Potomac's Pivetta flirts with perfect game

Nick Pivetta was looking for consistency. What he found bordered on perfection.

The Nationals' No. 12 prospect did not allow a baserunner until the seventh inning and finished with a career-high nine strikeouts as Class A Advanced Potomac beat Wilmington, 3-1, on Sunday at G. Richard Pfitzner Stadium.

"I felt great. Everything was working really well," he said. "I commanded all my pitches and everything was moving smoothly. You get those types of days and you just roll with them."

Pivetta (7-4) has been working on his changeup and curveball of late and the results showed as he retired the first 19 Blue Rocks.

"Those things finally clicked together, the two of them. And with my two-seam [fastball], I had a lot of two-seam action and everything moved forward," the 22-year-old right-hander said. "It's a really good feeling. You put in that work and you get rewarded sometimes, and that was one of those moments."

In the seventh, Pivetta retired Royals No. 19 prospect Ramon Torres on a groundout before Jack Lopez legged out an infield single.

"I was disappointed, but I was happy I made it that far," the 6-foot-5 Canadian said. "Having those types of games, they're work. The reason they're so hard is because you face those guys every single time and there's a lot of variables that could happen, like you get a little squibbler as a hit or something like that. So to make it that far, I was really grateful and I'm just going to try to do better each time."

Pivetta's batterymate, Craig Manuel, threw out Lopez trying to steal second, so the 2013 fourth-round pick was back to facing the minimum.

"Being able to go straight back into the windup after that, where I've been comfortable all game, was awesome," he said. "Just him doing that for me helps out and makes the outing that much better."

On his next pitch, however, Pivetta lost his shutout when Mauricio Ramos belted a homer to left field.

"Oh, yeah, that was my mistake. It was a pitch up middle-in and as soon as he hit it, I knew it was gone. But those things happen," he said. "Just having that feeling that I was able to bring [the bid] that far into the game was awesome. It's the farthest I've ever been in my whole entire career, so having something like that is just awesome."

Pivetta got Cody Stubbs to fly out to finish his night. The New Mexico Junior College product has yielded three earned runs over his last 20 innings to get his ERA down to 2.29, which ranks third in the Carolina League. 

Tyler Maples struck out three over two hitless frames to secure his first full-season save.

Wilmington starter Alex Mils (6-4) allowed three runs -- two earned -- on nine hits while fanning five in six frames.