Quakes Rock Ports 13-2
RANCHO CUCAMONGA, Calif. - The Rancho Cucamonga Quakes had nearly no offense for the final seven innings on Thursday night. That changed drastically on Friday as the Stockton Ports allowed 13 runs on a season-high 17 hits, falling to the Quakes by a final of 13-2.
Stockton grabbed an early lead as Max Muncy hit his league-leading 17th home run of the season, a two-run blast off Quakes starter Jarret Martin (5-6) in the first inning. Martin, though, would go on to retire 14 of his final 16 batters after allowing the home run to Muncy. Martin earned the win, going five innings and allowing two runs on four hits while matching a season-high with eight strikeouts.
The Quakes took the lead for good in the bottom of the first on a pair of home runs off Ports starter Shaeffer Hall (1-1). With one out, Scott Schebler hit a solo home run to right, his second homer in as many games, to make it 2-1. With one on and two out, Jonathan Garcia hit the first of two two-run homers on the night to give Rancho Cucamonga a 3-2 lead.
The Quakes exploded for five runs in the third. After back-to-back singles opened the inning, O'Koyea Dickson came up and hit a two-run double to right-center to widen the Quakes lead to 5-2. Garcia followed with another two-run homer to make it 7-2. Hall allowed a single to Webster Rivas and then was lifted for Blake Hassebrock. Hassebrock walked his first batter and then uncorked a wild pitch that allowed Rivas to score from third with two outs, giving the Quakes an 8-2 lead.
Hall suffered his first loss of the season, going two-plus innings and allowing eight runs on nine hits.
Hassebrock pitched into the fourth inning and, after walking the leadoff batter, gave up an RBI triple to Noel Cuevas. Dickson followed with an RBI single to right, putting the Rancho Cucamonga lead at 10-2. The Quakes added another run on an RBI double from Chris Jacobs that knocked Hassebrock from the game. Hassebrock went 1.2 innings and allowed three runs on four hits while walking two and striking out two.
T.J. Walz followed Hassebrock into the game and, after walking the first two batters he faced to load the bases, struck out Darnell Sweeney to end the fourth inning. Walz went on to pitch 2.1 scoreless innings in relief for Stockton.
After a scoreless inning from David Mota, Omar Duran took over in the eighth and allowed two unearned runs on RBI doubles by Garcia and Jacobs. The runs were unearned because of two dropped fly balls, one by Duran and the other by right fielder Dusty Robinson.
JonMichael Redding, Joel Lima, Pedro Baez and Eric Eadington each tossed a scoreless inning down the stretch. The four Quakes relievers combined to shut the Ports offense down on just one hit over the final four innings of the ballgame.
B.A. Vollmuth went 1-for-4 for the Ports and extended his hitting streak to 14 games with a single in the fourth inning.
The Ports and Quakes play the third game of their four-game series on Saturday night at Loan Mart Field. Tanner Peters (7-4, 4.50 ERA) will make the start for Stockton, opposed by Rancho Cucamonga right-hander Carlos Frias (0-0, 0.00 ERA). First pitch is set for 7:05 p.m. PDT.