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The Cincinnati Reds have moved a string of formidable pitching prospects through Louisville in recent seasons. Aroldis Chapman, Homer Bailey, Matt Maloney. You know the list.

Don’t check the list for this name: Pedro Villarreal.

You won’t find him. But on Wednesday, his third day in town, Villarreal went to the mound with purpose and ended the Louisville Bats’ five-game losing streak, pitching them past Norfolk 6-5 at Louisville Slugger Field.

“Just call him our stopper,” Bats pitching coach Ted Power said before wrapping an arm around Villarreal in the clubhouse. “He stopped the bleeding.”

There are many reasons the Bats have won only 11 of their first 34 games. Here are three: Their pitchers lead the International League in walks, wild pitches and hits allowed. Strike one, strike two, strike three.

Until Saturday Villarreal was pitching for the Reds’ Double-A farm team in Pensacola, Fla. Nearly four years after signing his first pro contract, he made his Triple-A debut Wednesday.

He pitched like a guy who’d been here for years. Only two of the five runs he allowed in 52/3 innings were earned. He struck out seven. Norfolk managed six hits while chasing Villarreal’s fastball, sinker, change-up and slider.

Here is the thing he did that his teammates have not been doing this season: He did not walk anybody. Of the 87 pitches Villarreal threw, 61 were strikes, usually early in the count.

“I pride myself on not walking anybody,” he said. “That’s the thing I’m proudest of.”

“There are a lot of guys with great arms and great stuff,” Bats manager David Bell said. “Pedro also has the makeup to go with it. He has that competitive nature that’s going to allow him to keep getting better and be a big league pitcher.”

The skeptics will require more proof. There were nine pitchers on the Baseball America list of the top 30 prospects in the Reds’ system, and Villarreal was not one of them.

A majority of seventh-round draft picks are not even playing professional baseball four years after they were selected. The Reds took Villarreal, 24, in the seventh round in 2008 out of Howard College in Big Spring, Texas. He’s never been considered a sure thing the way Bailey and Chapman were. He’s barely been a maybe thing.http://www.courier-journal.com/article/2...ext|Sports

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