Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, August 20, 1995 TAG: 9508210115
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RAY COX STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
As it was, his Salem Avalanche colleagues gave him four runs with which to work. Wright, in turn, gave the Winston-Salem Warthogs nine innings of anguish.
Wright butted right up against his pitch limit, but came in under the wire with a seven-hitter and his second complete game of the year as Salem beat Winston-Salem 4-0 on Saturday night at Salem Memorial Baseball Stadium.
A gallery of 4,515 applauded as the Avalanche (27-28) re-mained in a second-place tie with Durham, 11/2 games behind front-running Kinston in the Southern Division of the Carolina League. Kinston trimmed Frederick 1-0 to halt a three-game losing streak. Durham kept pace with a 3-2 triumph over Lynchburg. Winston-Salem (26-29) fell 21/2 games in arrears.
Derek Botelho, Winston-Salem's pitching coach, compared 6-foot-5 Wright to the circuit's best pitchers.
``He's outstanding,'' Botelho said of Wright, the Colorado Rockies' top pick (28th overall) in the 1993 draft. ``For me, he's the same as [Kinston's Bartolo] Colon. Colon might throw a few miles per hour faster, but Wright's got the same kind of stuff.''
Bill Hayes, the Avalanche's manager, came perilously close to pulling Wright.
``A couple of pitches away,'' he said. ``But he wasn't coming out until he hit 120 pitches and he was just under that. That was probably the best he's pitched as a professional. I know it's the best he's pitched since he's been here.''
One of the many attributes the 20-year-old right-hander brings the team is the ability to give it a good outing even when he is not pitching at peak efficiency. On Saturday, Wright was hampered by an ugly blister on the long, slender middle finger of his pitching hand.
``I couldn't snap my slider off the way I usually do,'' he said. ``But then maybe that was the reason for the success I had.''
Or it might have been the fastball.
``It was average the first five or six innings,'' he said. ``But then I got into a rhythm and I got stronger. My fastball was better in the last few innings than it was in the first or the second.''
The Avalanche only had four hits, three of those off Warthogs left-hander Todd Ruyak, who once pitched for the University of Virginia. The key might have been Salem's first run, which came on a two-out scoring single by Vicente Garcia. The Avalanche is 40-15 when it scores first.
``I figured after we scored that first run we had them if I did my job,'' Wright said. ``The defense has been getting it done all year.''
Garcia, unable to play second base because of a sore knee, went 2-for-3 with a sacrifice as the designated hitter.
Salem broke open the game in the fifth and sixth innings. Forry Wells led off the fifth with a single, took second on a passed ball, was sacrificed to third by Steven Bernhardt, then scored on a fielder's choice.
``We did the little things like Wells getting a good jump toward home before he scored,'' Hayes said.
NOTES: The game got off to a sour start for the Warthogs when manager Mark Berry was ejected shortly after intervening on behalf of Winston-Salem's Ray Brown, who was arguing balls and strikes after looking at strike three to end the Warthogs' half of the first. As Berry was presenting his case, Winston-Salem's Aaron Boone, who was on second base, was tossed for airing his views.
NOTE: Please see microfilm for scores.
by CNB