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Best Games at Victory Field, No. 5: Indians Blank Clippers as Eppler Fans 10

Indy rolls Columbus 10-0 for first of league-high 15 shutouts
Tyler Eppler's 2018 debut featured a career-high 10 strikeouts. (Photo by Austin Friedline)
November 12, 2018

INDIANAPOLIS - The Indians' first win of the 2018 season was one of their best at Victory Field. The Tribe finished 40-30 at home and had nine of their league-high 15 shutouts on their home field, with the first being a 10-0 blanking of division-rival Columbus on April 7.

INDIANAPOLIS - The Indians' first win of the 2018 season was one of their best at Victory Field. The Tribe finished 40-30 at home and had nine of their league-high 15 shutouts on their home field, with the first being a 10-0 blanking of division-rival Columbus on April 7.

The Tribe jumped on right-hander Adam Plutko for two runs in the second and two more in the fourth to grab a 4-0 lead. Kevin Newman poked a two-out, two-run single to give Indy the early advantage ahead of consecutive run-scoring doubles by Jacob Stallings and Eric Wood in the fourth.

Making his 2018 debut, Tyler Eppler excelled over 5.2 scoreless frames. He scattered six hits and one walk while recording the first 10-strikeout game of his career. Eppler pitched around two singles in the third by striking out Mike Napoli and worked in and out of trouble in the fourth, scattering three singles before inducing an inning-ending groundout off the bat of Greg Allen.

Eppler sailed through the fifth - and heart of the Columbus order - with three straight ground balls to second baseman Kevin Kramer. He capped his outing with strikeouts of Yu Chang and Mike Papi, the latter caught looking at strike three for a third time.

The Tribe opened the floodgates in the home half of the sixth, scoring five times to build a nine-run cushion. Max Moroff tripled to start the frame, an inning in which the Indians sent 11 batters to the plate. Stallings and Newman laced RBI doubles, and both Austin Meadows and Moroff sandwiched RBI singles around a bases-loaded walk to José Osuna.

Richard Rodríguez recorded seven outs in relief - five on punchouts. He struck out the side in the eighth and handed over to right-hander Tyler Jones who tossed a 1-2-3 ninth to complete the 10-0 victory.