Tejeda carries offense for Wood Ducks

April showers bring May flowers, but it's also brought some extra thunder to the bat of Anderson Tejeda.
The 12th-ranked Texas prospect homered twice and matched career highs with four hits, four RBIs and four runs scored to lead Class A Advanced Down East past Frederick, 11-4, on Sunday afternoon at Grainger Stadium. It marked the third home run in two games for Tejeda, who went deep during Saturday night's game, which was suspended in the bottom of the eighth inning. The Wood Ducks completed the 4-1 victory prior to Sunday's regularly scheduled game.

Gameday box score
"I feel the biggest adjustment I've been able to make has been laying off bad pitches," Tejeda said through translator Alex Rodriguez, Down East's trainer. "I'm not chasing like I was last year. When you go after good pitches, you're more likely to get the barrel of the bat on the ball."
The 20-year-old opened the scoring for Down East in the first with a two-run homer to center field before singling to left and scoring on Andretty Cordero's base hit in the third. Tejeda followed Charles Leblanc's leadoff walk in the fifth with his eighth roundtripper of the year over the fence in right-center field for his second career multi-homer game and the first since Aug. 28, 2016 with Class A Short Season Spokane.
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The lefty-swinging shortstop led off the sixth with a double to right and scored on Alex Kowalczyk's double before striking out in his final at-bat. It was Tejeda's second career four-hit game and the first since he achieved the feat in the Rookie-level Arizona League on July 30, 2016. He leads the Carolina League with 41 RBIs and is tied for third in home runs behind Salem's Bobby Dalbec, Boston's No. 12 prospect, and Potomac's Rhett Wiseman, who both have nine.
"I see myself as more of a doubles hitter than a home run guy," Tejeda said. "I like to find the gaps, either to the opposite field or the pull side. Sometimes I'm able to get them over the wall, which is great for me and my team." 
After struggling to a .233 average, which included 34 strikeouts in 23 games during April, Tejeda has batted .305/.356/.568 this month to raise his season slash line to .270/.337/.492 with 22 extra-base hits and 41 RBIs in 48 games. He's matched his home run total from last year with Class A Hickory in 67 fewer games and is two short of the career high 10 he hit across three levels in 2016.

"Nothing in my daily routine has changed much from the past," the Dominican Republic native said. "I'm trying to go the other way a lot more instead of always pulling the ball. That's been a big key to my success lately. But mostly I'm trying to stay with what I've done and established in Spring Training. I'm having a good month and I'm having fun. You need to enjoy the highs, battle through the lows and take it one day at a time."
Josh Altmann also went deep for the Wood Ducks. Starter Emerson Martinez (3-4) allowed three runs on six hits while striking out four without a walk over seven innings to snap a five-start winless streak.
Orioles No. 29 prospectRyan McKenna singled three times and Preston Palmeiro doubled in two runs for the Keys.