The left arm was sore, as expected, but Cole Sturgeon grabbed a bat and took to the Portland Sea Dogs’ batting cage Friday afternoon.

Despite his performance on the mound Thursday night, Sturgeon is still an outfielder who makes a daily visit to the cage.

Cole Sturgeon decided a year ago that he wanted to concentrate on hitting as a pro after hitting and pitching at the University of Louisville. But he still has a lively arm, and it came in handy Thursday night for the Portland Sea Dogs in a 16-inning victory. Sturgeon pitched three shutout innings. Photo courtesy Portland Sea Dogs

Cole Sturgeon

Sturgeon, 23, made headlines with his three innings of shutout relief in the Sea Dogs’ 6-5 16-inning victory over the New Hampshire Fisher Cats on Thursday (technically 12:14 a.m. Friday).

Sturgeon began the game in left field. He moved to right in the 11th after another player was removed for a pinch hitter, then walked to the mound for the 14th.

By the 12th inning, Manager Billy McMillon knew he was running out of available pitchers.

“I went up to the position players and asked who can pitch,” McMillon said. Sturgeon “was the first one I went up to.”

That wasn’t a coincidence. Sturgeon had been an outfielder and reliever in college – and a pretty good one (1.98 ERA his senior season in 2014).

“I knew he had done it but it had been over a year,” McMillon said.

The manager gave Sturgeon simple instructions.

“He said to go out there and take it nice and easy, and just throw strikes. That’s pretty much what I did,” Sturgeon said. “I didn’t want to do anything stupid. I haven’t thrown in over a year.”

Fans may remember Texas Rangers outfielder Jose Canseco pitching against the Red Sox in 1993. He injured his right elbow, requiring surgery.

“We didn’t want to get (Sturgeon) hurt,” catcher Jake Romanski said. “Just stay with the heater and it worked out for us.”

Actually, Sturgeon tried one split fastball and almost hit a batter.

“I gave him a look that said, ‘hey, stay with the fastball,’ ” Romanski said.

He did, throwing 16 strikes in his 30 pitches. Only one ball was hit in the air to the outfield. Sturgeon gave up one walk and one ground single. He induced seven groundouts, one infield pop and one fly to left.

“His fastball has a really good two-seam run on it,” Romanski said.

Sturgeon has always been a standout pitcher, back to the days when he led his Owensboro, Kentucky, Little League team to the 2004 World Series (the team did not get out of pool play).

He also helped Louisville make it to the College World Series twice. He was voted the Most Outstanding Player in the 2014 NCAA regional after batting .364 and pitching 1 1/3 innings of shutout relief in the deciding game.

Scouts followed Sturgeon, eyeing his arm and bat.

“There were some teams that wanted to draft me as a pitcher, but I didn’t want to go that route,” Sturgeon said.

The Red Sox chose him in the 10th round last year. He’s batting .260 in his short career and was rushed up to Double-A Portland on June 6, in part because three Sea Dogs outfielders are on the disabled list.

“I’m excited to be here. Kind of learning on the fly,” Sturgeon said. “Just watching the guys and seeing how they go about things, and take in as much as I can.”

Sturgeon didn’t just earn Thursday’s win with his pitching. He lined a single to lead off the 16th and hustled to third on Marco Hernandez’s single (with Hernandez alertly taking second base on the throw to third).

After an intentional walk to Reed Gragnani, Jantzen Witte had a great at-bat, fouling off several pitches, before reliever Cory Burns threw a wild pitch, bringing in Sturgeon with the winning run.

Sturgeon finished the night 2 for 6 with a sacrifice, one run – and those three scoreless innings.

“He did an amazing job,” McMillon said.

Sturgeon’s performance brought to mind the effort of Sea Dogs outfielder Jay Johnson, who pitched in the longest Portland game – a 17-inning 8-7 win over the Connecticut Defenders in 2008. Johnson was not only the winning pitcher but had the walk-off RBI hit.

Now Sturgeon becomes part of Sea Dogs history.

“We had a lot of fun with it,” he said.

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