Marauders | Steranka pushes Bradenton by Jupiter
BRADENTON -- The Bradenton Marauders' offensive depth in 2015 is about more than just the typical starters who have carried the highest-scoring offense in the Florida State League.
Manager Michael Ryan insists he could reach for his bench on any given day and the drop in production wouldn't be too stark, and he frequently does -- no current player has appeared in more than 95 of Bradenton's 108 games.
Jordan Steranka is the elder statesman of the Marauders' bench. He's the only player on the active roster who was born in the 1980s. When he missed more than a month from mid-June to mid-July, he served as the first base coach nearly every day. Playing time has been scarce. Wednesday was only his 31st game of the season, although he's been relatively productive when he's been on the field.
With his fourth three-hit game of the season -- and his second in four days -- Steranka powered Bradenton's offense to a 6-3 win against the Hammerheads in the second game of a three-game series at McKechnie Field, keeping Bradenton (56-52, 29-14) within two games of the Cardinals in the FSL South's second-half standings.
"I'm trying to keep it simple up there," Steranka said after going 3-for-4 with a double with 826 in attendance. "'See ball, hit ball'-type of mentality."
After connecting for the Marauders' first hit of the game in the second inning, he found himself in the middle of Bradenton's biggest inning of the night. The bottom of the fourth began with the top of the Marauders' order coming to the plate. The lonely hit by Steranka had been wiped out by a caught stealing and starting pitcher Jeff Brigham was handcuffing Bradenton in his Hammerheads (50-60, 15-25) debut. Only two of the Marauders' first nine batters even put a ball into the outfield.
Junior Sosa, who started in Justin Maffei's usual position at the top of the order and in left field, smacked a single between the first and second basemen. Austin Meadows followed with another line drive to right before outfielder Harold Ramirez walked to load the bases. After a breezy three frames, Brigham (0-1) was in trouble.
Steranka came back to the plate. The first baseman isn't far removed from an injury which sidelined him from mid-June to mid-July and Wednesday gave him a chance to not only start as the designated hitter, but also slot in to the cleanup spot of Ryan's lineup.
"I've always been a kind of middle of the order guy. When I played for him I batted there," Steranka said. "I have a comfort there."
He ripped a single up the middle for his first bases-loaded hit of the season. Sosa and Meadows dashed home to give the Pirates' Class A Advanced affiliate a 2-1 lead. Moments before the inning ended, Steranka scored on a double by Michael Fransoso to stretch Bradenton's lead to 4-1 before a baserunning mishap by Fransoso and first baseman Edwin Espinal ended the frame.
Jupiter, however, answered with its only multi-run inning until Tyler Eppler quelled the threat before the lead was totally blown.
The first batter in the top of the fifth, Felix Munoz, lined out to second and outfielder Blake Barber slashed a double to the left-field corner. Eppler (3-1) quickly induced a groundout, but a walk to outfielder Yefri Perez -- and then a steal by the FSL's stolen bases leader -- and a single by shortstop Justin Bohn plated a pair of runs for the Marlin affiliate.
The starting pitcher escaped the jam by getting outfielder Austin Dean to groundout and finished his day with three earned runs in five up-and-down innings.
"The first three innings were really solid," Ryan said. "It's just the two runs after we scored the four hurt us a little bit."
Ryan got the final four innings from his relief pitchers, first turning to Dovydas Neverauskas for his Marauders debut.
The Lithuanian, who moved to the bullpen after struggling as a starter for Ryan at Class A West Virginia last season, fired two scoreless innings while surrendering two hits and striking out one.
"Not used to seeing that from him, to be honest," Ryan said. "He's got a great arm and there were some outings last year you could really see that's what he looked like."
The final two innings were Montana DuRapau's and the reliever worked around a leadoff walk in the ninth with a pair of strikeouts to seal his seventh save of the season, setting up a rubber match in Thursday's finale of a three-game homestand at McKechnie.
This story was originally published August 6, 2015 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Marauders | Steranka pushes Bradenton by Jupiter ."