Hillcats' Aquino flirts with no-hitter

After joining his third organization this season, Jayson Aquino got some much-needed advice from Hillcats pitching coach Rigo Beltran. On Saturday, the coach left his pitcher alone.

The Indians left-hander carried a no-hitter into the eighth inning as Class A Advanced Lynchburg blanked Carolina, 2-0, at Five County Stadium.

Before finding himself five outs from history, Aquino (1-2) began the year in the Blue Jays system. But after five starts with Class A Advanced Dunedin, he was traded to the Pirates and moved to Bradenton. The 22-year-old southpaw appeared in 13 games with the Marauders before he was on the move again, this time to the Indians.

"He was a little confused of why he keeps going from one organization to the other, and just sharing from my experience because I had been traded three times as well," Beltran said. "So I was telling him, 'All it means is that other organizations want you more than the previous organization and there's a reason why we end up in certain places and maybe there's a reason why you need to be here; there's a lesson you need to learn with this organization that you're not learning anywhere else.'"

In his fifth start for the Hillcats, Aquino faced the minimum through 7 1/3 innings. In the second, Carlos Franco walked but was promptly erased on a double play.

"Just a great outing. He had everything working, he was commanding his fastball, his slider and his changeup," Beltran said. "He did a great job of throwing strikes, I think he had 86 percent first-pitch strikes, so he was really commanding the pitch count and just attacking the zone."

As the no-hit bid unfolded, Beltran and the rest of the bench kept with tradition and left Aquino alone. The pitching coach didn't speak to his hurler until the native of the Dominican Republic found himself in a hole in the eighth.

With one out, Franco and Joey Meneses singled. Beltran made his way to the mound to settle Aquino down. Although Reed Harper singled to load the bases, the talk paid off as Aquino got Jose Briceno to ground into an inning-ending double play.

"[Franco] ended up finding a hole for a base hit, next guy came up and got another base hit. They were three singles that got through holes," the coach said. "He looked like he was in a good place, he looked calm and like he knew what he wanted to do. He ended up coming up with the bases loaded and made a quality pitch to produce a ground-ball double play."

Aquino got two quick outs in the ninth, but after allowing a single to Connor Lien, he was four pitches beyond his limit of 90, so he exited with three strikeouts and his first scoreless outing since May. Robbie Aviles secured the final out for his third save and Aquino's first win in his new organization.

Saturday marked a successful bounce-back performance by the 6-foot-1 hurler, who allowed four runs on 12 hits over 5 2/3 innings at Salem in his last outing on Monday.

"[He did] a better job of keeping the ball down in the zone; he was up in the zone and behind in the count the last previous outing," Beltran said. "Him and I worked on some things during the bullpen [session] and he really did a good job of turning that into the game, and the great start was the result."

As the season comes to a close, Aquino has settled in with likely his final organization. Many of the southpaw's teammates played for the Class A Lake County squad that reached the Midwest League Championship Series last season, creating a postseason spirit this year.

"He kind of blended in really well with this team. He seems like a really good teammate. I see him laughing and joking around with all the guys," Beltran said. "He's really got caught up in the playoff atmosphere, he wants to win, he wants to be a part of it and he's already talking about pitching in the playoffs."