Reds' Adleman beats odds, shines in big leagues
PITTSBURGH — Sunday is always the busiest day of the week at Village Market in Wilton, Connecticut. A locally owned grocery store, known for quality food and small-town hospitality, the market was packed on the first day of May, like it is any other Sunday.
In the meat department, Emanuel Vega was hoping to catch some of the Reds and Pirates game, despite this being squarely in New York Yankees territory, with a spattering of Red Sox and Mets fans sprinkled in. Watching Alex Rodriguez or David Ortiz or Matt Harvey is one thing, but down in Pittsburgh was one of his own.
Vega is one of roughly 75-100 people employed by the Village Market. Tim Adleman is another.
On Sunday, Adleman wasn’t wearing the hat the health department requires him to wear in the Village Market’s deli section, but a Cincinnati Reds cap. The 28-year-old Adleman, who was once told he wasn’t good enough to play for the Florence Freedom, stood on the mound at PNC Park in Pittsburgh in front of 28,755 fans and millions of others on TV and the internet. The right-hander who wears a neatly cropped black beard — which quickly identifies the graduate of Georgetown University as older than many of his co-workers in the deli section — struck out former MVP Andrew McCutchen, the second big-league batter he’d ever faced, for his first big-league strikeout.
Vega wasn’t able to see it live, nor was Jen Villeva, who works in the deli alongside Adleman, but everyone working on Sunday was stealing looks at their smartphones and spreading the word about how Tim — the guy who helps prepare deli trays for suburban house parties, stocks shelves and helps customers find the right cheese — was faring against the Pittsburgh Pirates.
He was faring well.
Adleman pitched six-plus innings, allowing two runs on three hits with two walks and six strikeouts, as the Reds beat the Pirates 6-5 in 11 innings, breaking a six-game losing streak.
“He was really cool out there today and he was very effective,” Pirates manager Clint Hurdle told reporters after the game. “And the hitters were saying the same things — ‘This guy’s pitching a good ballgame, he’s hitting his spots, he’s mixing it up.’ ”
Adleman needed just 14 pitches to get through the first inning and getting through the Pirates’ lineup on just 39 pitches through three innings, and not pitching with a runner on base until the fourth when he walked McCutchen. He responded by striking out the next two batters, leaving McCutchen at first.
He gave up a long home run to Gregory Polanco to lead off the fifth, but then retired the next two batters before walking No. 8 hitter Chris Stewart to face pitcher Jeff Locke, who was his sixth and final strikeout victim of the night.
All the while, he looked cool and collected. That, he noted, may have been a pretty good acting job.
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“I’m not sure I knew what the hell was going on out there, so I didn’t have the time to get nervous, I just had to make my pitches and try to help the team win,” he said.
In the stands, a total of 26 people — between his immediate family, an aunt and uncle, and his friends — were there cheering him on as he achieved his life-long goal. Even by big-league debut standards, that was a lot of people. When Brandon Finnegan, whose locker was next to his, overheard the number, he was astounded. “Twenty-six?” Finnegan said with a chuckle.
But that number was dwarfed by those cheering for Adleman from afar. From a youth coach in North Carolina, to other family members across the country and right there at Village Market, there were people cheering for a guy who had beaten all the odds. Adleman was a four-year pitcher at Georgetown, while most prospects leave college after three years. He was drafted by the Orioles and cut in his second season. Unwilling to give up on his dream, Adleman attended a tryout camp with the Florence Freedom in 2012. He didn’t make that team, but he was recommended to another, lower-level, independent league and played for three different independent teams, in Lincoln, Nebraska; El Paso, Texas; and in New Jersey, before the Reds took notice and signed him for the 2014 season.
Not even a 12.39 ERA in high-Class A Bakersfield in 2014, where at 26, he was an average of nearly three years older than the average player, dissuaded him. That year he earned an early call-up to Double-A Pensacola but was then sent back to Bakersfield, only to finish the 2014 season at Double-A. In 2015, he led the Blue Wahoos in wins, ERA, starts, innings pitched and strikeouts, earning a big-league invite this spring.
Although he didn’t make the team out of spring, he got the call Saturday morning from Louisville manager Delino DeShields, letting him know that not only was he getting the call to the big leagues, he would start Sunday in the place of right-hander Raisel Iglesias, who went on the disabled list with inflammation in his right shoulder before Sunday’s game.
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Baseball can present unique opportunities, whether it’s for pitching in Pittsburgh or in El Paso. Adleman wasn’t the only one to grab hold of his opportunity. Scott Schebler, who came into the game .145, entered the game as part of a double switch in the bottom of the eight and responded with two go-ahead, RBI doubles, one in the top of the ninth and then the eventual game-winner in the 11th. Tyler Holt, a pinch-runner for an injured Zack Cozart, saw Joey Votto get in a run-down in the top of the eighth inning and didn’t want Votto to make the last out. So he ran home, through the tag of catcher Chris Stewart, knocking the ball out of his glove for a go-ahead run in that frame.
Taking advantage of any opportunity is important not just in baseball, but in life. In Connecticut, even though Vega couldn’t see the game live, he knew what was going on and that Adleman was taking advantage of his big opportunity.
“A lot of the guys that were here working today, we’ve worked with him a lot, so it was good to know he was there, he’s been trying for a long time to get there,” Vega said. “It’s a good thing he finally made it. You just never give up, keep trying, no matter how long it takes. Sometimes it takes longer than others to get where you want to get to.”