. Trenton got him off the hook by tying it at 3-3 in the eighth on a Lane Adams double and a sacrifice fly. Then in the ninth, a leadoff walk to Culver proved fateful; after a Dustin Fowler single (one of his two hits), he scored the walk-off run on an Andujar fly ball.

High-A Tampa Yankees: Off for the FSL All-Star Game. Jorge Mateo did do this though!

Low-A Charleston RiverDogs: L 3-4 vs. West Virginia Power (12 innings)

Only one Yankees farm club lost yesterday, and even then it was a hard-fought battle. All three of Charleston’s runs came via the long ball. Third baseman Angel Aguilar put them on the board with a solo blast in the fourth (his eighth of 2016), and 18-year-old phenom Leonardo Molina jolted a two-run shot of his own in the fifth. Each time Charleston put runs on the board though, West Virginia immediately matched them in the home half against starter Daris Vargas.

So the game was tied at 3-3 in the sixth. The score would remain deadlocked for another six innings as the bullpens took over. Charleston managed just two hits from the eighth inning onward; no one had a multi-hit game. Hobie Harris covered 3 2/3 scoreless in relief of Vargas, but Jose Mesa Jr. could only preserve the lead into the 12th. A two-out double was followed by a walk-off single from Logan Ratledge, ending the long minor league night.

Short Season-A Staten Island Yankees: W 2-1 vs. Brooklyn Cyclones (10 innings)

The younger Yankees of New York sure know how to put on a show. One day after winning their season opener in a wild 20-inning affair in Brooklyn, Staten Island celebrated its own home opener with New York-Penn League history. It was an inauspicious beginning when Brooklyn plated a run in the first on a hit by pitch, a walk, a fielder’s choice, and a walk pitch. Staten Island shook it off to tie it up in the fourth via a Kane Sweeney double and an RBI single from Timmy Robinson, a 21st rounder from 2016.

As the night went on though, it became apparent that something strange was afoot. Staten Island starter Drew Finley might have allowed that first-inning run, but he held Brooklyn hitless through all six innings of work with five strikeouts. In fact, the Yankees’ top high school pick of the 2015 draft departed the game having retired 15 Cyclones in a row. Reliever Josh Roeder took over and was even more stingy. Although he was an unheralded arm from the 2015 draft with mixed results in Staten Island last year, Roeder was simply dominant on this night, striking out 10 of the 12 hitters he faced. He was perfect.

In the bottom of the 10th inning, Sweeney’s second hit of the day secured an amazing feat when Dalton Blaser scored the winning run. Remarkably, Finley and Roeder combined on a 10-inning no-hitter, the first extra innings no-no in the 77-year history of the NYPL. It was just the second no-hitter in the Staten Island Yankees’ 17-year existence after Jason Arnold’s masterpiece on July 27, 2001 (which he said took 121 pitches, something that would never happen in the NYPL today).

Sometimes, the minor leagues are simply amazing.

Above: Playlist of three videos from Staten Island’s no-hitter: Finley and Roeder’s last outs, and the walk-off single by Sweeney to clinch it in the 10th.