Dominant Cats Cruise to 8-0 Win Over Oklahoma City

WEST SACRAMENTO, Calif. – For the fourth time this season the Sacramento River Cats have won three straight games, putting together a dominant performance for an 8-0 shutout of Oklahoma City on Thursday.

Scoring started early and often for the River Cats (25-17), dropping a three-spot with their first set of swings. Driving in the first run for Sacramento was Jorge Soler, who was continuing his rehab assignment, as he laced a ball into left field that scored Ismael Munguia.

Though a double play for Oklahoma City (23-19) seemed to kill the momentum of the frame, that was before Hunter Bishop stepped to the plate. The River Cats newcomer crushed his second homer in as many games, blasting a ball over the wall in right field for a two-run shot that put Sacramento up 3-0. That made Bishop the third River Cat this season to homer in consecutive days, joining Heliot Ramos and Casey Schmitt.

Continuing the pressure, the River Cats added a run in both the second and third, as Brett Auerbach’s single scored newcomer Brady Whalen while Trenton Brooks smashed his fourth homer of the season out to right field on a 3-2 pitch.

Not done yet, a walk to Whalen and a double from Auerbach had both in scoring position before the former scored on a wild pitch, while the latter crossed the plate on a sacrifice fly from Munguia. The final run of the contest was plated in the seventh, doing so with back-to-back singles from Soler and Brooks.

There could be no shutout without dominant pitching, as three River Cats hurlers combined to keep Oklahoma City off the scoreboard. Though he did not factor into the decision, Landen Roupp went four scoreless for the second straight outing, punching out a season-best seven in the process.

Meanwhile, Tommy Romero (3-0) entered the day with the best ERA in the Pacific Coast League and showed why, blanking the Oklahoma City bats for 4.1 innings of work with a season-best seven strikeouts en route to his third win of 2024. He scattered three hits, one of which came in the ninth prior to exiting in favor of Raymond Burgos who was making his season debut for Sacramento. Burgos was able to hold the line despite allowing a hit of his own, preserving the fifth shutout win of the season for Sacramento.

The five shutout wins are two more than the River Cats earned in 2023, and are one shy of the six that they had during the 2022 campaign. With a final of 8-0, it was the largest shutout win for Sacramento since they blanked the Reno Aces in Sacramento by the same final on June 24, 2021.

This is the fourth three-game winning streak of the season for Sacramento, who are now 4-1 in their past five games.

Four River Cats ended with multi-hit efforts, including Bishop with his second straight after going 2-for-4 with a run scored, a homer, and two RBI. He has a hit in all three of his career Triple-A contests, and overall is 5-for-12 (.417). Both Brooks and Auerbach also finished with the same stat line, while Soler was 2-for-3 with a run scored an RBI in his second rehab contest.

Having already clinched a series split at minimum, the River Cats will look for an outright series win when the two teams line up for game four on Friday evening with first pitch from Sutter Health Park at 6:45 p.m.