Modesto pitcher tosses a 2-hitter

Rodriguez whiffs 10

By BRIAN VanderBEEK
bvanderbeek@modbee.com

last updated: June 03, 2008 03:50:05 AM

All you need to know about the upside of young Modesto right-hander Aneury Rodriguez is this:

There have been two nine-inning shutouts thrown this season in the California League. Rodriguez has both.

The lanky Dominican allowed two singles, faced 28 batters, struck out 10 and needed only 103 pitches to dispatch High Desert 1-0 on Monday night at John Thurman Field.

"Yeah, I did both," the soft-spoken and unflappable 20-year-old said. "They felt the same. In both games, I was throwing the curveball a lot and getting strikes. My change of speeds was working well."

His other shutout came May 11, at home against Lake Elsinore, when Rodriguez (5-4) used 107 pitches in a one-hit, six-strikeout effort. To further measure his feat, Modesto had only one complete-game shutout the entire 2007 season -- a two-hitter by Brandon Hynick on April 30 at Inland Empire.

Despite being the youngest player on the team -- the only Nut not yet 21 -- Rodriguez put on a clinic of the type of pitching that wins at all levels. Of his 103 pitches, 76 were strikes, and most of the 27 that missed were close. He spotted his fastball and curveball well enough to throw at any time and reached a three-ball count only twice.

It was a performance that even had manager Jerry Weinstein asking the philosophical questions.

"How do you hit a guy who won't give in?" Weinstein said. "How do you hit a guy with that kind of will? That's twice, and nothing fazes him. That's a really young guy but a tough competitor, and not to mention that he throws 75 percent strikes.

"The thing that makes him so difficult to hit is the contrast between the pitches. You have to be sitting on the speed of the pitch you're intending to hit because there's so much difference between the curve and the fastball that you can't time it."

High Desert starter Nick Hill (1-6) pitched well enough to win. He allowed six hits -- all singles -- in 6º innings.

His only flaw was allowing three singles in the first inning, which came consecutively to Daniel Mayora, Mike Paulk and Victor Ferrante to produce the lone run. The Nuts had only three hits the rest of the way.

Tyson Gillies had both hits for High Desert and was the only Maverick to reach base. The first hit was an infield chop over second base to lead off the fourth, and the second was another chopper, this one to third, that bounced cleanly into left field.

"The ball that Gillies hit up the middle was on a two-strike emergency swing," Weinstein said. "The second, we were playing in because he's an excellent bunter, and he bounced it over third base."

There was a huge difference in the type of game in the two shutout wins by Rodriguez. In the first one, the Nuts gave him 11 runs of support. This time, he was never more than one bad pitch away from a tie game.

That bad pitch never came.

"I never think about getting a shutout when I'm on the mound," Rodriguez said. "I think about getting ground balls and winning, just to help the team. If I throw strikes and don't get ground balls, then I start thinking about strikeouts, like tonight."

• Comments
• Add Comment
• Disclaimer