Although his collegiate debut did not go as planned, freshman right-handed pitcher Isaiah Carranza will make his first collegiate start in the Ducks’ (3-0) home opener Thursday.
Carranza relieved Cole Irvin in the season opener at San Diego State after the senior pitched seven seemingly flawless innings. Manager George Horton said it was Irvin’s best form since his 2013 Freshman All-American season. Carranza, however, recorded just one out and allowed two runs on two walks, which evened the score at two and erased Irvin’s performance.
Freshman Kyle Robeniol was expected to be the starter against Illinois State on Thursday, but Carranza will start instead to give Robeniol additional rest. Robeniol threw 5.o innings of relief and earned the win Saturday in relief of Matt Krook, whose first start in almost two years did not go as well as planned.
Irvin expressed confidence in Carranza despite the freshman’s hiccup in his first appearance.
“He’ll do fine,” Irvin said. “He just needs to, hopefully, simplify things early in the game — make the game a lot easier, slower.”
Irvin acknowledged that in his first collegiate start, he “started to go a little fast,” when he should have taken his time.
“He just needs to slow the game down and make sure he gets a good, deep breath before each pitch, and he’ll do fine.”
Carranza pitched better in his second assignment on Sunday, when he entered for David Peterson in the sixth inning and threw 1.1 innings, allowing two hits, one walk and no runs with two strikeouts.
Carranza said he’s feeling “a lot of excitement” about the opportunity to start in the home-opener.
“After getting the wiggles out last weekend, I’m ready to start.”
Carranza said the pace of the game was faster than anything he’d experienced before college, but once he got the kinks out, it was “a lot of fun.”
“It’s the same game of baseball I’ve been playing all my life, so I’m ready to just calm it down and let my team work,” Carranza said. “We’ll be fine.”
He noted that he has to be a lot more careful pitching against collegiate batters than players at lower levels.
“When you miss in college baseball, they’ll capitalize on that. So I’ve got to keep the balls down and work on my off-speed.”
Many of Carranza’s pitches missed high of the strike zone, which Horton said was “unusual,” even for someone with 6-foot-5 frame. But the issue was not unique to Carranza.
“Most all our relievers — when they came in their first inning, because of the slope of the mound — [keeping pitches low] became a challenge,” Horton said. “Unfortunately the ability to adapt to that quickly only became with Jake Bennett.”
Bennett, a 6-foot-6 freshman right-hander, threw an inning in relief of Carranza on Sunday and gave up one run on one hit.
Carranza’s goal is to pitch as many innings as he possibly can, so as to save Oregon’s bullpen arms for the three subsequent games of the four-game series.
On Friday, Oregon will return to the top of its starting rotation, featuring Irvin, Matt Krook and Peterson.
Follow Kenny Jacoby on Twitter @KennyJacoby