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Gavyn Jones shines in 1st start, propels A’s in dramatic 10-inning victory over Orleans
ORLEANS, Mass. — The Major League Baseball Draft impacts every team in the Cape Cod Baseball League, but its effects are certainly not felt equally.
Plenty of Cape League teams saw draft-eligible players either depart early for preparation, or get plucked off their rosters by MLB organizations in later rounds. Chatham is not alone in dealing with the fallout of this past weekend’s selections. But, with an already thin pitching staff, it’s difficult to argue few teams were affected as directly by the draft as much as the Anglers were — it essentially took out Chatham’s Wednesday starter.
Luke Jackson (Dallas Baptist) was always supposed to pitch for the A’s against Orleans. In a tweet released by the team just two days prior, Jackson was listed as the Anglers’ scheduled starter for the matchup. His plan was always to spend an extended amount of time in Chatham this summer, gearing up for a crucial redshirt junior season with DBU — his new school.
But as it turns out, Jackson might have pitched too well in Chatham for that plan to ever work out. Buoyed by his 2.45 earned run average with the A’s, the Tampa Bay Rays decided to take a chance on Jackson, selecting in the 11th round of the MLB Draft. His unanticipated selection forced him to make a difficult decision, as he ultimately chose to end his time in Chatham by signing with the Rays.
Because of this ordeal, Anglers’ manager Dennis Cook was left without a starter roughly a day before the matchup. Who would he turn to? None other than Gavyn Jones (Oklahoma), making his first start of the season just days after closing out the A’s 7-2 road win over Yarmouth-Dennis.
Despite starting just one game at Oklahoma this past collegiate season, Jones battled through five innings of two-run ball against the Firebirds on just two days of rest, giving Chatham (11-12-3, East) a chance to claim an 8-7 10-inning win over Orleans (12-12-2, East). He suffered an early setback with a two-run second inning, but he strongly recovered, allowing one hit and no runs across his final three innings of work.
“He started pounding the strike zone with his fastball,” Cook said. “He just started throwing more strikes and working ahead, instead of being in offensive counts.”
While Jones allowed two singles in his first inning of work, it ultimately ended scoreless, as he released the pressure by inducing a weak two-out groundout to shortstop from Robbie Lavey.
Gavyn Jones hadn't started a Cape League game until he got the ball against Orleans, but he tossed 5.0 frames of two-run ball as one of the Anglers' top performers in their 8-7 win over the Firebirds. Photograph by Ella Tovey
It took one plate appearance for Orleans to ratchet that pressure back up, higher than it had ever been before. After falling behind 3-1 to Ryan Kucherak, Jones fed him a fastball over the heart of the plate. The pitch got hammered over the left-field fence, giving Orleans a one-run lead in the top of the second.
That lead doubled almost instantly, as Jones gave up a two-out walk and hit by pitch to put two runners on for Anthony Potestio. In an Orleans lineup full of dangerous hitters, there’s few people who you’d want to face with runners on than Potestio, who left Wednesday sporting a top-five OPS in the CCBL.
On the first pitch he saw, the Firebirds right fielder blooped a ball into left, plating Jonathan Mendez to give Orleans its second run in as many innings.
“(I was) just overdoing things,” Jones said. “Just trying to kind of get away from contact.”
Two innings later, though, Chatham got them all back. Freeman and Jackson led off the fourth with consecutive singles, and Chase Fralick (Auburn) came through with a one-out single to score the Anglers’ first run. Hanley followed by doubling to tie the game at 2-2, and Isaiah Lane (San Diego) didn’t even have to move a muscle to give the A’s their first lead, as a balk by Orleans reliever Mason Koch allowed Fralick to score Chatham’s third run.
Once Jones settled in, he responded incredibly well from his calamitous second frame, requiring only ten batters to record nine outs across the following three scoreless innings. The only semblance of a threat he faced came on a two-out Garza single in the fifth, which was immediately erased after a perfectly-executed pickoff move to get him out. With five full innings under his belt, it was the longest outing Jones has had since entering college.
“Contact’s a good thing, good things happen when you attack hitters,” Jones said. “That’s what I did in the back half of my outing. So, it obviously showed, too.”
Jones’ performance had already done an effective job at silencing a once-raucous Orleans crowd. But if there were any cheers left from the Firebirds’ faithful in the top of the sixth, they were almost immediately extinguished by Martin, who demolished a fastball from Orleans lefty Sebastian Gonzalez over the right-field fence for his first home run of the summer.
In the next frame, the Anglers gave themselves a couple enough insurance, with Fralick extending Chatham’s lead to 6-2 by blasting a two-run double into left.
“He’s putting it together right now,” Cook said. “I think he’s going to be OK.”
As it turns out, Chatham would need every bit of that insurance to sneak away with a win. Command issues by Kaden Smith (TCU) — as well as a misplayed bounce on a Kucherak grounder to third — led to three Orleans runs in the frame. And while Dane Burns (Mississippi State) settled the game down after replacing Smith, he still gave up a game-tying infield single to Dawson Bryce.
“You can’t walk three hitters when you’re up four. You can’t do it,” Cook said. “You open up the door for a gigantic inning. We’re lucky that they only scored what they scored.”
After both teams were sat down with little issue in the ninth, Hanley delivered for the Anglers in the extra 10th frame, reaching on a Mendez error to score Martin and reclaim a 7-6 lead for the A’s. And with a two-out double into center, Freeman plated Hanley to tack on a second run to Chatham’s newly-found cushion. Though Orleans scored a seventh run on a wild pitch by Burns in the bottom of the frame, the righty was otherwise flawless as he closed out the win.
When the Anglers have fallen behind the eight-ball early, they have often resigned themselves to their fate, allowing their deficits to swell uncontrollably as they flounder on all fronts. But the A’s have shown the capability to battle back into games as well — they just need their starters to give them a fighting chance.
And on Wednesday, Jones — thrust into his second start of 2025 — gave Chatham more than a fighters’ chance to steal a win from Orleans.
Plenty of Cape League teams saw draft-eligible players either depart early for preparation, or get plucked off their rosters by MLB organizations in later rounds. Chatham is not alone in dealing with the fallout of this past weekend’s selections. But, with an already thin pitching staff, it’s difficult to argue few teams were affected as directly by the draft as much as the Anglers were — it essentially took out Chatham’s Wednesday starter.
Luke Jackson (Dallas Baptist) was always supposed to pitch for the A’s against Orleans. In a tweet released by the team just two days prior, Jackson was listed as the Anglers’ scheduled starter for the matchup. His plan was always to spend an extended amount of time in Chatham this summer, gearing up for a crucial redshirt junior season with DBU — his new school.
But as it turns out, Jackson might have pitched too well in Chatham for that plan to ever work out. Buoyed by his 2.45 earned run average with the A’s, the Tampa Bay Rays decided to take a chance on Jackson, selecting in the 11th round of the MLB Draft. His unanticipated selection forced him to make a difficult decision, as he ultimately chose to end his time in Chatham by signing with the Rays.
Because of this ordeal, Anglers’ manager Dennis Cook was left without a starter roughly a day before the matchup. Who would he turn to? None other than Gavyn Jones (Oklahoma), making his first start of the season just days after closing out the A’s 7-2 road win over Yarmouth-Dennis.
Despite starting just one game at Oklahoma this past collegiate season, Jones battled through five innings of two-run ball against the Firebirds on just two days of rest, giving Chatham (11-12-3, East) a chance to claim an 8-7 10-inning win over Orleans (12-12-2, East). He suffered an early setback with a two-run second inning, but he strongly recovered, allowing one hit and no runs across his final three innings of work.
“He started pounding the strike zone with his fastball,” Cook said. “He just started throwing more strikes and working ahead, instead of being in offensive counts.”
While Jones allowed two singles in his first inning of work, it ultimately ended scoreless, as he released the pressure by inducing a weak two-out groundout to shortstop from Robbie Lavey.
Gavyn Jones hadn't started a Cape League game until he got the ball against Orleans, but he tossed 5.0 frames of two-run ball as one of the Anglers' top performers in their 8-7 win over the Firebirds. Photograph by Ella Tovey
It took one plate appearance for Orleans to ratchet that pressure back up, higher than it had ever been before. After falling behind 3-1 to Ryan Kucherak, Jones fed him a fastball over the heart of the plate. The pitch got hammered over the left-field fence, giving Orleans a one-run lead in the top of the second.
That lead doubled almost instantly, as Jones gave up a two-out walk and hit by pitch to put two runners on for Anthony Potestio. In an Orleans lineup full of dangerous hitters, there’s few people who you’d want to face with runners on than Potestio, who left Wednesday sporting a top-five OPS in the CCBL.
On the first pitch he saw, the Firebirds right fielder blooped a ball into left, plating Jonathan Mendez to give Orleans its second run in as many innings.
“(I was) just overdoing things,” Jones said. “Just trying to kind of get away from contact.”
Two innings later, though, Chatham got them all back. Freeman and Jackson led off the fourth with consecutive singles, and Chase Fralick (Auburn) came through with a one-out single to score the Anglers’ first run. Hanley followed by doubling to tie the game at 2-2, and Isaiah Lane (San Diego) didn’t even have to move a muscle to give the A’s their first lead, as a balk by Orleans reliever Mason Koch allowed Fralick to score Chatham’s third run.
Once Jones settled in, he responded incredibly well from his calamitous second frame, requiring only ten batters to record nine outs across the following three scoreless innings. The only semblance of a threat he faced came on a two-out Garza single in the fifth, which was immediately erased after a perfectly-executed pickoff move to get him out. With five full innings under his belt, it was the longest outing Jones has had since entering college.
“Contact’s a good thing, good things happen when you attack hitters,” Jones said. “That’s what I did in the back half of my outing. So, it obviously showed, too.”
Jones’ performance had already done an effective job at silencing a once-raucous Orleans crowd. But if there were any cheers left from the Firebirds’ faithful in the top of the sixth, they were almost immediately extinguished by Martin, who demolished a fastball from Orleans lefty Sebastian Gonzalez over the right-field fence for his first home run of the summer.
In the next frame, the Anglers gave themselves a couple enough insurance, with Fralick extending Chatham’s lead to 6-2 by blasting a two-run double into left.
“He’s putting it together right now,” Cook said. “I think he’s going to be OK.”
As it turns out, Chatham would need every bit of that insurance to sneak away with a win. Command issues by Kaden Smith (TCU) — as well as a misplayed bounce on a Kucherak grounder to third — led to three Orleans runs in the frame. And while Dane Burns (Mississippi State) settled the game down after replacing Smith, he still gave up a game-tying infield single to Dawson Bryce.
“You can’t walk three hitters when you’re up four. You can’t do it,” Cook said. “You open up the door for a gigantic inning. We’re lucky that they only scored what they scored.”
After both teams were sat down with little issue in the ninth, Hanley delivered for the Anglers in the extra 10th frame, reaching on a Mendez error to score Martin and reclaim a 7-6 lead for the A’s. And with a two-out double into center, Freeman plated Hanley to tack on a second run to Chatham’s newly-found cushion. Though Orleans scored a seventh run on a wild pitch by Burns in the bottom of the frame, the righty was otherwise flawless as he closed out the win.
When the Anglers have fallen behind the eight-ball early, they have often resigned themselves to their fate, allowing their deficits to swell uncontrollably as they flounder on all fronts. But the A’s have shown the capability to battle back into games as well — they just need their starters to give them a fighting chance.
And on Wednesday, Jones — thrust into his second start of 2025 — gave Chatham more than a fighters’ chance to steal a win from Orleans.
