Bandits lose pitchers' duel to Cedar Rapids
Hector Roa's homer provides the only run in 2-1 loss Tuesday
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa - A two-out run in the seventh inning broke a tie that lasted since the second inning to drop the Quad Cities River Bandits, 2-1, to the Cedar Rapids Kernels Tuesday night at Perfect Game Field. Hector Roa smoked a solo home run to tie the game in the second inning, his sixth of the year, for Quad Cities only run. Bobby Wernes had his second straight multi-hit game. Matt Bower allowed just one run in 5.1 innings on the hill for the Bandits.
Quad Cities (27-31, 58-69) dropped their fourth straight game with the narrow loss. A two-out single by Nelson Molina plated the eventual winning run for Cedar Rapids (34-24, 70-57) in the home seventh. The Bandits out-hit the Kernels, six to five, despite the loss.
Bower allowed a first-inning run on back-to-back, two-out hits from Zander Wiel and Luis Arraez to give Cedar Rapids the lead. Roa answered in the second with a line-drive dinger with two outs in the inning. Bower would go 5.1 innings, surrendering just those two hits and a career-high five walks while striking out four. Eduardo Del Rosario answered with six innings of work for the Kernels, surrendering the one run on six hits with six strikeouts.
Justin Ferrell (4-6) took over for Bower in the sixth and went the rest of the way, surrendering the seventh-inning run in 2.2 innings and allowed three total hits, two walks and struck out four. Williams Ramirez didn't allow a base runner in two scoreless innings that featured three strikeouts to get the win. Anthony McIver (S, 10) went 1-2-3 through the Bandits in the ninth to close out the win.
The Bandits look to get back into the series Wednesday in the third of four games from Cedar Rapids this week. Framber Valdez (1-1, 3.18) takes the hill for Quad Cities against Sean Poppen (0-0, 1.80) for Cedar Rapids. First pitch is set for 6:35 p.m. CT and you can join Jake Levy for the radio broadcast, starting with the Bandits On-Deck Show at 6:20, on 1170 AM K-BOB, riverbandits.com and the TuneIn app.