It was Ripley's "believe it or not" night for the affiliates Friday. Consider:
Jarrett Hoffpauir hit for the cycle in Las Vegas's win over Tacoma. It was his second cycle of the season.
Two Jays, Aaron Mathews in Vegas and Eric Thames for New Hampshire, hit inside the park home runs
New Hampshire were losing 6-1 in the eighth inning and won.
David Cooper, who has been struggling all season, hit a two run home run in the ninth to tie the game
Bubbie Buzachero, who had an ERA around 8 before last nights game, pitched five innings to get the win for the Fisher Cats
Chad Beck, whose pre-game ERA was over 6, made a spot start for Dunedin and pitched five shutout innings
Travis D'Arnaud hit a grand slam homerun.
Zach Stewart gave up five runs in the first two innings, then pitched three almost perfect innings
Las Vegas got going early, Jarrett Hoffpauir started the first inning with a triple and scored on a Luis Figueroa single. Figgy was thrown out at home on a double by Brett Wallace. Rey Gonzalez started for the 51's and dodged trouble all night. It eventually caught up to him in the fifth when Tacoma tied the game. But in the bottom of the fifth Hoffpauir, who had singled in the third, hit a two run home run to put Vegas back in front 3-1. Gonzalez gave up two more runs in the sixth and was pulled in favour of Jesse Carlson.
In the bottom of the sixth Aaron Mathews hit a two run inside the park home run to give Las Vegas a two run lead. Mathews was followed by Hoffpauir who needed a double for the cycle. Hoffpauir hit the ball over the outfielders head for his double and the cycle. It was Hoppy's second cycle for the season. Figueroa followed with another double to make it a 3 run game. After that the bullpen took over, Merkin Valdez did give up one run.
Hoffpauir, obviously, had four hits . Figueroa and Wallace had two hits each.
Milb story on Hoffpauir.
Zach Stewart had a rough first couple of innings. In the he walked three hitters and added a couple of hits and was lucky to escape with two runs allowed. In the second Stewart gave up three runs with five hits allowed and throw in a passed ball and a wild pitch. But Stewart then settled down and went five, the gave up just one hit and one walk over the last three innings.
A Brad Emaus double led to a run for New Hampshire in the fourth but after seven and a half innings Trenton led 6-1. But in the bottom of the eighth a two out error opened the flood gates. Add in a walk and Eric Thames hit an inside the park home run to make the score 6-4.
In the ninth Adam Loewen doubled with one out and then David Cooper hit a two run home run to the the game. In the tenth Eric Thames walked and went to third on a throwing error by catcher Austin Romine. Shawn Bowman then singled to drive in the winning run.
Even more improbable than the come back was that Bubbie Buzachero got the win. First Buzachero pitched five innings, his longest outing in a long time, and secondly Bubbie's ERA before this game was around 8.
Bowman and Mastroianni had two hits each.
Kevin Gray's game story.
For those of you wondering about Cooper, here is what his manager had to say in Gray's story:
“If you look at the charts, he’s had a lot of hard-hit balls, but he wasn’t getting any hits,” Rivera said. “I moved him down in the order, and now he’s hitting better. I have nothing do with it, but at the end of the day, it’s working.”
Chad Beck made a spot start with his 6 plus ERA and of course pitched five shutout innings. Frank Gailey pitched three innings and Juan Hernandez made his first appearance of the year and pitched the ninth.
Dunedin scored all their runs in the fifth inning. Brian Van Kirk, Daniel Perales and Welinton Ramirez singled to load the bases. Adeiny Hechavarria singled to drive in one run and then Travis D'Arnaud hit a grand slam. Mike McDade followed the grand slam with a double and that was Dunedin's last hit of the night.
Lansing went down 6-0 in the second inning and could never catch up. The first eight hiiters of the second inning reached against starter Dave Sever, leading to the six runs. Ryan Schimpf played a role on both sides of this game. In the third inning he hit a solo home run to get Lansing on the board. And then in the seventh, after the Lugnuts had come back to trail 6-5, Schimpf made two errors on the same play, leading to two unearned runs and putting the Luggies down by 3. Schimpf tripled in Lansing's last run in the ninth. Schimpf and Brad McElroy had two hits each.
Sever pitched four innings and took the loss. Matt Wright pitched three innings in relief and gave up the two unearned runs.
Three Stars
3rd star - David Cooper
2nd star - Travis D'Arnaud
1st star - Jarrett Hoffpauir
Standings
Las Vegas - 21-28, last place, 11.5 GB
New Hampshire - 30-18, 1st place, 2 GA
Dunedin - 31-18, 1st place, 1.5 GA
Lansing - 28-20, 3rd place, 3.5 GB
