Pitching + Placencia = Tri-City Beats Hillsboro

The Tri-City Dust Devils (21-22) rode a combination of outstanding pitching and an 2B Adrian Placencia grand slam to an 8-2 win over the Hillsboro Hops (18-25) Friday night at Ron Tonkin Field.

Tri-City needed just two pitchers to cover all nine innings. Starter Chase Chaney (3-1) gave his team his best performance of 2023, going six innings and only giving up the two runs Hillsboro scored in his final inning of work. Chaney faced the minimum in his first five innings, getting help from his defense to erase a leadoff walk in the 1^st (caught stealing) and a hit in the 5^th (double play, started by Chaney). The Lawrenceville, Georgia native struck out five along the way.

He handed the ball to reliever Cole Percival, making his Dust Devils and Angels organizational debut. The righty, son of Angels legend Troy Percival, capped the night on the mound by going the final three innings for his first save of 2023, striking out two and facing the minimum himself.

At the plate Tri-City struck its big blow in the top of the 2^nd inning, leading 1-0 on an RBI infield single by SS Arol Vera in the 1^st. Placencia came up with the bases loaded and one out, facing Hops starter Spencer Giesting (1-2) from the right hand side. Giesting, behind in the count 3-0 and struggling with his control, had to come in with a strike. Placencia pounced, crushing a line drive over the left field fence for the Dust Devils’ first grand salami of 2023. Placencia’s third home run of the year, and second from the right-hand side, gave the visitors a 5-0 lead through an inning and a half.

Tri-City added two runs in the 6^th via two Hillsboro errors and a walk, and another run on an RBI infield hit by RF D’Shawn Knowles in the 7^th for the final 8-2 margin. The visiting nine talled 11 hits, with four Dust Devils putting together multi-hit games: Placencia, Knowles, CF Joe Stewart and LF Alexander Ramirez.

The Dust Devils also flashed the leather on the night including two double plays and a 2^nd inning diving stop by 1B Casey Dana, who flipped the ball to a covering Chaney to rob Hops SS S.P. Chen of a hit.

The win ended a 4-game losing streak for Tri-City and gave them their first win of the series. They will look to grab another one in game five of the six-gamer at 4:05 p.m. Saturday afternoon at Ron Tonkin Field, where a pair of southpaws will face off: Sammy Natera, Jr., (1-2, 2.49 ERA) for the Dust Devils and Yu-Min Lin (0-2, 3.80 ERA) for the Hops.

Broadcast coverage of the game begins with the pregame show at 3:45 p.m. both here and at the MiLB First Pitch app.

Following Saturday’s contest the teams will play a 1:05 p.m. Sunday matinee, with the Dust Devils then returning home for a six-game series with the Spokane Indians from May 30-June 4.

Tickets for the Spokane series, including the June 2-4 return of the Columbia River Rooster Tails, are on sale now. Also, special ticket rates are available for groups of 20 or more. For more information on Dust Devils single game, season, mini-plan (11, 22, 33) and group tickets, visit dustdevilsbaseball.com, call the team office at (509) 544-8789, or visit the team office (10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on game nights, or Monday-Friday 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. otherwise).