Guardians Baseball Insider

August 29, 2015 Lynchburg Hillcats

It’s always weird to look back at a roster from five years ago and realize that exactly zero players made it to the big leagues from that team. With that in mind, let’s take a look at a Hillcats game from 2015 that featured one huge name prospect and a couple others who looked promising, but none who played for Cleveland.

Jayson Aquino made this particular start against the Carolina Mudcats and was brilliant. Originally signed by the Rockies out of the Dominican Republic, Aquino also pitched in the Blue Jays’ and Pirates’ organizations before joining Cleveland and would go on to pitch for St. Louis and Baltimore before retiring following the 2018 season. His only MLB appearances would be with the Orioles in 2016 and 2017.

In this game, Aquino started out strong with a strike out in a perfect first, then a walk and double play to face the minimum in the second. He would not allow another baserunner until the eighth as he retired 18 in a row following the second inning walk.

The Hillcats offense got started in the third after Yean Carlos Gil had retired the first seven batters of the game. Bobby Ison hit a triple, then scored on an Ivan Castillo single. LeVon Washington then moved up Castillo with a double and he would go on to score on a wild pitch. The two runs scored would amount to all of the scoring for both teams in this game and the three hits were the only ones for either team until the sixth.

In that inning, Yhoxian Medina singled, but was caught stealing. Castillo added another single in the eighth, but was stranded. In the bottom half, the Mudcats had their best chance of the night against Aquino. With one out, Carlos Franco, Joey Meneses and Reed Harper all singled after one was out to load the bases. With the game on the line, Medina turned a double play to end the inning without score.

Gil was removed from the game heading into the ninth, but only Clint Frazier was able to reach with a walk. Aquino then attempted to complete the shut out with two quick outs, but he was pulled after a Conner Lien two out single. Robbie Aviles then came in to retire the final batter of the evening and keep the Hillcats 2-0 victory.

Back to my initial comment, while precisely zero Hillcats from this line-up ever played for the Indians, looking at both teams only Dustin Peterson played for either Major League affiliate and he played just two games with the Atlanta Braves prior being taken on waivers by the Tigers. He went 0/2 with a strike out in his Atlanta career. Considering both teams, only Peterson, Jose Bricano (46 games with the Angels in 2018) and Clint Frazier (127 games with the Yankees prior to 2020) have had any Major League experience.