2016: It’s Mitch Keller’s World
March 26 was Opening Day for the 2020 MLB season… or at least it would have been, if not for the COVID-19 outbreak that has put our entire world, and basically all sports, on an indefinite hold. However, without the coronavirus, today would have been 4 days until MiLB Opening Day. With 15 seasons in the books for the West Virginia Power, it’s to turn back the calendar and revisit each of the first 15 Opening Days in Power history.
We opened the first chapter of the West Virginia Power with the 2005 Opening Day game in Hagerstown. Friday, we looked back at the first home opener in team history in 2006. The winning streak continued Saturday with the 2007 opener, and then we dredged through the rain-soaked 2008 debut. We relived the excitement from the 2009 All-Star season, moved on to the 2010 campaign, and dove into the 2011 opener. We broke down one of the heaviest MLB-laden teams in the 2012 season, and then we saw a return trip to the postseason in 2013. After looking through the team’s worst overall record ever in 2014, we dove into the team with the best record in Power history in 2015. Now we head down the home stretch, starting with the 2016 season.
Coming off two playoff appearances in three seasons, the Power was primed for another run at the postseason, as manager Brian Esposito returned for a second year at the helm and a new crop of talent made its way to Charleston. Though Esposito would lead West Virginia to another winning record at 71–68, in turn making himself the winningest manager in Charleston, W.Va., SAL history (158 victories, two higher than Mike Guerrero), the team would miss out on the playoffs and thus end a very successful tenure for Esposito without a ring. However, plenty of notable names came under Espo’s tutelage in 2016, with the return of Cole Tucker after an injury in 2015 sidelined him for a portion of the 2016 campaign, along with some new faces that were on their way to becoming renowned in Pittsburgh, such as Mitch Keller, who took home a plethora of awards that year. Tito Polo also returned for a second year and earned an All-Star nod, while Dario Agrazal, Taylor Hearn and Daniel Zamora all worked their way through Charleston en-route to the big leagues. Needless to say, even without the postseason, this year still had plenty of memorable moments.
Opening Day, however, was not one of them. West Virginia began the season in Greensboro (the only time they have ever faced the Grasshoppers on Opening Day), and coughed up a late one-run lead to fall, 3–2, at First National Bank Field. Polo had himself a ballgame, coming up a double shy of the cycle. He smacked a solo home run in the fourth for the game’s first run, and then scored on a fielding error in the sixth to make it 2–1 West Virginia. Unfortunately, J.T. Brubaker’s solid start in his Power debut was spoiled, as Cesilio Pimentel allowed a walk and an RBI double with two down in the eighth that tied the game, while Alfredo Reyes’ throwing error one batter later let Greensboro take the lead for good.
One fun fact about Opening Day: The game only took 2 hours and 20 minutes to complete, making it the shortest nine-inning Opening Day game for the Power in team history.
An additional side note here: Brubaker should be on the list of Power players from this team to make the big leagues, and he probably would be if not for a right forearm strain that sidelined him for most of the 2019 season.
Interestingly enough, none of the seven members from the 2016 roster that have gone to The Show played in this game, mainly because most of them are pitchers (John Bormann and Tucker are the exceptions). However, three of the Power’s four Midseason All-Stars did play in the contest: Daniel Arribas, Hayes and Polo.
By the way, the rest of the future big leaguers from this squad include: Agrazal, Tanner Anderson, Hearn, Keller and Zamora.
With the 2016 season, there’s one pitcher that stands above the rest, and that is Keller. Man oh man, did Keller have a heckuva season or what?
Here are his numbers:
8–5 with a 2.46 ERA in 23 starts across 124.1 innings with 131 strikeouts compared to 18 walks, with batters hitting .211 against him.
Pretty good, right? Right. Oh, and as for his place in the league, he had the lowest WHIP (0.92), second-best ERA (I mean, how do you beat a 1.86 mark from Brannon Easterling, yeesh) and BAA and the eighth-most strikeouts.
He got plenty of accolades too: SAL Midseason, SAL Postseason and Baseball America Low A and Minor League All-Star honors, Most Valuable Pitcher in the SAL and the MiLB.com Fans’ Choice for Breakout Prospect, along with garnering a SAL Pitcher of the Week honor in mid-April and Pitcher of the Month for April.
And one last thing on Keller: His ERA is the third-best in Power history, while his strikeouts are fifth-most in Power history. Ok, I think you get it, he’s really good at baseball.
Remember when we told you yesterday that Austin Coley set the record for most innings pitched in a season in Power history during the 2015 season? Well, that record only lasted a calendar year, as Agrazal beat him out by 2.1 innings with an even 150.0, which led the SAL in 2016. Meanwhile, Julio Eusebio notched 11 saves during the 2016 season, tied for seventh-most in Power history.
One last tidbit from the 2016 season: The Power has played three games that have lasted more than 5 hours in team history. The first two came during the 2011 season, and the most recent one occurred April 18, 2016, in an 8–7 win in 16 innings against Kannapolis. The game took 5 hours and 1 minute to complete, marking the longest game played in terms of time from 2012 to present.
We only have three years remaining! The 2017 season comes your way tomorrow.
