Rockers-Legends Preview, May 28, 2024

High Point Rockers vs. Lexington Legends

The Rockers and Legends will start a three-game set on Tuesday at Truist Point, which will be the first of in essence a six-game series with the final three games being played at Legends Field in Lexington. This matchup marks the third straight week the two clubs will have played and after the week is over they will have finished five of their seven series for the season. Heading into Tuesday, High Point has won seven of the nine games against Lexington so far this year. Lexington is coming off losing three out of four games to Hagerstown over the weekend and has lost seven of their past 10 games. On the flip side, the Rockers have won seven of their past 10 and have won or split their past five series.

About the Rockers:

The Rockers come into this game at 17-11, two and a half games behind Gastonia for first in the South Division. They are a half game up on the Charleston Dirty Birds who the Rockers split a four-game set with this past weekend. After the Rockers got off to a scorching start winning their first five games, they dropped three straight series. However, they have since found their footing. They had a nine-game homestand where they went 7-2, winning all three series vs Southern Maryland, Lexington and Charleston. They then split road series with both Lexington and Charleston. They’ll have a chance this week to make up ground on Gastonia and retake first place in the South with six straight games against last place Lexington.

Key Players:

Ryan Grotjohn:

Grotjohn started the season in a slump that saw him putting together quality at-bats and hitting the ball hard across the field, but not getting results. It felt as though every ball he hit hard was right at a fielder. Through it all, he remained confident, knowing if he continued to make good contact, those balls would fall. It took a couple weeks, but he was right. Over Grotjohn’s past ten games he is hitting .333 with three homers. His bat was a big reason why the Rockers took first place over Charleston, and now his bat could be the biggest factor in the Rockers reclaiming it.

Jake Washer:

Washer smashed his first home run of the season on Sunday in a 6-0 Rocker victory. His bat has been hot all year and particularly hot in the past ten games. He is hitting .316 over those past 10 with four runs batted in. Washer splits time behind the plate with Brian Parreria, but the way he has been swinging it, it will make it difficult to keep his bat out of the lineup.

Keys Trends:

HR ball:

The Rockers have the third-most homers in the Atlantic League with 40 and have won every game this season in which they out-homer their opponent. More than 41% of their offense production comes via the HR, demonstrating how vital it is to the Rockers success. However, the Rockers offense is evolving to not be so reliant on the home run. Over the Rockers past 12 games, just 25% of their offense has come from the long ball. Despite that, the Rockers are 13-0 when they outhomer their opponent, compared to just 2-9 when they don’t.

Playing clean defense:

A point of emphasis from Rocker manager Jaime Keefe has been when the team plays clean defense, the Rockers. The Rockers have been winning games recently, but a couple have slipped away from them during the past road trip due to sloppy defense. High Point has made at least one error in five of its past six games and has eight errors overall during that span. The biggest example was on Sunday, when a pair of errors aided Charleston to a five run third inning that proved to be the difference in the game. Overall the Rockers are one of the cleaner teams in the league with the third fewest errors committed, however they’ll have to reverse the recent trend of sloppy play in the field.

Dominance on the mound:

In 2023 High Point had the best strikeout to walk ratio in the Atlantic League. They had the second most strikeouts and fewest walks, with 69 fewer than the next closest club. This season the Rockers are demonstrating a similar dominance. They have the best ERA at 3.53 and have a strikeout to walk ratio of 3.65. Rockers pitchers have plenty of strikeout stuff, striking out more than 11.5 batters per nine innings and have 31 more strikeouts than the next closest club. The Rockers prevent runners from getting on base because they don’t walk a soul. They have walked just 85 guys all year, which can explain in part why they have stranded more runners than their opponent in each of their past seven games.

 About the Legends:

Lexington comes into this three-game series at 7-21, the worst mark in the league, 10 games behind High Point and 12.5 behind Gastonia, which paces the South Division. The Legends have dropped seven of their past 10 games, which includes losing three of five to the Rockers over the past couple weeks. They are by far the youngest team in the league, and their inexperience has cost them thus far.

Keys Players:

Dustin Beggs:

Beggs was Lexington’s opening day starter this season and an arm they will have to lean on again to try to turn their season around. Beggs has had a rough season to this point. He has made four starts and has pitched to a 5.89 ERA. What has killed Beggs the most has been the home run ball. He has given up eight so far this year. This is not a new problem for Beggs, who allowed 24 homers last year with Spire City. Beggs has made three starts against High Point. The first two have gone High Point’s way, but in the more recent matchup, Beggs made an adjustment and dominated the Rockers through seven innings, leading Lexington to a 2-1 win. Beggs has an ERA of 5.63 and has given up four of his eight homers to the Rockers. If Beggs can replicate his last start vs the Rockers, he may steal another win from High Point.

Pedro Gonzalez:

Gonzalez has only played 12 games with Lexington this season but has made a big impact. He made his season debut vs the Rockers two weeks ago at Truist Point and homered in that game. He has racked up four homers in total, with three of the four coming vs the Rockers. He has a .295 average for his short season and a .368 average vs High Point. At 6’6” Gonzalez has a huge presence in the box and has been a scary hitter for Rocker pitchers. They will have to be careful with Gonzalez as he poses the biggest threat of all Lexington hitters.

Key Trends:

Can the offense keep up:

Other than leading the league in doubles, Lexington is toward the bottom of the league in every offensive category. However, if you watch the Legends play, they are a team that causes havoc on the bases, scratches and claws offensively to keep up. We saw an example of this last week in Lexington when Aldenis Sanchez stole home in the bottom of the eighth inning to tie the game and send it to extras where the Rockers would ultimately prevail. Lexington’s pitching staff is their weakness, so the offense will have to score in bunches to keep up.

Keeping the ball in the park:

The Legends have the highest ERA in the league at 6.92. The reason for the high number, the long ball. The Legends have allowed 47 homers this year, which is five more than the next closest club. They’ve walked 163, 19 more than Hagerstown, the next closest club. The Rockers have hit the third most homers in the league and draw the second most walks, making this series a matchup of strength vs weakness. Lexington has to be able to prevent throwing ball four, and keep the ball in the park to give themselves any shot.

Pitching Matchup:

Tues: LEX – Dustin Beggs vs HP – Taylor Guerrieri

Beggs: 29 IP (6G-5GS) / 5.89 ERA / 9BB:22Ks / 8HR allowed

Guerrieri: 17IP (5G-3GS) / (4.76 ERA) / 17Ks / 5BB / 6HR allowed

Wed: LEX – Jose Acuna vs HP – Neil Uskali

Acuna: 20.2IP (5G-4GS) / 6.09 ERA / 25BB:12Ks / 4HR allowed

Uskali: 5.0 IP (2G-1GS) / 5ER (9.00 ERA) / 4BB / 4Ks

Thurs: LEX – Elio Serrano vs HP – Jonah Scolaro

Serrano: 14.1IP (11G) / (5.65 ERA) / 13BB:16Ks / 1HR allowed

Scolaro: 14.2IP (3GS) / (1.84 ERA) / 4BB / 13Ks / 1HR allowed

Starting Pitching Keys:

The Rockers have seen a lot of Dustin Beggs. This will be the fourth start he’ll make this season vs High Point. Thus far he has a 1-1 record across 16 innings with a 5.36 ERA and four homers allowed. The Rockers won the first two against Beggs before he held the Rockers to one run over seven innings last week in Lexington. Acuna has made one start vs the Rockers this season and only got through three innings. He allowed six runs, one homer and an opponent batting average of .462. He has walked seven Rockers and has zero strikeouts. Serrano will be making his first start of the year. In relief vs the Rockers he has thrown four innings and allowed three runs. These three starters will have to limit the free passes so that when they give up long balls it only burns them for one run, rather than allowing the big inning.

The theme for the three Rocker starters in this series are they all had a rough introduction to the starting rotation, but have since settled in very nicely. Taylor Guerreri will make his third straight start against the Legends. After getting roughed up in his first start against Southern Maryland, Guerreri has pitched to a 1.50 ERA. He has 12 innings this year against Lexington and the two ER allowed have both come via the HR. All nine runs he has allowed this year have come due to allowing the HR ball. Guerreri has allowed six this year and if he can limit those he may dominate Lexington again. Uskali made his first start against Lexington and walked the first three guys he faced, but limited the inning to just two runs and settled in to allow the Rockers to come back and win. Uskali will have to build on his previous two appearances and show his best stuff so far. Scolaro also had a rough first go as he was getting stretched out and used to outdoor pitching once again. However, like Guerreri and Uskali he settled in and allowed only one run over 11 innings in his next two starts. All three of Guerreri, Uskali and Scolaro will look to continue to create soft conduct and have success in this series vs the Legends.

Milestone Watch:

Rockers manager, Jaime Keefe, has the third best active win percentage in the Atlantic League and got wins 300 and 301 when the Rockers swept their doubleheader Sunday against the Dirty Birds on May 19th. He has another milestone on the horizon though, with three more games managed he will hit 2,000.

How Can I Tune In?

            Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday our coverage will start at 6:20 p.m. EDT with a first pitch time of 6:45 p.m. EDT. Tune into the game on MixLR or watch the game on FloSports.