2018: Coming Up Just Short
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, tomorrow would be 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. Then, we reminisced on the incredible season for Mitch Keller in 2016, and pushed on to the 2017 campaign, where Luis Escobar set the single-season Power strikeout record. Time for our penultimate season breakdown in 2018.
The 2018 season will always be remembered as the one that got away. This team was always on the brink of breaking through and just never fully put it together. This statement became most evident in the final series of the season, when Wyatt Toregas’ bunch was one win away from the team’s first playoff appearance since 2015, and they could not finish the job. The stage was set in Charleston, S.C., as the Hagerstown Suns had just defeated the Kannapolis Intimidators on the penultimate day of the season, giving West Virginia two shots at the postseason… they just needed to win one game.
The first game, two stellar pitchers duked it out, with Oddy Nunez suffering one negative frame in the fourth that proved to be the difference, since Shawn Semple was untouchable for the RiverDogs. No matter, as the Power had a pretty fresh bullpen and one more shot Monday to take the Northern Division Wild Card spot. West Virginia exhausted a pair of pitchers before turning it over to the back-half of their bullpen in the eighth, with John Pomeroy and Beau Sulser, two of the most dominant relievers in the league, tasked with tugging the Power to the playoffs, but it wasn’t meant to be. Pomeroy served up two hits before turning it over to Sulser, who saw an inside pitch to Dermis Garcia get clobbered down the left-field line, clang off the foul pole, and end West Virginia’s season with one deafening blast. Season over. Playoffs hopes extinguished. Boom, just like that.
The season began with a thud as well, though it wasn’t one massive blow, instead, the Greenville Drive pecked away at the Power all night long in an 8–1 drubbing on Opening Night at Appalachian Power Park. Domingo Robles was flummoxed in 3.2 innings, serving up five earned runs on nine hits, while West Virginia’s offense mustered just three hits, one each from Rodolfo Castro, Oneil Cruz and Calvin Mitchell.
That outing would be Robles’ worst start of the season, in fact, as the southpaw turned into one of the premiere pitchers in the Power’s rotation, capping a 9–6 record in 21 starts with a 2.97 ERA, the sixth-best mark in Power history (and seventh-best in the SAL that season). In fact, Robles cemented himself along elite company in Charleston, becoming just the sixth qualified pitcher in Power history to post a sub-3.00 ERA (and fourth in the last five seasons). He rightfully earned a promotion to High-A Bradenton in early August, but one could only wonder if he had spent the rest of the year with West Virginia, maybe the Power could have secured that one extra win they ended up so desperately needing.
Cruz also falls in the category of, if the Power had him in August and September, who knows what would have happened. However, despite missing the last three weeks of the season, the team’s everyday shortstop was a sight to behold in 2018. Cruz blistered, and yes, I mean that literally, 14 homers in 103 games while boasting a .286 average. Every ball he hit was a laser beam, and he was simply just a joy to watch.
For his efforts, Cruz was named a SAL Postseason All-Star, alongside Mitchell, as well as the league’s Most Outstanding Prospect, the first Power player to earn that honor since Gregory Polanco in 2012. Cruz also ended up with the fifth-highest average, OPS (.831) and triples (7) in the SAL. He also was the first West Virginia shortstop to claim year-end accolades since JaCoby Jones in 2014.
As for Deon Stafford, one of the team’s two Midseason All-Stars, he had a career night in Rome in August, as he amassed six RBI in a game, the first Power batter to do so since Chase Simpson in 2015. He totaled all six RBI in the final two innings at State Mutual Stadium, cracking a bases-loaded double in the eighth before stroking his first career grand slam in the ninth.
Stafford was also a part of the team’s historic comeback in mid-April in Hickory. The Power trailed 10–6 after five innings and 11–8 heading into the ninth, but ended up tallying seven runs in the frame, headlined by Stafford’s go-ahead two-run double down the left-field line to make it 12–11. West Virginia went on to win 15–11.
Mitchell, who claimed both Midseason and Postseason All-Star nods, had himself a year as well, posting the seventh-best average (.280), eighth-most doubles (29) and ninth-best OBP (.344) and hits (124) in the league.
Though no one from the 2018 team has made it to the big leagues just yet, several players are certainly on the precipice, including Blake Weiman, who earned an NRI to Spring Training in 2020, as well as Cruz, who is still on the Pirates’ 40-man roster. Sulser should be not far behind, while guys like Cody Bolton, Max Kranick, Stafford and others are slowly climbing their way up the ladder behind them.
While the results on the field didn’t amount to what this team was capable of, this 2018 team will be remembered for a lot more than a missed playoff berth. It may take another 4–5 years, but you’ll see a lot of these guys again, and you’ll have to go to MLB.com to check their stats this time.
