Phillies' Moniak puts up first pro four-hit game

Mickey Moniak recently found himself in a funk at the dish, but he swatted it away Wednesday.
"The past week-and-a-half or couple weeks, by my standards, I've been struggling a little bit. I haven't been sticking to my approach at the plate," Philadelphia's No. 2 prospect said. "Tonight, I wanted to just focus on getting a good pitch to hit, and when I got a pitch, doing some damage with it. For the most part, I was able to do that, and it was a good night for sure."
The 19-year-old center fielder put together his first professional four-hit game, going 4-for-5 with a double, a run scored and a walk in Class A Lakewood's 14-1 rout of visiting Delmarva. The BlueClaws' 21 total hits were one off the franchise record set at Asheville on May 4, 2014.

Gameday box score
For Moniak, the offensive outburst came after back-to-back 0-for-4 showings, and he watched his batting average fall from .290 on May 25 to .261 on Tuesday.
"I just felt like I was swinging at pitchers' pitches. I was getting myself out, free swinging, pretty much. Tonight I was swinging at my pitch, not giving the pitchers any credit," the No. 14 overall prospect said. "Baseball is a game of failure -- that's pretty cliche, but it's the truth. You're not going to have [four-hit games] every night, and when you don't, you do your best not to think about it, put it in the past and move on."
He broke the hitless spell with a single up the middle on an 0-2 pitch from No. 26 Orioles prospect  Zach Muckenhirn in the first inning.

"I've always had confidence in myself. Being in pro ball for the first full year, I'm going to have struggles I've never faced previously in my career," Moniak said, but "going up there and getting the first one out of the way, that definitely felt good, and I tried to have consistent at-bats [in each of my next times up]. "
He succeeded. Facing the Delmarva left-hander again in the second, he walked on five pitches. In the fourth, he lined Muckenhirn's first offering to the right side, too hard for first baseman Preston Palmeiro to rein in. Against righty Francisco Jimenez in the fifth, he pulled the sixth pitch of the at-bat into right for a two-bagger.
"The pitcher got ahead of me. The count was 1-2 and I fouled a couple good pitches off," Moniak said. "I was trying to put the ball in play with two strikes, because you can't let the pitcher beat you in that situation. I got a pretty good pitch, and I got the barrel on it."
After grounding out to shortstop Chris Clare in the seventh, the first overall pick of last year's Draft beat out a grounder to the same spot in the eighth.
Throughout the game, Moniak realized the Delmarva staff was sticking with a plan against him, and he likewise stayed the course with his approach. 
"For the most part, I've been getting pitched the same way all year, somewhat backward, getting 2-0 curveballs and that sort of thing," the Southern California native said. "Any night you can get four hits and the team gets the win, it's always a special night. This was a great night for us as a team, and I'm glad I got to do my part."
His 17th multi-hit game of the season gave him a .274/.332/.404 slash line. He's collected 15 doubles, four triples, two homers and five stolen bases.
Carlos Duran homered, tripled and drove in five runs while Darick Hall added a three-run homer and an RBI single for Lakewood. Raul Rivas went 4-for-5 with two RBIs and a run scored.
Southpaw Bailey Falter (3-3) earned the win, scattering six hits and striking out six over five scoreless innings.