The Athletics will look to their future on Friday when they call up prospect Gunnar Hoglund from Triple-A Las Vegas to make his major league debut against the floundering Marlins in Miami to open a three-game series.
Hoglund, 25, has posted a 1-2 record with a 2.43 ERA and 1.04 WHIP in six starts this season for the Aviators. The right-hander scattered three hits over five scoreless innings while striking out five in his last start on Sunday.
A first-round selection in a pair of drafts, the former Mississippi product joined the Athletics’ organization as a prize prospect from the Toronto Blue Jays in the Matt Chapman deal in 2022.
“It will be his major league debut. He’s thrown the ball pretty well in Triple-A. We like what he saw in spring training,” Athletics manager Mark Kotsay said of Hoglund. “This is a kid we targeted in the Chapman deal. This will be his first time out in the big leagues, and we’re excited about it for him.
“We do feel he’s pitched well enough to be here. You don’t just bring someone up just to call them up. For us, it’s a good situation to have some depth and obviously give him an opportunity.”
The Athletics captured their third straight series with a 3-0 victory over the Texas Rangers on Thursday afternoon. The upstart club has won seven of its last nine games overall and boasts a majors-best 11-6 mark on the road this season.
The Marlins, in turn, have been extremely generous by yielding 55 runs en route to losing five in a row and plummeting into the cellar of the National League East.
Miami starters have failed to work past the fourth inning in the last five games. To take it a step further, a Marlins starter has allowed at least four runs before being relieved in each contest of a six-game road trip.
The end result for Miami on Wednesday was a disastrous 12-7 setback to the Los Angeles Dodgers.
“We have areas that we need to continue improve upon and just keep going,” Marlins manager Clayton McCullough said. “(Losing) doesn’t ever feel good (and) that it ends up happening. … We’ll be back at home. We’ve gotta keep on moving along. We have a long season ahead of us.”
The bright spot was Kyle Stowers, who homered twice to highlight his first career four-hit game on Wednesday. He leads the team in both batting average (.323) and RBIs (19).
“Stowers has been good for us all season long,” McCullough said. “I think he has put together really good at-bats. (On Wednesday) to be able to use the entire field to cover multiple speeds and pitches is a great sign. Hopefully he continues to stack those quality days on top of each other.”
While Miami did not divulge its starter, a likely candidate is right-hander Valente Bellozo (0-1, 2.25 ERA). He threw just 28 pitches on Tuesday for Triple-A Jacksonville.
Bellozo, 25, last pitched for the Marlins on April 7, permitting one run on five hits in 3 2/3 innings of a 2-0 setback to the New York Mets.
He has yet to face the Athletics in his young career.
–Field Level Media
