Young tosses six one-hit innings

The way things were going for Pat Young on Saturday night, the Eugene Emeralds might as well have stayed home.

"It was one of those days where I felt like everything was working," he said. "I had good command of my fastball, and both of my secondary pitches I was able to throw for strikes. I got a lot of swings and misses, and when the ball was in play, I had great defense behind me."

The Giants' 13th-round pick in this year's Draft allowed one hit over six innings in short-season Salem-Keizer's 3-0 road win over the Emeralds.

Young (2-1) struck out six batters, induced 11 ground-ball outs and lowered his ERA to 0.79 in seven Northwest League starts.

"I noticed I was getting a lot of ground balls," he said. "It just seemed like everything they put in play, the infield was able to get to."

Young retired the first five hitters he faced out on grounders, then got Marcus Davis to look at a called third strike.

"Going the first few hitless felt good, but I got nervous because a couple of ground balls were hit hard," the Villanova product said. "Great plays by my defense saved some hits, though."

Edwin Moreno led off the third with a double to left field off a fastball from Young.

"I just missed my spot," the 21-year-old right-hander said. "I was trying to go outside on him and it caught too much of the plate."

After the hit, Young got four consecutive groundouts, then struck out two in the fourth and two more in the fifth. Other than Moreno's double, the only ball the Emeralds hit in the air against him was Henry Charles' fly ball that ended the sixth.

"It was just the same thing [as the double]. It just caught too much of the plate," Young explained. "It was a good enough pitch to get the out, so it was nothing really to complain about."

Tyler Rogers and Raymundo Montero yielded one more hit over the final three innings, with Montero pitching the ninth for his 13th save.

Giants No. 16 prospect Brian Ragira tripled, singled, walked, scored a run and drove in another for the Volcanoes.