Tides win road opener
Bradish throws four scoreless innings in first start of season
Kyle Bradish tossed four scoreless innings in his season debut and the Norfolk Tides scored two of their runs on an error and wild pitch in a 3-1 victory series-opening over the Scranton/WilkesBarre RailRiders on Tuesday night in Moosic, Pa.
After splitting their opening series 3-3 with Charlotte at home, the Tides (4-3) were victorious in their first road game of the season. Scranton/Wilkes-Barre lost its second straight after opening the season with four consecutive wins.
The first half of the game was a pitchers’ duel. Bradish allowed two hits, struck out six and walked none, throwing 41 of his 58 pitches for strikes. RailRiders starter Matt Krook also threw four scoreless innings, but allowed an unearned run in the fifth on Ender Inciarte’s fielding error.
Norfolk made it 2-0 in the sixth when Tyler Nevin scored on reliever Manny Banuelos’ second wild pitch of the inning. Nevin singled to lead off the inning.
Scranton/Wilkes-Barre trimmed the deficit to 2-1 in the bottom of the sixth on Miguel Andujar’s RBI double off Tides reliever Ryan Hartman. Hartman (1-0), though, settled down and allowed the lone run in four innings to earn the victory. Nick
Vespi struck out the side in the ninth to pick up his first save of the season.
Terrin Vavra gave the Tides an insurance run in the top of the ninth with an RBI single to center, scoring Jacob Nottingham.
Nevin finished with two of Norfolk’s eight hits.
Estevan Florial went 3 for 3 for the RailRiders, while Andujar went 2 for 4.
The teams played the second game of the series Wednesday night. Game 3 is set for 6:35 p.m. today.