By MIKE ROSE
Rochester, NY — The Rochester Red Wings jumped in front of the Scranton Wilkes/Barre RailRiders and never looked back as they won their fourth straight game, 8-1. The Red Wings were powered by a three-run first inning which saw seven hitters come to the plate. On the other side, Jackson Rutledge put together one of his best outings of the season for Rochester. Rutledge went seven innings surrendering one run on two hits and two walks with three strikeouts.
“That’s about as good as I’ve seen Rut in my time with the Nats,” Red Wings manager Matt LeCroy said. “What makes me excited is what he did in his bullpen with Chavy (pitching coach Rafael Chaves) he was able to bring to the game and that’s a really good lineup that he went through fairly easily. Hopefully this is a sign Mr. Rut is going in the right direction and maybe he can help carry our team.”
It was another packed house at Innovative Field as the crowd surpassed 11,000 for the third straight day to take on one of the best starts of Rutledge’s minor league career. The outing was the first time he worked seven innings in a game since June 15, 2023, when he was with Double-A Harrisburg. It was also the first seven-inning outing of Rutledge’s Triple-A career. This start came following a rocky showing on Tuesday against the RailRiders where Rutledge surrendered nine runs on nine hits across 4.2 innings.
“We got to work this week really the whole crew and Chavy did a good job of keeping me rolling,” Rutledge said. “And then making adjustments of just not getting stuck on that back leg, get a more forward momentum going and just let my body work naturally and fluidly and just stop being stiff.
“I wasn’t trying to do anything but just make hitters take uncomfortable swings. Whether that’s throwing two-seamers inside or cutters inside to lefties. So really my goal was to make them swing the bat and make them swing the bat uncomfortably and I think I hit that goal.”
The Red Wings put together their three-run first by committee. The Yankees’ No. 17 ranked prospect Yoendrys Gomez started on the mound for the RailRiders after limiting Rochester to one hit across 5.1 shutout innings Tuesday. Jack Dunn led off with a bunt single before swiping second and third. After a 10-pitch walk from Travis Blankenhorn the newest Red Wing Harold Ramirez cashed in the first run with an RBI single. Juan Yepez followed with a walk to load the bases and Alex Call worked another walk to force in a run. Jackson Cluff plated Ramirez on a sacrifice fly to finish off the fast start.
“I was just looking for a really good pitch because I know I got a man on third, just want to make some contact to bring that runner in,” Ramirez said.
Rochester kept piling on against the RailRiders bullpen. Dunn drove in a run in the fifth with an RBI single and Ramirez had his second RBI hit of the day to extend the lead to 5-1 after five. The Red Wings tacked on two more in the sixth and one in the eighth to push the game out of reach.
The victory marked Rochester’s fourth consecutive win to clinch a series win over the RailRiders. LeCroy hopes with the first half drawing to a close next week his team can continue to keep its rhythm.
“Hopefully, it gets us in the right mindset to say, ‘Alright we get a reboot, we get a free half,’ and go out and continue to play the way we’re playing against basically two of the top three teams in our league,” LeCroy said. “Hopefully, that gives us momentum to go and play for something at the end of the season. We develop but the biggest thing when you come in this clubhouse, we want to win every game that we can. Playing for something at the end of the season has its own natural energy to come in and know that today’s game means something.”
The Red Wings (36-31) will look to keep their winning ways going Tuesday when they begin a road series against the Syracuse Mets in the final series of the first half. Andrew Alvarez (0-1, 7.04) is slated to get the start for Rochester while the Mets’ projected starter is still unknown. The first pitch is scheduled for 6:35 p.m. at NBT Bank Stadium.
In a most strange turn of events, the Wings earned their longest winning streak against a team that probably no one expected…especially after being shut out the 1st two games and then having to face Cy Young winner Cole two days later.
Instead, Wings came from behind 4-0 to eke out a 5-4 win on Thursday and then their terrible pitching did an abrupt about face and looked like a million bucks on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
I can’t recall in all my years having 3 consecutive crowds as big as this past weekend: 13,605, 12,128, and 11,141. After a horrendous run of terrible weather, Dan Mason &Co deserved this…and the Wings won all 3 games.
There’s a caveat to this however. Rochester is a Yankee town, through and through, so many of the fans who have disguised themselves as empty seats probably showed up to see the Yankee farm team. Were they really cheering on the home team…that much?
Well, no matter. They showed up and a filled ballpark is a beautiful thing. Again, while I really dislike the Yankees, wouldn’t it be a total boon to Rochester Community Baseball if they were our parent club? Imagine the crowds, the media attention and all that goes with it. It would benefit the league too.
Why are we stuck with Washington….a team that has zero support or interest in Rochester…MLB in its infinite ‘wisdom’ can’t see that two New York based teams is actually much better than one in NY and one in Pennsylvania.
Speaking of attendance, the final 4 games of the St Paul series also drew very nice crowds (our most recent parent club…although I’m not sure that attributed to the good attendance all that much?) Anyway last 4 games: 9,439; 8,118; 8,637; and 7,315. The Tuesday opener against SWB also drew 8,419. These are heady numbers. Its a shame the regular season doesn’t have the allure it used to have…an exciting race to make the Governor’s Cup playoffs. Now if you can’t finish #1 in a 20 team league, you go home. Forget that its a split season so you have 2 chances (big whoop). the format in the lower minors is actually better than AAA. Go figure.
So its on to Syracuse for the final series of the 1st half. The Mets are in 1st place in our division, but that too is meaningless really. In an alternate universe I would wish that somebody with some brains would restore some legitimate meaning to the regular season again. But MLB runs the show and clearly they don’t care.
Just look at the excitement from players and fans during the Calder Cup playoffs. Everyone is totally into it. It means something. Hockey gets it. I send a huge ‘boo’ to MLB for destroying what used to be wonderful competition.
Great weekend for the Red Wings and their fans. It was fun. Lets have more 2nd half. (will James Wood be back; or will the Gnats just decide to roll the dice and bring him up?)