JARED FREED/Related Press
Juan Reyes of Venezuela celebrates after pitching a complete-game shutout towards Japan on Monday, successful 4-0. It’s his second complete-game shutout this match and he grew to become the primary Venezuela pitcher to perform that feat.
To say Venezuela’s Juan Reyes has been excellent on the mound this Little League World Sequence wouldn’t do the right-handed pitcher justice.
Reyes was almost flawless on Monday afternoon at Volunteer Stadium in a 4-0 win towards a stable Japan workforce, however that win on Monday wasn’t an anomaly.
It was his normal.
To this point Reyes is 2-0 for the Latin America Regional champions of Cardenales Little League from Barquisimeto, Venezeula and he’s shut down each offense he’s seen up to now.
On Monday, that was a great Japan workforce by which Reyes threw an entire sport with 9 strikeouts, three singles allowed and simply two walks, doing so on 77 pitches. That shutout on Monday put Reyes on a brief listing of gamers to perform a troublesome feat.
Reyes grew to become the primary participant in Little League World Sequence historical past from Venezuela to throw two full sport shutouts on the Little League World Sequence, the primary Worldwide pitcher to take action since Yoshinori Satoh of Japan in 2002, and simply the eleventh participant in LLWS historical past to ever accomplish the feat.
It speaks to the expertise Reyes has to place him in some unique firm.
On Wednesday within the workforce’s match opener, Reyes threw 74 pitches — 55 of which had been strikes — and struck out 9 with solely 4 hits allowed and one stroll.
Eighteen strikeouts, no extra-base hits and no runs allowed? You may’t beat that on the mound in a match the place pitching is essential.
“I thank God initially,” Reyes mentioned on Monday. “All my pitches had been going good and I’m proud of the outcomes I’ve been getting.”
And his workforce is very happy with it too.
“I simply wish to thank God, we’ve numerous hope for our workforce,” Venezuela’s Jesus Gomez mentioned on Monday. “We’ve got an incredible workforce and protection with good pitching.”
Like many groups, Venezuela’s pitching depth has stood out by means of the Sequence up to now.
In a 4-0 win over Canada, Andres Reyes Querales went 5 innings and solely got here out after reaching his pitch restrict and hitting 89 after throwing a one-hitter with seven strikeouts. However Sebastian Lopez got here in and relieved him and threw a flawless sixth with one strikeout with no hits or walks.
“For the reason that very first day, one of many strongest fits of our workforce is our pitching workers,” Venezuela supervisor Luis Bermudez mentioned. “A pitching workers can go a good distance on this match.”
And, whereas Reyes isn’t eligible to pitch on Wednesday after going 77 pitches on Monday, the workforce has loads of different arms that may get the job achieved.
That features Reyes Querales, who Bermudez famous could be beginning towards both Chinese language Taipei or Aruba.
Whereas the pitching performances of Reyes and Reyes Querales have been spotlighted, the protection of Venezuela has been nice as effectively. Venezuela has allowed only one error over its three video games on the Sereis and the infield and outfield performs nice.
Japan put quite a few balls into the sphere of play on Monday in its 4-0 loss, however Venezuela got here up sure-handed each time and by no means let any errors permit a runner to achieve
“Subsequent to pitching, e work onerous on protection,” Bermudez mentioned. “We solely made one error in three video games, so we’ve good pitching with good protection behind them.”
As well as, Venezuela catcher Jose JImenez does stable preserving the ball in entrance of him and never letting handed balls and wild pitches shift momentum.
“I really feel so joyful and I work so onerous,” Jimenez mentioned. “Our pitching workers is so good. (It permits) us to do issues again there.”
Posting three straight shutouts to open the match — with wins ovoer Puerto Rico (5-0), Canada (4-0) and Japan (4-0) — has the Latin American Regional champions gaining confidence understanding they’ll compete with stable groups daily on the Worldwide facet of the bracket.
“”We’re taking part in off our pitching workers,” Bermudez mentioned. “We all know we’ve robust video games, however we’ve the boldness to exit and face each problem we’ve.”
And a few of that confidence additionally got here within the type of speaking to New York Mets supervisor Carlos Mendoza on Sunday on the MLB Little League Basic at Bowman Discipline.
Mendoza is from Barquisimeto, Venezuela, the identical city as this yr’s Little League all-star workforce. And the workforce was excited and joyful to speak to him on Sunday in the course of the Basic festivities.
“He was so joyful and happy with us,” Reyes mentioned. “We had been joyful they backed us up and gave us some good phrases and encouragement for the match.”
After three video games, one factor appears sure and that’s the Latin America Regional champions are going to be tough to defeat.
