Kernels Walk-Off Bandits in Extras

Cedar Rapids, Iowa – The Quad Cities River Bandits battled to erase two separate deficits on Tuesday, but ultimately fell to the Cedar Rapids Kernels 6-5 in ten innings at Veterans Memorial Stadium.

Both teams broke into the run column in the first inning, with Kale Emshoff giving the River Bandits what would wind up their only lead in the game with an RBI infield single. But Rubel Cespedes would immediately tie the game in the bottom half against Hunter Owen with an RBI single of his own.

After Miguelangel Boadas kept Quad Cities scoreless in the top half of the second—picking up one of his career-high nine strikeouts—the Kernels took a 3-1 lead on two more RBI singles, these off the bats of Agustin Ruiz and Ricardo Olivar. However, Owen would not allow another run over the remainder of his 5.0-inning start and retired nine of the final 10 batters he faced.

In the fourth, Quad Cities battled back for the first time and strung together three two-out RBIs to tie the game 4-4, as Jack Pineda doubled in a pair and then scored on a poke up the middle by Justin Johnson.

While Juan Mercedes gave the Kernels two perfect innings and quieted Quad Cities’ bats in the sixth and seventh, Ruiz again put his team in front, this time against Chazz Martinez, who allowed the two-out RBI double to put Cedar Rapids ahead 5-4.

Chase Wallace kept the Bandits in the game with 2.0 perfect innings of relief in the seventh and eighth and lowered his season’s ERA to 0.69.

After being held off the scoreboard for four-straight innings, the Bandits’ bats broke back through in the ninth and loaded the bases against Gabriel Yanez with one out. Trevor Werner’s sacrifice fly plated Johnson and knotted the score 5-5.

Brandon Johnson stranded the winning run on third in the Kernels’ half of the ninth to push the game to extra innings, but after Quad Cities failed to score its placed runner in the top of the tenth, Jay Harry played the two-out hero against Johnson in the bottom half, plating pinch runner Willy Joe Garry Jr. with a walk-off double to right-center field.

A.J. Labas (3-2) earned the win for the Kernels, striking out a pair in his scoreless tenth, while Johnson (3-2) was saddled with the loss, allowing the one unearned run over 1.2 innings. Yanez (3) suffered his third blown save of the season by giving up the Bandits’ run in the ninth.

Quad Cities will look to even the series on Wednesday afternoon and sends Ben Kudrna (2-2, 2.56) to the mound against Cedar Rapids’ Andrew Morris (2-1, 2.64). First pitch at Veterans Memorial Stadium is scheduled for 12:05 p.m.