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Peguero rallies Rainiers with six hits

Mariners farmhand falls triple shy of cycle, drives in three runs
July 26, 2013

Eighty years ago to the day, Joe Dimaggio had his 61-game Pacific Coast League hitting streak snapped. Carlos Peguero's night wasn't as historical, but it was impressive nonetheless.

The Mariners farmhand went 6-for-7 with a homer and three RBIs on Friday night, helping Triple-A Tacoma outlast Reno, 9-7, in 12 innings.

"He's so talented," said Rainiers hitting coach and two-time Major League All-Star Howard Johnson. "He was a complete hitter tonight."

Peguero finished a triple shy of the cycle and scored twice. His two-run shot in the sixth scored rehabbing Mariners slugger Mike Morse and lifted the Rainiers within 4-3. He came through with his third single of the night in the 12th to plate Ty Kelly with an insurance run after Stefen Romero put Tacoma in front with a sacrifice fly.

The single up the middle came against Eury De La Rosa and culminated an eight-pitch at-bat during which Peguero fouled off three offerings.

"His last hit of the night was probably his best," Johnson said. "It was against a left-hander and he was down, 0-2, and he kept battling, fouling pitches off. And he got one to hit and ended up with an RBI single."

The 26-year-old outfielder leads the Rainiers with 16 homers and 63 RBIs while batting .278 in his third season in the Pacific Coast League. A member of the Seattle organization since 2006, Peguero has never had more than four hits in a game before, most recently on June 24 against Fresno.

"Peguero's been swinging the bat pretty good. He's been really streaky this year," Johnson said. "He's gone through periods where he's had trouble putting the ball in play and he's had stretches where he plays like this. He's still a fairly young guy. He's still learning and he still has time to develop.

"I think he needs to learn the strike zone a little bit better and not be so aggressive chasing balls outside of the zone. You're not going to have success at the Major League level if you can't wait pitchers out. When he learns to do that, he's going to be one heck of a hitter at the big league level. And he showed that he's learning how to do that tonight."

Peguero has played in two games with the Mariners this season, going 2-for-6 with a homer. He also had big league stints in each of the previous two seasons and his hitting coach believes more consistency will prove to the organization that the native of the Dominican Republic belongs in the Majors for good.

"He hits the ball so hard, it's just a matter of putting a couple things together and he'll be a complete hitter, like he was tonight," Johnson said. "That's what you want at the Major League level: a complete hitter. You want to see him do it again, at least go deep into at-bats and stay aggressive but not to the point that he's chasing bad pitches."

Tacoma trailed in the ninth, 5-4, but tied it on Romero's RBI triple. The Rainiers pulled ahead in the 10th on solo homers by Abraham Almonte and Robert Andino, but the Aces scratched out two runs in the bottom half.

Romero, the Mariners' No. 8 prospect, finished with three RBIs, while Morse was 2-for-6 with two runs scored.

Alfredo Marte went 3-for-6 with a homer and two RBIs for Reno.

Rehabbing D-backs right-hander Brandon McCarthy pitched six innings for the Aces and was charged with three runs -- two earned -- on six hits. He struck out three batters and walked one.

Robert Emrich is a contributor to MiLB.com. Follow him on Twitter @RobertEmrich. Josh Jackson is a contributor to MLB.com.