Mark Appel Makes His Debut For Tri-City

I didn't actually get to see or even listen to Mark Appel's debut, two kids kind of do that thing to baseball stuff from time to time, but I didn't need to because Twitter is the best thing since sliced bread. If you're a baseball fan Twitter is the place to be for breaking news and instant reaction to things happening on the field. It's like going to an Astros only bar where everyone knows your username.

The other great thing about Twitter is that you can search for keywords so to find out how Appel's debut went I did a search for 'Appel' and this is what I found:

per the Tri-City broadcast Appel is set to throw 30 pitches tonight

— Harry Pavlidis (@harrypav) July 5, 2013

Appel warm up tosses. pic.twitter.com/NTvkj9g1tp

— Jayne (@whattheheck57) July 5, 2013

Time to panic? j/k RT @zacharylevine: Mark Appel's first pitch as a pro: Fastball hit over CF's head for a triple.

— Matt Jackson (@MJ4Sports) July 5, 2013

Lowell's Tzu-Wei Lin welcomed Mark Appel to professional baseball with a triple. #RedSox

— J.P. (@Jaypers413) July 5, 2013

Second Appel inning very quick. Was sitting low 90's and hit 93. Off speed was 79-82.

— Jayne (@whattheheck57) July 5, 2013

Mark Appel is indeed out of the game after 2 innings. Lousy results, right arm still attached.

— Zachary Levine (@zacharylevine) July 5, 2013

Mark Appel pro debut: 2 IP 3 H 2 R 1 ER 1 K for Tri-City. #Astros #NYPL

— Jessica Quiroli (@heelsonthefield) July 5, 2013

Mark Appel goes two innings, 26 pitches, allows 2 runs. Velocity and movement both there; results will follow as he shakes off rust

— Matt Appel (@mattappel) July 5, 2013

First game in two months. "@BlaiseAgnew: @keithlaw what's Appel usually sit at? Only 90-93 on the gun tonight."

— keithlaw (@keithlaw) July 5, 2013

Mark Appel's night is done. 2 IP, 3 hits, 2 runs and a strikeout. Much sharper in the second inning. Cats trail 2-0

— Tri-City ValleyCats (@ValleyCats) July 5, 2013

And there you have it, a bad first inning followed by a much better second inning. As Keith Law noted it's been a while since Appel has been in game action so expectations are to be tempered. Hearing that he's hitting low-to-mid 90s with movement is exactly what we want to hear.

Brooks noted that he had five ground outs and no fly outs which is even more encouraging. Glenn (wgr56), who is at the game, noted that Appel mostly used fastballs and seemed to get hit pretty hard, however, "the popping leather sounded good."

If you were at the game feel free to share any thoughts or media you may have.

Oh and by the way, as I was searching for Appel I ran across several of these tweets:

Une fille qui dit toujours Oui j'appel sa une Wi-Fi

— Gueule d'Ange✨ (@ToninioSapapaya) July 6, 2013

Apparently, Appel means call in French, which just opened a whole new world of Appel puns for me.

Appel me maybe?