Aviators’ hitters sizzling at Las Vegas Ballpark this season

The Las Vegas Aviators’ debut season at Las Vegas Ballpark in 2019 was magical in so many ways. The team hit a franchise-record 250 home runs, welcomed a franchise-record 650,934 fans (more than any other team in Minor League Baseball that season), rallied to win a division title and boasted the Pacific Coast League Manager of the Year in skipper Fran Riordan.

The only blemish on that gem of a season? The Aviators dropped a best-of-5 opening-round playoff series to the Sacramento River Cats, squandering a 2-games-to-1 lead.

It took nearly 20 months, but the Aviators finally got a chance to exact some revenge when they welcomed the River Cats to Las Vegas Ballpark for a season-opening six-game series in early May. After dropping the first two games — and scoring just five runs — Las Vegas rallied to win the next four in a row, tallying 36 runs in the process.

Two weeks later, the Aviators traveled north to Sacramento and once again took four of six games from the River Cats, producing a total of 30 runs in the four victories. Now Sacramento is back at Las Vegas Ballpark for another six-game series, with Las Vegas looking to build on its 8-4 season record against the River Cats.

To do that, the Aviators — who are averaging 6.4 runs per game against Sacramento this season — likely will need their hitters to pick up where they left off the last time they were at Las Vegas Ballpark. In winning the final three games of a series against the Tacoma Rainiers, Las Vegas lit up the scoreboard to the tune of 43 runs while belting 13 home runs.

Those three games continued a season-long trend in which the Aviators’ hitters have consistently punished the baseball at Las Vegas Ballpark. In fact, Las Vegas enters the series against the River Cats leading the 10-team Triple-A West (formerly the PCL) in numerous home-specific hitting categories, including:

• Runs scored (192 in 24 games, for an average of 8 runs per game)

• Batting average (.306) and RBI (181)

• On-base percentage (.385), slugging percentage (.542) and OPS (.927)

The Aviators also rank second in the league at home in hits with 264 (trailing only Salt Lake, which has 280 in six more home games); tied for second in home runs with 46 (trailing only Salt Lake’s 51); second in walks with 105 (trailing only El Paso’s 115); and fourth in doubles with 49 (only five behind El Paso and Salt Lake).

The best part? It’s been a complete team effort, as five active Aviators are batting at least .312 at Las Vegas Ballpark (led by outfielder Greg Deichmann’s .379 average); five have at least three home runs (led by third baseman Jacob Wilson’s 11); five have at least four doubles (led by Wilson’s eight); six have scored at least 15 runs (led by Wilson’s 21); two have at least 24 RBI (led by Wilson’s 31); and four have least 10 walks (led by Deichmann’s 16).

None of that includes the gaudy numbers put up by first baseman Frank Schwindel, who this week earned a much-deserved promotion to the Oakland A’s after leading the Aviators in batting average (.324), homers (16), RBI (41), hits (60) and runs (42). Like many of his teammates, Schwindel was particularly destructive at Las Vegas Ballpark, where he was batting .374 with 37 hits, 10 homers, six doubles, 29 RBI and 27 runs.

“Even with Frank gone, we’ve still got a lot of guys on this team who can do damage with the lumber, and they certainly have put on a show for the fans at Las Vegas Ballpark this season,” Riordan said. “Hopefully we’ll deliver more of those offensive fireworks during this series against a tough River Cats club.”

STUNG BY THE BEES: After capping their 12-game homestand with those three straight wins over Tacoma, the Aviators packed up their momentum and took it to Salt Lake, where they outslugged the Bees 8-6 in last Thursday’s opener of a six-game series. Alas, the momentum bubble burst from there, as Salt Lake rallied to win four of the next five contests.

It was an odd series in that the first three games were slugfests (8-6, 10-9 and 10-9) while the last three were pitchers’ duels (5-3 in 10 innings, 3-1 and 4-2). Along the way, the Aviators (23-25) saw their streak of hitting a home run in consecutive games end at 21 when they failed to go deep on both Monday and Tuesday. Still, they established a new franchise record, topping the 2019 squad that homered in 19 straight contests.

Wilson (nine games), catcher Austin Allen (eight games) and outfielder Cody Thomas (five games) continued lengthy hitting streaks in Salt Lake, while shortstop Pete Kozma (10 games), Deichmann (eight games), and infielders Nate Mondou (seven games) and Vimael Machín (five games) saw their hitting streaks halted.

On the mound, right-hander Brian Howard delivered a second straight outstanding start, allowing one unearned on two hits and three walks while striking out five in 5 2/3 innings in Monday’s 3-1 loss. And after three straight shaky outings to start the series, the bullpen came up huge in the latter three contests when eight relief pitchers combined to post a 1.32 ERA across 13 2/3 innings, yielding just two runs on 11 hits and two walks with 16 strikeouts.

DYNAMIC DUO: Several Aviators hitters closed out June with a flourish, none more so than Wilson, who is batting .395 (15-for-38) during his current nine-game hitting streak with four homers, four doubles, nine runs and 15 RBI. Wilson ended the month batting .337 (30-for-89) with eight homers, eight doubles, a triple, 25 RBI, 19 runs, 12 walks and an astounding 1.132 OPS (on-base plus slugging percentage).

Thomas also went wild in June, batting 313 with 11 homers, six doubles, two triples, 28 RBI, 24 runs, 10 walks and a 1.123 OPS. In nine games to close out the month (June 20-29), the 26-year-old Texas native batted .308 (12-for-39) with four multi-hit games, six home runs, 13 RBI and 10 runs.

Since going 1-for-5 against Sacramento on May 30, Thomas has hit safely in 22 of 27 games with 10 multi-hit contests, raising his season batting average from .171 to .278.

LET’S BE FRANK: Schwindel 29th birthday on Tuesday was certainly one to remember, as that’s the day he learned he was heading back to the big leagues for the second time in his career (and first since appearing in six games with the Kansas City Royals in 2019). A day later, he added some sweet icing to his birthday cake when he hit a mammoth two-run homer in his first at-bat with Oakland, helping the A’s to a 3-1 victory.

It was Schwindel’s first career big-league round-tripper and continued a torrid 2021 season. In fact, by the time he left Las Vegas, Schwindel led all of Triple-A West in runs scored (42) and total bases (119), and was tied for first in hits (60), homers (16) and RBI (41). He also compiled three separate hitting streaks of at least five games, including an eight-game stretch from June 18-26 when he batted .472 with four homers and 13 RBI.

In the month of June alone, Schwindel batted .340 (33-for-97) and matched Thomas with 11 homers and 28 RBI.

PROMOTIONS IN MOTION: The six-game homestand against Sacramento is filled with several fan-friendly promotions, starting with $2 Beer Night during Thursday’s series opener. Back-to-back postgame fireworks shows are scheduled for Friday and Saturday, and on Tuesday the Aviators will once again transform into the Reyes de Plata (“Silver Kings”) as part of Minor League Baseball’s Copa de la Diversión initiative that celebrates local Hispanic/Latino culture.

First pitch for all games is 7:05 p.m., except for Sunday’s Fourth of July contest, which begins at 4:05 p.m.

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