Labour’s Clutch Triple Pushes Ems Past Dust Devils In Pasco

The Eugene Emeralds (67-50) bounced back with another trademark one-run win on Friday night, downing the Tri-City Dust Devils (43-66) by a final of 3-2 at Gesa Stadium.

THE DETAILS:

• Winning Pitcher: Ty Weber (1-0, 0.00 ERA): 1.0 IP | 0 H | 0 R | 1 BB | 1 K
• Losing Pitcher: Brandon Dufault (0-1, 18.00 ERA): 1.0 IP | 2 H | 2 R | 2 ER | 1 BB | 3 K
• Save: Chris Wright (17)
• HR(s): Eugene: N/A | Tri-City: N/A

HOW IT HAPPENED: Coming off a 3-1 defeat the night prior, the Emeralds took the game’s first lead on Friday night, and they didn’t wait long to do so.

Sean Roby led off the second inning with a double off the base of the outfield wall in right, and after Tyler Fitzgerald moved Roby up ninety feet on a soft groundout to the right side of the infield, Marco Luciano brought Roby home with a sac fly to left that put Eugene ahead, 1-0.

It remained a 1-0 lead in favor of the Ems until the sixth when Eugene’s one-run advantage turned into a one-run deficit. The sixth started with 19-year-old Kyren Paris doubling to deep right field, and Paris advanced to third on a wild pitch by Emeralds starting pitcher Jake Dahlberg in the ensuing at-bat.

Tri-City’s Kevin Maitan then brought Paris home in that very same at-bat, skying a sac fly to right that plated the speedy Paris from third to tie the game at 1-1.

Dahlberg bounced back admirably by striking out the next batter, Kenyon Yovan, for what was Dahlberg’s tenth strikeout of the evening. With two outs and the bases empty, Dahlberg got to a full count to Keinner Pina but ultimately issued a walk, his first walk issued of the evening.

With Dahlberg’s pitch count now over one-hundred pitches, the Emeralds opted to turn towards the bullpen and call upon Nick Avila, but the right-hander out of Long Beach State immediately ran into trouble. Kevin Watson Jr. greeted Avila by singling to center field, advancing Pina to third while Watson Jr. then advanced to second on the throw to third from.

Moments later, Pina came into score to put the Dust Devils ahead, 2-1, on what was officially ruled as a wild pitch by Avila after the right-hander got a swinging strike only to see the ball then glance off the glove of Ems catcher Fabian Pena and jettison to the backstop.

Eugene didn’t take long to answer, though. The Emeralds responded with their own two-run inning in the seventh, starting with yet another leadoff double from Sean Roby. Two batters later, Marco Luciano battled back from what was an 0-2 count to work a walk and put runners on the corners with two outs. Franklin Labour then stepped up and brought both Roby and Luciano home, lacing this sixth triple of the season into the right field corner to score plate both baserunners and put the Emeralds back in front, 3-2.

That proved a good enough margin for the Emeralds bullpen as Nick Morreale worked a scoreless eighth inning while Chris Wright earned his league-leading seventeenth save of the season to cap a 3-2 win for the Ems.

PEAK PERFORMERS:

• Jake Dahlberg – LHP: Despite taking the no decision, Dahlberg was dealing over his 5.2 innings of work, amassing ten strikeouts while allowing five hits, one walk and two earned runs.
• Sean Roby – 1B: Roby continued his strong second half of the season, going 2-for-3 with two doubles and two runs scored. Roby, who is batting .240 on the season, is batting .322 since the start of of August.

WHAT’S NEXT: The series between the Emeralds and Dust Devils continues on Saturday at 7:05pm PST at Gesa Stadium.

You can catch all the action in Pasco with road broadcaster Alex Stimson on the call via 95.3FM The Score, MiLB.com or on the MiLB app.

Tickets to Emeralds home games are available at www.EmeraldsBaseball.com or by calling (541) 342-5367.

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