Arkansas Travelers starter Levi Stoudt was gone by the time Kaden Polcovich swung and missed at the night's 337th and final pitch, just more than three hours after he'd thrown the night's first.
By that point, his start had become irrelevant.
The Travelers had dug their way out of a 6-1 deficit at Dickey-Stephens Park in North Little Rock, tying the game on a wild pitch down to their final out in the bottom of the ninth inning -- only to surrender a game-winning three-run homer a half-inning later as the Frisco RoughRiders won 9-6 in 10 innings Tuesday night.
But Manager Collin Cowgill wasn't about to forget the walks.
"The one thing with Levi is he just can't afford to walk guys," Cowgill said as he headed for the clubhouse. "The walks cost us, but he did a pretty good job of bouncing back there and getting us through five [innings]."
Stoudt's two first-inning walks weren't necessarily damaging -- the Travs erased the first on a double play and escaped the inning with another groundout -- but they were a foreboding sign of control issues to come.
The RoughRiders were able to lock in for two hard-hit singles in the top of the third, sandwiched around another walk. Dustin Harris then launched a grand slam before Stoudt could even get an out in the inning.
Entering the game, Stoudt had walked 14 batters in 602/3 innings. But with four walks and four strikeouts against Frisco on Tuesday night, his strikeout-to-walk ratio dropped from 4.43 to 3.67, sliding him out of the top five in the Texas League.
Not all was bad, though. Stoudt retired nine of the final 11 batters he faced, allowing only one hit after the grand slam.
It helped that his velocity was up in the mid-to-high 90s -- something that Travs pitching coach Sean McGrath said a couple of weeks ago is the product of an adjusted recovery plan that allows Stoudt to build up to each start.
"He pitches with four [above-average] pitches," McGrath explained. "You can see with your eyes -- he's got a fastball that's got true riding life to it. The slider is outrageously good. The change-up flashes and the curveballs come in as well."
Tuesday wasn't exactly the norm for Stoudt. He hadn't walked more than four in any of his previous 12 starts and he'd held opponents to three or fewer runs in nine of those games.
But the Seattle Mariners' 2019 third-round selection has now allowed at least three runs in all four of his June starts and he's yet to pitch into the sixth inning in any of those outings.
Perhaps it's not alarming -- Stoudt doesn't turn 25 until December, had Tommy John surgery in late 2019 and didn't pitch at all in 2020 -- yet there's pressure to excel. Not only is he listed as the Mariners' No. 6 overall prospect, he's part of a rotation that includes three of the organization's top young arms.
"For the most part, [Levi's] giving us really quality work," McGrath said. "We're looking at the totality of [the season] and the bad starts are in there. What's more important is he's doing a really good job of picking the ball up every fifth or sixth day."