Sacramento's Turley hurls six hitless frames

Most of Minor League Baseball may be in the infamous "dog days" of summer, where the sun is the hottest and the games sometimes feel the longest. For Nik Turley, an early-season stretch out of action has kept him fresh, and on Monday night, he flashed his finest form of the year.

Turley did not allow a hit over six innings, matching a season high with eight strikeouts and walking two and Triple-A Sacramento held on to edge visiting El Paso, 5-4, at Raley Field.

"I feel like I'm able to repeat my delivery a lot better than I did at the beginning of the season," said Turley, who lost roughly six weeks in April and May with a lacerated finger. "I missed some time, so I feel like I'm still towards the beginning of my season. It's definitely good to hit a stretch like this. I feel like I'm able to repeat, and that's the biggest thing."

The lefty was untouchable early. Turley (4-4) was perfect through his first five innings, retiring 15 Chihuahuas in order and striking out eight of the first nine.

"Early on, I was able to just locate," he said. "I felt like I was putting every pitch basically where I was trying to. That doesn't always happen, especially not with every one of my pitches, so I felt good. I felt strong."

The lone El Paso at-bat through the game's first three innings that didn't result in a strikeout was Cody Decker's liner to left that Sacramento's Jarrett Parker snared leading off the second. That's when Turley knew he had a chance to make it a special night.

"Everything seemed to be going my way," he said.

The southpaw utilized all four of his pitches effectively and found a rhythm with catcher Trevor Brown.

"Trevor Brown did an awesome job behind the plate," he said. "We were on the same page, and that's a huge part of it too. He kept my rhythm going, and he did a great job blocking some of the curveballs I threw. It was fun."

Turley knocked a single to left field and scored two batters later on Kelby Tomlinson's RBI single to center to help his own cause in the third, but he felt the effects of his trip around the basepaths as the night wore on.

The native Californian lost his bid for perfection in the sixth when Mike McCoy and Jake Goebbert worked consecutive one-out walks, but Turley rebounded to induce flyouts from Abraham Almonte and Benji Gonzalez for his final outs of the night.

"Through the first four [innings], I felt like I was pretty efficient," said Turley, who threw 66 of his 99 pitches for strikes. "I had some long at-bats in the fifth and sixth, especially the sixth. The two walks, they were both pretty long at-bats, a lot of foul balls. I got to 3-2 on both of them. I felt like I was pretty efficient through the first four, and after running the bases, I felt like I got a little gassed. I'm not used to that."

After posting a 10.47 ERA through his first four outings with the River Cats, Turley has been terrific in five of his last six. The 25-year-old has gone 3-2 with a 2.16 ERA, the second-best mark in the PCL over that span.

River Cats reliever Clay Rapada pitched a perfect seventh to keep the no-hit bid alive, but El Paso's Tim Federowicz ripped a leadoff single off of Steven Okert for his team's first hit in the eighth.

The River Cats built an early lead with a four-run third and Parker lofted a sacrifice fly to center for a fifth run in the fifth. The last one would prove to be crucial. Aided by a fielding error charged to Sacramento third baseman Kevin Frandsen and a passed ball by Brown, the Chihuahuas scored four times in the eighth to cut their deficit to one run.

Erik Cordier entered with two outs in the eighth and pitched around two hits over 1 1/3 innings to close out the victory and earn his eighth save.