Tri-City routs Vancouver for series win
Vancouver Canadian pitchers hadn’t walked an opposing batter in 24 consecutive innings entering Wednesday night’s contest with the Dust Devils. That streak didn’t last long as Nate Easley led off the bottom of the first with a walk, and Vancouver pitchers went on to issue nine free passes en route to a 10-1 Tri-City victory.
With the win, the Dust Devils (8-5) are on their first three-game winning streak of the season and have a share of the Northwest League’s North Division lead.
“It’s a good feeling,” Tri-City outfielder Luis Asuncion said of being on a winning streak. “I think we have a good team and we’re ready for everything this year.”
The wheels fell off the Vancouver (7-6) bullpen in the sixth inning as Matt Smoral walked the first three batters he faced, and then Gabriel Noyalis went on to walk three batters as well. Thanks to a sacrifice fly by Chris Baker and a bases-clearing double by Westhers Magdaleno, the Dust Devils managed to score six runs on one hit in the sixth to take an 8-0 lead.
“I don’t think it’s any different whether we get five hits in a row or if we walk five times in a row,” Dust Devils manager Ben Fritz said. “They’re going up there with an intent and they’re succeeding at what they’re trying to do.”
The Dust Devils didn’t waste an at bat in the first inning as leadoff man Nate Easley got it started with a leadoff walk, Josh Magee hit an RBI double to left-center to open the scoring, Boomer White hit into a ground out up the middle to move Magee to third, and Kyle Overstreet capped the scoring by lifting a fly ball to deep center to score Magee and give Tri-City a 2-0 lead.
“Anytime you can manufacture runs like that, it’s a plus,” Fritz said. “Half of our (batting practice) is spent on situational hitting, so to see them executing it out there, it’s definitely fun to see coaching third.”
The Padres organization is known for preaching aggressive baserunning throughout the organization, and the Dust Devils experienced the downside of that risk-reward strategy Wednesday as they had five runners thrown out on the base paths.
“Five outs on the bases tonight, a couple of them are mistakes we can’t make, a couple of them are aggressive mistakes, which we will take,” Fritz said. “Every one of them, when you go to talk to them and they know they’ve done something wrong, that’s the coaching moment and they’re doing it themselves. We’re learning from it and we’re going forward.”
For the third consecutive game, the Dust Devils got a dominant starting pitching performance, this time from Will Headean (2-0) who tossed five innings of scoreless, one-hit ball to drop his ERA to 1.20.
Asuncion kept his league-leading hit streak going by checking in with his first multi-hit game of the season, a 3-for-3 performance that included a double, a walk and a run scored. Asuncion has now safely hit in his first 11 games of the season.
“I felt great tonight,” Asuncion said. “I just try to take the same approach to every game, and it’s working out.”
With the victory, the Dust Devils have won 12 of their last 15 games against the Canadians dating back to 2014.
Tri-City will try for the series sweep over Vancouver at 7:15 p.m. Thursday. Jordan Guerrero (1-1, 5.40 ERA) will take the hill for the Dust Devils and will face Patrick Murphy (1-1, 2.25 ERA).
The Dust Devils will then host the Everett AquaSox — tied with Tri-City at the top of the division — for the final time this regular season in a three-game weekend series beginning Friday. All contests are scheduled to begin at 7:15 p.m.
Dust Devils 10, Canadians 1
3
Vancouver ab | r | h | bi | Tri-City ab | r | h | bi | ||
Woodman cf | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Easley 2b | 2 | 3 | 1 | 0 |
Gudino ss | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Magee lf | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 |
C.Biggio dh | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | White 3b | 3 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
J.Andrson rf | 4 | 1 | 1 | 0 | Sosa 3b | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
L.Jones lf | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Ovrstreet 1b | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Romnin ph | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Baker ss | 3 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
Lizardo 3b | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Mattison c | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Clark 1b | 4 | 0 | 1 | 1 | Asuncion rf | 3 | 1 | 3 | 0 |
J.Hrnendez c | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 | Burgos cf | 4 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
Barreto 2b | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Mgdlno dh | 4 | 0 | 2 | 3 |
Totals 30 | 1 | 3 | 1 | Totals 28 | 10 | 10 | 7 | ||
Vancouver | 000 | 000 | 100 | — | 1 |
Tri-City | 200 | 006 | 20x | — | 10 |
E—Higuera (1), Lizardo (4), Baker (2). LOB—Tri-City 5, Vancouver 6. 2B—Hernandez (1), Magee (1), Asuncion (2), Magdaleno (1). SF—Overstreet, Baker. SB—L.Jones (3), Easley (2). CS—Burgos (2).
4
Vancouver | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO |
Higuera L, 1-2 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 2 |
Smoral | 1 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 1 |
Noyalis | 1 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 1 |
Holmes | 2/3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 1 |
E.Smith | 1 1/3 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
Tri-City | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO |
Headean W, 2-0 | 5 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 4 |
Zimmerman H, 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
Stillman | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
Miller | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
WP—Higuera, Smoral 2, Noyalis. HBP—By Headean (Woodman). Umpires—Homeirst, Codey Davis; First, Zachary Dodson. T—2:53. A—1,632.
Dustin Brennan: 509-582-1413, @Tweet_By_Dustin
This story was originally published June 30, 2016 at 12:17 AM with the headline "Tri-City routs Vancouver for series win."