The Vancouver Canadians were 5-2 winners over the Hillsboro Hops at Nat Bailey Stadium on Friday.
The C’s picked up the first run of the day in the bottom of the first courtesy of a two-out solo home run to left-center field by Jackson Hornung off Joe Elbis.
The Hops got a homer of their own to even the score in the top of the fourth when Jean Walters clubbed a leadoff homer over the right field wall off C’s starter Carson Pierce.
Hillsboro grabbed the lead in the top of the fifth with a two-out rally against Alex Amalfi. A single to center by Manny Peña and base hits to right by Cole Roberts and Juan Corniel brought Peña around the bases to make it a 2-1 game.
Monty’s Mounties were able to mount a rally against Elbis in the sixth. Dasan Brown—activated off the injured list as the designated hitter—drew a leadoff walk. Je’Von Ward singled to right and Jackson Hornung flared one to left to load the bases. Jeff Wehler was hit by a pitch from Elbis and that brought in Brown with the tying run. Robert Brooks put the C’s in the lead with a one-out sacrifice fly to left field to score Ward.
The Canadians were able to get Elbis to leave the building in the seventh inning when Estiven Machado reached on a Kevin Sim error at first base. Marcos De La Rosa was then hit by a pitch after just barely getting out of the way of the previous two pitches. That was it for Elbis and Vancouver, B.C. native Eli Saul entered the game. Saul walked Brown to load the bases and Ward produced a sac fly to the edge of the warning track center to score Machado.
Vancouver would get the final run of the game in the eighth against flamethrower Alfred Morillo. Brooks was hit by a pitch with one out and made it to second when Morillia could not make a grab on a comebacker from Jean Arnaez. Machado walked to fill the bases and a wild pitch would score Brooks to give the C’s a three-run cushion.
Alex Amalfi got the win in relief, Aaron Munson worked a shutout seventh in his Canadians debut and Grayson Thurman worked two shutout frames for the save.
C-Notes
Pierce was perfect in the first three innings. He struck out Conticello swinging and Sim looking to end the first, fanned Junior Franco to end the second and punched out Cole Roberts in the third. Pierce struck out Conticello after the Walters home run but finished one out shy of four innings when Jack Hurley got a two-out base hit to center.
Amalfi was brought into the game and needed just one pitch to get out of the inning as Brooks threw out Hurley trying to steal second as Arnaez put down the tag at second for a 2-4 putout. Amalfi also recorded strikeouts of Franco and Walters in the fifth and worked a clean sixth. He would get the win thanks to the C’s rally in the bottom of the sixth inning.
Munson walked Christian Cerda to begin the top of the seventh before sitting down the next three hitters, including a strikeout of Peña.
Thurman sat down all six hitters he faced, striking out the final two men he faced as Hurley went down swinging and Cerda was caught looking to end the game.
Wehler followed Hornung’s homer with a single to center field for the other Vancouver hit in the first inning.
Hornung had a double to the left field fence that Roberts had trouble locating to begin the bottom of the fourth. However, Hornung would not advance any further as Elbis retired the side after that.
Arnaez was credited with a base hit but it was one that ended the C’s sixth-inning rally as Wehler was hit by the ball when he tried to advance to third base.
Ryan Jennings gets the start for Vancouver in the C’s final 1:05 p.m. Saturday Matinee at the Nat. Tyler Zickel and Chris Georges will broadcast the action on CanadiansBaseball.com and MiLB.TV.
Radar Gun Rundown
Carson Pierce was at 82-96 miles per hour with strikeouts at 93, 84, 86, 81 and 85. Alex Amalfi had Ks of 95 and 94 and was at 78-86. Aaron Munson was at 88-95 with a strikeout of 93. Grayson Thurman had a punchout at 82 and was at 87 as well. For the Hops, Morillo hit 100 on the gun and was also at 98.
C-Tweets
C's Plus Baseball | A Vancouver Canadians Blog 