You could make it look a lot prettier than it was:
Steve Johnson left the game allowing only one hit and just one run.
See? What that doesn't tell you is that Johnson walked 3, hit a batter, and threw less than half his pitches for strikes in just over 2 innings of work. Apparently, that was just his second start of the season for Norfolk. He got a high pitch count for 2+ IP, and was yanked pretty quickly in the third.
But that wasn't the story of the night for Norfolk. Although I was personally excited to see a card-carrying member of the exclusive #TEAMSTEVE, the real show was put on by Nick Addition, who relieved Johnson and went to work. It was addition by Addition, which isn't very clever, but is still accurate.
An early offensive breakout against Mud Hens pitcher Duane Below put Toledo in a position relevant to his nomenclature (more clever, still not that good). Cord Phelps and his Mariah Carey walkup music and Ivan De Jesus both had RBI singles in the first and the lead would stand.
If you like high pitch counts, walks, and long fly ball outs, then maybe this was an exciting game. Otherwise, there's not much to say. Buck Britton made a few nice plays at third base look routine. Dariel Alvarez does not seem to be too overwhelmed by the pitching at this level of play (1 hit, several squared up balls on the night). Steve Lombardozzi played a bit out in LF and moved to 3B when a flurry of substitutions came in. Evan Meek gave up a solo HR in the bottom of the 9th but was still able to record save number eight for the Tides.
Norfolk has a 17-2 record against Toledo in the last three seasons.
The highlight of the night for me was getting a chance to meet Chris Jones. In the minors, the pitcher who started the night before will commonly go sit in the stands and take notes on the next night's pitcher, which is what Jones was spied doing. He was sitting in an upper part of the stadium where the ushers couldn't stand guard over him, so I approached him and chatted him up a bit.
If you're following the farm, you may notice that Jones has had an excellent string of starts. When asked, he said there wasn't any adjustments made or any one thing particularly different that he did for those starts: everything is just starting to click. Seeing as the man was doing his homework, I didn't try to linger too long and bother him, but he seemed like he wouldn't have minded even if I had.
Fans like to look at ball players and personify them as solid, if not remarkable, people who are as good at being human as they are at playing ball. If first impressions count, and Jones makes it to Baltimore, then by that measure he'll be an easy guy to root for.
I was in attendance of this game because my Rotary district had partnered with the Norfolk tides in efforts to further Rotary's international cause of ending polio. The Tides donated $4 of every Rotarian ticket sale to End Polio Now, which amounted to $1,600. Hooray, Tides! If you'd like to learn more about this cause, please visit www.endpolio.org.