Joe Musgrove has frustrated Midland, Frisco and San Antonio since being promoted to Class AA in June.
Wednesday night he set his sights on an Arkansas Travelers team mired in their longest losing streak of the season.
The Corpus Christi right-hander gave up home runs to Sherman Johnson and Anthony Bemboom, but otherwise held Arkansas scoreless on 2 hits while striking out 7 over 6 innings in the Hooks' 7-3 victory at Dickey-Stephens Park in North Little Rocking.
The outing improved the former first-round draft pick to 4-0 in seven Class AA starts while lowering his ERA to 2.20. Musgrove, the Houston Astros' No. 10 overall prospect according to MLB.com, was so good for 99 of his 101 pitches that he wasn't all that upset about the two home runs, the second of which gave the Travs a 2-0 lead in the second inning.
"You never want to give up home runs," Musgrove said. "But, absolutely, you can handle those. I try to attack the zone and keep the walks down, because if guys get on base those home runs turn into two, three runs."
He didn't have to worry about that much Wednesday. After Johnson's home run to lead off the first, his sixth of the year, Musgrove gave up a two-out double to Blake Gailen but left him stranded. Bemboom's second-inning home run, his fourth of year, came with two outs, and Drew Maggi followed with a groundout to end the threat.
After that, Johnson led off the third with a single but didn't advance and Musgrove gave up a two-out walk to Gailen in the sixth but struck out Brian Hernandez to end his outing.
Chris Cotton and Vincent Velasquez, who has made nine appearances for the Astros this season, allowed one unearned run over the final three innings as the Travs lost their seventh consecutive game.
"It seems like we don't take care of the baseball one night and there are too many free passes another," Arkansas Manager Bill Richardson said. "We can't give out free passes like we did and expect to beat a team like this. Our guys know it, as well as you."
Arkansas starter Chris Ellis gave up 3 runs on 4 hits while walking 6 over 5 innings. He walked four batters and hit another in Corpus Christi's two-run third and gave up consecutive doubles in a one-run fifth. In the eighth, reliever Danny Reynolds walked a batter and gave up a single before he had to leave with what Richardson called a hip flexor injury.
Hyatt walked the first two batters he faced before Teoscar Hernandez hit a two-run single to give the Hooks a 7-2 lead.
The Travs' seven-game losing streak followed a four-game winning streak that put them three games ahead of Springfield in the second-half Texas League North Division standings. Since then they have lost once to Northwest Arkansas, four times at Springfield and the first two games of the series against Corpus Christi.
Now the Travs trail the Cardinals by one game with 24 to play.
"Disappointed? Yes," Richardson said. "But I konw the same team a week ago is this same team. The effort level is there. We'll figure it out. We've got a lot of baseball left."
Richardson pointed to today's starter, Los Angeles Angels top overall prospect Sean Newcomb, as a reason for optimism.
"What you need is somebody to stand up say, 'Let's stop the madness,' " Richardson said. "We need to get off the schneid, and to do that we need some guys to step up."
MISSIONS 8, NATURALS 1
A four-run fifth inning and a three-run seventh inning were more than enough for San Antonio starter Ronald Herrera on Wednesday night as the Missions cruised past the Northwest Arkansas Naturals in front of an announced crowd of 2,930 at Arvest Ballpark in Springdale.
Herrera (2-0) struck out 8 and allowed 1 run off 4 hits over 8 innings before handing it over in the ninth to Cody Hebner, who didn’t allow a hit.
Naturals starter Kyle Zimmer (1-2) took the loss, allowing 3 earned runs on 2 hits over 4 1/3 innings.
The Missions (20-26) used four singles, two walks and a sacrifice fly to take a 4-0 lead in the fifth inning. Adolfo Reina, Casey McElroy and Albert Martinez had run-scoring singles in the inning, and Benji Gonzalez brought in the other run with a sacrifice fly.
San Antonio added three more in the seventh inning.
Benino Pruneda hit Adolfo Reina with a pitch to lead off the inning. Back-toback singles by Gonzalez and Luis Domoromo loaded the bases before Pruneda hit plunked McElroy to bring a run. Martinez followed with a single to center to drive in Gonzalez to chase Pruneda, and Yeison Asencio grounded into a forceout to score Domoromo and give the Missions a 7-0 lead.
The Naturals (16-29) scored their lone run in the eighth on Raul Mondesi’s sacrifice fly that drove in Zane Evans.
Asencio added a run-scoring single in the ninth to cap the scoring.
Asencio was 3 for 5 with 1 run scored to lead the Missions, who outhit the Naturals 10-4.
— Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Sports on 08/13/2015