Guardians Baseball Insider

June 24, 2015 Akron Rubberducks

Mike Clevinger was acquired by the Indians from the Angels in exchange for Vinnie Pestano in August of 2014 and made his big league debut in a big way in 2016 with the Indians, but in between there was a whole lot of minor league domination.

Clevinger spent all of 2015 with the Akron Rubberducks and on this date that season, he was particularly dominant. Against the Reading Fightin Phils, he went five innings, allowing three hits, one walk and no runs. This was Clevinger’s first scoreless appearance of 2015 and dropped his ERA to 2.85. He went on to shut out Birmingham over 7.2 innings in his next appearance as well and ended the season with a 2.73 ERA across 158 innings with 40 walks and 145 strike outs.

As good as he was in this game, it wasn’t enough alone to win the game and he didn’t earn the win himself, although the Ducks did take the victory. Instead, it took until the seventh inning for Akron to get on the board, starting with a Destin Hood double. Thanks to a J.P. Crawford error at short, Jordan Smith also reached, then Ronny Rodriguez knocked in the first run of the game with a sac fly. While Smith stole second after and Tony Wolters walked, they were both stranded there.

With the one run lead not enough for comfort, the Ducks put things away in the eighth. Erik Gonzalez started the inning with a single, then Yandy Diaz followed with another. After a pointless Anthony Gallas sacrifice bunt, Hood had his second extra base hit in a row with two runs scoring on his triple. Ronny Rod followed up with a single this time around, but was caught stealing and the Ducks finished the inning with three runs and the four total were enough for the win.

Joe Colon and Josh Martin finished the game for Akron out of the bullpen, allowing one hit and no runs over four innings. Colon earned the win and the final run scored by the Ducks in the eighth kept Martin from the save. Despite this, he was well on his way to his best MiLB season, finishing the year with a 2.27 ERA in 67.1 innings, all in Akron. He earned just two saves on the season (it would have been three if not for that Ronny Rod RBI single) and struck out 80 with just 19 walks.

The other big name in this game, Hood, had an excellent 2015 as well with a .293/.344/.479 line across 40 games, but was released mid-July of that season. He did end up in the big leagues with the Marlins for a short period in 2016, but this was short lasted and he spent the 2019 season in independent ball with Lancaster.

Not the bury the last notable game from June 24 in Indians Minor League History, but –

Carlton Smith, Austin Creps and Luis Perdomo combined to pitch a no hitter against the Delmarva Shorebirds in 2007.

The only future big leaguers in the lineup that day were C Matt McBride and INF Niuman Romero

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