Pittsburgh Pirates Minors: Triple-A Indianapolis Goes Cycling

The Pittsburgh Pirates had a big win last night with a complete game from their starting pitcher.  While this is a rarity at Coors Field, it was not the most impressive thing in the organization.

The Pittsburgh Pirates saw Jameson Taillon pitch the 52nd complete game in Coors Field History last night.  This is quite impressive and rare to happen.  The stadium opened in 1995, so the fact that only 52 complete games have ever happened there speaks volumes of how hard that is to do.  However, the Triple-A Indianapolis Indians had something even more impressive happen in their game.

What do Kevin Newman and Jacob Stallings have in common? Both play in the infield.  Stallings and Newman were both drafted out of college, Newman out of Arizona and Stallings out of North Carolina. Both were drafted by the Pittsburgh Pirates and have played their who careers up through the Bucs system. What else?  Both are righties, throwing and batting.  Are we stretching here?  Yes, however now they have something special in common.

Last night both Kevin Newman and Jacob Stallings hit for the cycle in the same game.  The Indianapolis Indians were taking on the Lehigh Valle IronPigs, the Phillies Triple-A affiliate. According to Tyler Maun of Milb.com, this is something that has only happened once in the 150-year history of professional baseball.  The only other time it happened was earlier this year by the San Fransisco Giants organization.

First, let’s start with Jacob Stallings.  The 2012 seventh-round pick went 4-5 on the game.  Obviously, he had hit a single, double, triple, and a home run.  The most surprising of the three has to be the triple.  Stallings is a big guy at 6’5” and 220 pounds.  If you have seen him in his big league experience, he does not exactly flash speed running to first.  Still, he got the job done.  To go along with his cycle he had three runs batted in and scored two runs.  His home run was a solo shot.

Kevin Newman, of course, had to one-up Stallings.  The 2015 first round pick went a perfect 5-5 in his cycle.  In addition to the required hits for the cycle, he also had a second double.  This impressive game raised his batting average to .306 on the season.  Like Stallings, Newman also had three runs batted in and two runs scored.  Newman has done nothing but hit this year and is really showing that he is ready to get a shot at being the everyday shortstop next season.

The two-cycle game will go down in the history books.  Meanwhile, the game also helped the Pittsburgh Pirates Triple-A affiliate record another win on the season.  Indianapolis is now 63-51 on the season.  The team is three games up in the Western Division of the International League. So it looks like the team will also get a chance in the International League playoffs.