By CRAIG POTTER
The IronPigs rally for a 9-5 victory for the IL season-long 11th straight win.
ROCHESTER, N.Y. — The Rochester Red Wings got their offense in gear for the first three innings on Tuesday night against the Lehigh Valley IronPigs, but were unable to maintain a 5-0 lead and ended losing, 9-5, before 3,205 fans at Frontier Field.
“You blow a five-run lead and it’s not fun,” said Red Wings manager Mike Quade. “You’ve got to put a whole game together. To that end we’ll try that tomorrow.”
The win was the 11th in a row for Lehigh Valley, which is the longest winning streak in the International League this season.
The Wings scored in the first when Zack Granite led off with a double and scampered home on Bengie Gonzalez’s single.
In the third, Engelb Vielma started a rally with a single. Granite singled and Gonzalez delivered his second RBI hit of the game.
“We were hitting that we were supposed to, tough ground balls,” Granite said.
With one out, Daniel Palka blasted a home run over the left field fence for the 5-0 advantage.
“That was big,” Quade said of the homer. “We haven’t seen that in awhile.”
Nick Tepesch reliever starter Adalberto Mejia to begin the fourth. He yielded one run on a sacrifice fly. Tepesch gave up a leadoff single to Taylor Featherston in the fifth. Hector Gomez hit what looked like a double-play ball to shortstop Vielma, but he dropped the ball and both runners were safe.
The roof caved in on the Red Wings after that as the IronPigs sent 10 batters to the plate and racked up 6 runs for a 7-5 lead.
“Pitching and defense have gotten us through the last 10 days in the midst of an offensive struggle,” said Quade. “We finally put a good inning together, get a five-run lead then we make some defensive mistakes and we struggle pitching.
“Tepesch will be fine. He’s had a lot of inactivity the last three weeks, so he needed to get stretched out. He’ll start for us in five days so that was important to get him going with the possibility they might need help in Minnesota.”
Following Palka’s home run, LV hurler Ben Lively retired the final 11 Wing hitters he faced to improve his record to 5-1.
“He’s good,” Quade said. “I don’t have a right-hander with a hit off him yet…These guys have a really nice pitching staff, and if you measure up where you want to be, this is a pretty good starting point.”
*NOTES – In roster moves on Tuesday, LHP Adalberto Mejia was reinstated from the temporary inactive list, and RHP Alex Wimmers was transferred to Extended Spring Training in Florida…Daniel Palka’s home run was the first for him in 19 games…The 5 runs the Red Wings scored in 3 innings was the most by the team since Game 1 of the doubleheader on May 3…Pitchers D.J. Baxendale and Aaron Slegers had breakfast with fans Tuesday morning at Dunkin’ Donuts on Monroe Ave. – part of the “Breakfast with a Red Wing” promotion…$1 WEDNESDAY – Every Wednesday enjoy $1 hot dogs, Cracker Jack, peanuts, and chips courtesy of Zweigle’s, Democrat & Chronicle, and DiPaolo Baking Company. The Red Wings and IronPigs will play Game 3 of the 4-game series at 7:05 pm. The final game is Thursday at 1:35 pm.
Links
Rochester Red Wings – redwingsbaseball.com
Videos
Zack Granite interview – https://youtu.be/Xr7ek4EpfiE
Mike Quade interview – https://youtu.be/7RE2zh7WtK4