DENVER – Mark Manfredi’s path to his Major League debut – a scoreless 1 1/3 innings with two strikeouts in the Rockies’ 6-4, 10-inning loss to the Dodgers at Coors Field – began playing catch with his father. Except his dad was learning the game as much as teaching it.
“We would always do athletic stuff in the backyard, and I would always pick up the ball with my left hand,” said Manfredi, who joined the Rockies organization at the Trade Deadline from the Brewers and was selected from Triple-A Albuquerque before Wednesday’s game. “He’s like, ‘No, no, no. That’s the wrong hand. You throw it with your right.’
“And that tells me how much he knew about baseball. He was like, ‘How on earth am I going to find a lefty glove for him?’ He was very athletic – played basketball, football. Well, he must not have followed baseball.”
Manfredi’s dad, Mark Andrew Manfredi; mom, Romina; grandparents, Silvio and Angela; wife, Madison; infant son, Mark Silvio Manfredi Jr.; and friends that included coaches and teammates from the University of Dayton saw that Manfredi’s left hand is the right one for him.
Manfredi, 26, was pressed into service when left-handed starter Kyle Freeland left with two outs in the fourth inning because of neck tightness. The Rockies were trailing 4-0 – and superstar Shohei Ohtani was coming to bat.
“When I saw the injury and [Freeland] was walking off, I was, like, ‘This is 100% going to be me,’” Manfredi said.
Manager Warren Schaeffer was greeted by an eager pitcher.
“That was really cool to see him with a big smile on his face coming in there,” Schaeffer said. “When he took the ball, he said, ‘This is the perfect spot.’”
Manfredi walked Ohtani and yielded an Andy Pages single, but forced a Teoscar Hernández lineout to end the fourth. The spotless fifth began with a looking strikeout of Freddie Freeman and ended with a swinging strikeout of Miguel Rojas.
The strong debut from Manfredi kept the Rockies close until Mickey Moniak, who had already singled and doubled, tied the game at 4 with his 20th homer of the season – a two-run shot in the seventh. But two 10th-inning Dodgers runs left the Rockies on the wrong end of a three-game sweep.
Manfredi’s debut outing came after a whirlwind of a season, not to mention a quick introduction to pitching at altitude.
Manfredi appeared in 16 games at Double-A Biloxi and 18 at Triple-A Nashville in Milwaukee’s system before arriving (along with 19-year-old infielder Juan Martínez) for righty pitcher Antonio Senzatela. Suddenly, the Majors felt within reach.
“That was the first thing that I had in mind when I saw my name on the TV and got the calls,” Manfredi said.
Then he joined Albuquerque at 5,157 feet (Coors is just under the mile mark of 5,280 feet). Across four appearances with the Isotopes, he allowed six earned runs on six hits and six walks in five innings.
“Everyone talks about the [Pacific Coast League] and elevation. The only way I can describe it is you don’t really know until you experience it for yourself,” Manfredi said. “Everything is different, then you go back to non-elevation and your pitches move the way they have your whole life.”
But he was prepared long before altitude became part of his life. He developed a gyro slider, which can break downward. Also, during Spring Training, then-Brewers teammate Sammy Peralta, who pitched part of this season with the Rockies, taught him a grip for a sweeper – the pitch he used against Hernández to escape fourth-inning trouble.
On Tuesday, not knowing a callup was coming, he threw a two-seam sinker and liked the action. He used it once. But his main pitch in Wednesday’s debut was a four-seam fastball, the one he had to adjust the most at altitude.
Righty Nick Frasso, obtained from the Dodgers a week before the Deadline for righty reliever Seth Halvorsen, followed Manfredi with two scoreless innings. Connor Norby, obtained from the Marlins on Deadline day, went 2-for-4 with two doubles.
Colorado’s other close-to-the-Majors Deadline acquisition, righty starter Mason Adams, has a 2.25 ERA over eight innings in two starts at Albuquerque and is a logical candidate for a debut this season.
This Rockies team has transitioned its roster for much of this season, with acquisitions from other teams and younger homegrown products fueling improvement over last year’s Majors-worst 43-119 squad.
Manfredi has been in the organization less than a month and in the Majors for a day. But he falls right in with the attitude that has shown promise for the future.
“Just go right at them,” he said. “There’s no other way.”