’Cats find way to escape
Pitchers leave bases loaded three times, strike out 17 to overcome eight walks in win
Carlos Machado gave the Tri-city Valleycats the only run they’d need on the first pitch by Hudson Valley starter Zach Trageton on a chilly Saturday night.
The Valleycats’ pitching staff took care of the rest, finding ways inning after inning to douse the Renegades’ threats.
Machado hit a leadoff homer in the first and Tri-city pitchers struck out 17 in a 3-0 victory in Game 1 of the New York-penn League championship series before a crowd of 2,876 in the final game of the season at Bruno Stadium.
The Renegades, the team with the best record in the regular season, stranded 13 runners and left the bases loaded three times in the first five innings.
“We just attacked our game plan,” said Tri-city’s R.J. Freure, who pitched the final three innings for the save.
“We used our pitches, trusted ourselves, and realized we had people behind us to pick us up. No matter who we were facing, we just went after them with everything we’ve got and left it on the field.”
The Valleycats can close out the best-of-3 series by winning Game 2 at Hudson Valley at 4:05 p.m. Sunday. Game 3 is at 6:35 p.m. Monday, if necessary. Tricity is seeking its third NYPL title and first since 2013.
“I’ve never been on a team with this much enthusiasm to win,” Freure said. “I have a great feeling we can come out and take one at their place, for sure.”
Machado is an aggressive hitter who’s learned to make better decisions. He jumped on Trageton’s first offering and lifted it to the opposite field over the fence in right.
“As the first hitter of a championship game, there’s a lot of
adrenaline that comes with that,” Valleycats manager Jason Bell said. “Everybody wants to be the hero, but it’s about doing it the right way, and he got the pitch he wanted and took advantage of it.”
Valleycats pitchers twice struck out Hudson Valley center fielder Tanner Dodson swinging with the bases loaded.
In the second inning, Tri-city starter Shawn Dubin whiffed Dodson on a 2-2 count to end the inning.
Valleycats reliever Jose Rivera did the honors in the fourth inning, also fanning Dodson on a 2-2 pitch to get out of the jam.
The Renegades threatened again in the fifth, when Rivera walked a pair of batters. In came reliever Joey Gonzalez, who had pitched in only two games for Tri-city after being called up from the Gulf Coast League on Aug. 27.
Gonzalez issued another walk to load the bases, but then got Hudson Valley’s Jonathan Aranda to fly out to left to end the threat.
In the sixth inning, the Renegades put runners on first and second with one out. But Hudson Valley attempted a double steal. Tri-city catcher Oscar Campos threw out Bryce Brown at third for the second out of the inning.
Then Gonzalez struck out Ford Proctor swinging to vanquish the Renegades again.
Hudson Valley found a new way to come up empty in the seventh. Erik Ostberg drew a leadoff walk from Freure, who had just entered the game.
But the next batter, Jacson Mcgowan, ripped a line drive that looked headed into right field until it hit Ostberg, who was automatically out.
Freure got the next two outs with strikeouts of Kaleo Johnson and Jordan Qsar to finish the seventh.
Meanwhile, Tri-city padded its lead. No. 9 hitter Ramiro Rodriguez made it 2-0 in the second inning when he hit a soft liner to shallow center to score Austin Dennis.
The Valleycats stretched the lead to 3-0 in the seventh. Machado lined a one-out single to right and went to second on a single by Enmanuel Valdez.
Then Machado scored on backto-back wild pitches from Hudson Valley reliever Chris Muller.
With the fans standing at Bruno Stadium, Freure closed the game in the ninth with a forceout at second. The four Tri-city pitchers combined on a five-hitter but walked eight.
“The crowd did wonders for us tonight, especially on a very cold evening that’s probably not the most fun to watch baseball,” Bell said. “We really appreciate all the support they had tonight, and that helped give us that extra push for a lot of that game. Especially in the ninth inning, it was really electric, and that’s something I’ll always remember.”