The Volcanoes ended their four game skid on Tuesday night by defeating the Boise Hawks 9 to 1. Volcanoes starting pitcher Stetson Woods played the role of stopper in this one as he stymied Hawks' hitters across five stellar innings, earning his first win for the Volcanoes. After both teams
The Volcanoes ended their four game skid on Tuesday night by defeating the Boise Hawks 9 to 1. Volcanoes starting pitcher Stetson Woods played the role of stopper in this one as he stymied Hawks' hitters across five stellar innings, earning his first win for the Volcanoes.
After both teams had baserunning blunders to squander scoring opportunities in the first, the Volcanoes were able to manufacture a run in the second. Ryan Kirby leadoff the inning with a ground ball to shortstop Matt McLaughlin, who threw the ball into the Hawks dugout allowing Kirby to advance to second with nobody out. Dylan Manwaring was able to move Kirby to third base on a soft ground ball to the the second base side of McLaughlin. Kevin Rivera, who was moved down to the five spot in the lineup after being slotted in the two-hole the previous ten games, drove in Kirby on a sac fly to left to put Salem-Keizer up 1 to 0.
With two outs and nobody on, the Volcanoes offensive outburst was far from over. Byron Murray, who has been sidelined with an injury over the previous five days, extended the inning by working an eight pitch walk. Gustavo Cabrera then launched a long ball that careened off the scoreboard in left field for his first hit of the season, giving the Volcanoes a 3 to 0 lead.
In the third, Malique Ziegler tripled down the right field line and come around to score on a seeing eye grounder from left fielder Junior Amion to increase the Volcanoes lead to 4 to 0. Salem-Keizer was not satisfied with the four run lead as they mounted yet another two out rally. Kirby, who leads the Northwest League in extra base hits, added his second hit of the game on a hard grounder that deflected off the glove of Hawks first baseman Danny Edgeworth. Kirby would score the Volcanoes fifth run of the game when Rivera would again drive him home, this time on an opposite field liner to left.
A solo home run by catcher Tom Sidabeck was the mistake on the night by Woods as he cruised through five innings allowing up just the one earned run. While the bullpen blew the lead in Woods' previous two outings, that would not be the case tonight.
Kendry Melo was dominant tonight for the Volcanoes, striking out the first five batters he faced and not giving up a run over three innings. Melo has quickly established himself as the go to reliever out of the Volcanoes bullpen by not giving up a run in six innings over three relief appearances.
In the 8th, the Volcanoes strung together three more hits and took advantage of a costly misread by right fielder Aubrey McCarty en route to plating four runs in the inning. The game would finish at 9 to 1 as right hander Matt Pope tossed his first scoreless inning of the game to close the door for the Volcanoes.
Ziegler continued to pad his otherworldly stats tonight by going 3 for 5 with a run scored and an RBI. He is now in the top 5 in the Northwest League in batting average, on base percentage, slugging percentage, stolen bases, hits, total bases, and runs. Second baseman Richard Amion is now also amongst the league leaders in batting average with a .341 mark after going 2 for 4 with an RBI.
While relief pitching and timely hitting ailed the Volcanoes last night, they excelled at both facets of the game tonight by throwing four scoreless relief innings and going 4 for 6 with runners in scoring position.
Now that the Volcanoes have a win under their belt, they will look to take the series on Wednesday night when Volcanoes right hander Jose Marte and Hawks ace Breiling Eusebio face off at 6:15 p.m at Memorial stadium.
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