Nate Smith knew from the beginning he didn't have anything close to his best stuff Friday night.
The 22-year-old left-hander making his sixth Class AA start for the Arkansas Travelers said he was out of sorts mentally, and regularly missed the strike zone against the Springfield Cardinals. But Smith labored through five innings, and the Travs scored all of their runs in the seventh, escaping with a 3-2 victory over the Springfield Cardinals at Dickey-Stephens Park in North Little Rock.
"I was just fighting myself mentally all day," Smith said. "At one point, I was like, 'I really don't care, I'm going to throw the ball down the middle and let them hit it to my defense.'"
When Smith (3-1) did that, he was fine. He held the Cardinals to 1 run on 5 hits over 5 innings, but walked 5, causing him to throw 97 pitches and an early exit with the Travs leading 3-1 after the fifth. It could have been worse, though.
Matt Williams scored the Cardinals' only run in the third when he walked and scored on James Ramsey's sacrifice fly, giving them a 1-0 lead. The Cardinals loaded the bases later in the third when Smith walked Jonathan Rodriguez, but he got Curt Smith to pop out to end the threat.
In the fourth, Luis Mateo doubled and Williams singled and moved to second on a wild pitch to put runners on second and third with one out. Smith got Travis Tartamella to line out and Mike O'Neill to pop out. In the fifth, Smith gave up consecutive two-out singles, but escaped again when Curt Smith was caught in a rundown between first and second base.
"You just have to simplify everything," Smith said. "You can't be 'I'm going to try to do this, this and this.' You just have to execute each pitch."
Smith wasn't the only Traveler pitcher to struggle Friday.
Buddy Boshers gave up a double, a single and walk to load the bases with no outs in the sixth and O'Neill's groundout scored David Popkins to make it 3-2. In the eighth, the Cardinals stranded runners on first and third against Michael Brady, and in the ninth, Daniel Reynolds put runners on second and third before striking out Curt Smith and Popkins to earn his first save since 2011.
The 4 Travelers pitchers combined to walk 8 batters and 3 three wild pitches, but stranded 13 Cardinals runners, 10 of which were in scoring position.
"You compete," Arkansas Manager Phillip Wellman said. "I don't think any of us like getting our butts handed to us. You've got to bow your neck sometimes if you don't have your best stuff."
The bulk of the offense came in the fifth, just in time for Smith to get credit for the victory. Before Friday, the Travs were hitting .214 at Dickey-Stephens Park, but had 12 hits in a 9-1 victory on Thursday and added eight more on Friday.
Four of them came in the fifth inning off Springfield starter Mike Mayers, who was making his Class AA debut.
Eric Stamets led off with a home run to left field, his first of the season, to tie it at 1-1 before Kyle Hudson and Maikol Gonzalez each singled. Alex Yarbrough's sacrifice fly scored Hudson to make it 2-1, and Brian Hernandez drove in Gonzalez from second base with a single to center field.
"Twenty hits in two days is pretty good for us," Wellman said. "Hopefully we're going to keep this train rolling for a little bit and see what happens."
Sports on 06/21/2014