By Dan Glickman
ROCHESTER, N.Y. – The Rochester Red Wings lost again to the Durham Bulls on Thursday night, 6-2, not because of bangs, but because of whimpers.
For the first time in the series, Red Wings (10-30) pitchers prevented Durham (27-15) from hitting a home run, but they couldn’t stop the Bulls from driving runs across through a mix of small ball, clutch hitting, walks, and Rochester misplays.
The offense, meanwhile, was largely contained by a string of Durham relievers during what was a “bullpen day” for the Bulls. Although the Red Wings matched the Bulls’ nine hits, they went 0-for-9 with runners in scoring position and left 10 men on base. On a few occasions, including during the eighth, the Wings got the tying run to the plate, only to fall short. The lone runs for Rochester came on a two-run home run by catcher Drew Millas in the sixth, when the other scoring run was on first base.
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“You face a team that can pitch the way they pitch, every run, to me, is magnified even more,” said Rochester manager Matt LeCroy. “[And] we’ve had back-to-back nights where we’ve gotten on base and haven’t been able to score.”
The Bulls struck early, starting the game with a Tre’ Morgan walk against Wings starter Chase Solesky. Morgan would work his way around the bases, moving to second on a Tanner Murray single and then to third when Bob Seymour grounded into a fielder’s choice play. Former Red Wing Andrew Stevenson then grounded to first, allowing Morgan to score on the putout to make it 1-0.
The Durham scores in the following innings followed a similar pattern. Morgan scored again in the third on a bases-loaded force-out when Durham shortstop Carson Williams beat out a would-be double-play at first, for example, while an infield single made it 3-0 in the fourth. Later in the inning, a wild pitch brought in Morgan for Durham’s fourth run. Durham later added insurance in the sixth and ninth innings, after Solesky had left the game.
Solesky went five innings, allowing seven hits and four runs-three of them earned-while striking out four and walking two. The right-hander’s 93 pitches were the most for a Red Wings starter since a rehabbing Michael Soroka threw 94 on May 2.
Despite the loss, LeCroy was happy with Solesky’s showing.
“He battled his tail off, you know,” said LeCroy. “We didn’t finish some plays behind him, we didn’t finish some plays that would have limited some of the damage. He did a good job giving us what we needed.”
“But when you do face good pitching, it’s hard to make mistakes and hard to give up many runs, because they don’t give up many at all.”
The Wings will try to correct that when they continue their series on Friday night at 6:45, when Cade Cavalli, recently optioned to AAA as he tries to make his way back from injuries, takes the mound against Durham left-hander Ian Seymour (4-1, 1.96).
The Wings will continue wearing their “ROC the Lilac Week” uniforms, and the first 1,000 fans 18 or older will get a free cooler bag. In addition, there will be post-game fireworks—the first such show of the season.
guess all thats left of this half season is for the manager to cheer on individual performances. Far as the team goes, it really doesn’t exist. 10-30. Yeah, thats pretty bad. Not unlucky; not the fault of the umpires; not the injuries–just flat out not a competitive bunch the Nats sent us…as a functioning team.
I would ask the Rockies or the Orioles as well…how can you get motivated to come to work everyday? (guess you could play hard to get recalled to another team that is near the bottom of their division?)
Wings were not the local story last night. The Amerks were. But somehow the Wings managed to NOT blow a 10-1 lead..they nearly did but they emerged with a 10-6 win. Only the Wings 5th win at home.
they have the bats. They don’t have the arms. Cavalli was decent for 4 innings. But he is going to have to be able to go more than 4 innings or 75 pitches at some point.
Anyway, it was a win. And winning is always the most fun.