The Vancouver Canadians were hammered 10-4 by the Everett AquaSox at Nat Bailey Stadium Tuesday.
Canadians starter Michael Dominguez struck out Hogan Windish to end a perfect top of the first. The home side put up four runs in the bottom of the frame against Everett starter Sam Carlson but left money on the table. Alan Roden walked, Dasan Brown singled to center and Rainer Nuñez singled to right just out of the reach of a diving James Parker at second to score Roden. Gabby Martinez also had a base hit to right to drive in Brown to put the C’s up 2-0. Cade Doughty drew a walk before Alex De Jesus delivered a two-run single to left to bring in Nuñez and Martinez. Other than an Estiven Machado walk, the Canadians left the bases loaded despite sending 10 men to the plate.
Everett began to power their way back when Tyler Locklear homered to center field to open the second inning. Walking Cabrera was retired on a deep fly ball to the warning track in center before Dominguez whiffed Randy Bednar and Cole Barr to end the frame.
After Carlson threw 40 pitches in the first, Kelvin Nuñez took over on the mound for the Frogs and retired the side in order in the next two innings. Dominguez also had a 1-2-3 third, striking out Parker and Erik Stock before handling a comebacker from Harry Ford.
The top of the fourth began with Dominguez striking out Ben Ramirez but the AquaSox used the long ball again as Windish kept one fair down the left field line to cut the Vancouver lead in half at 4-2. Doughty was able to spear a hot smash from Tyler Locklear and Nuñez made a nice stretch at first to complete the 5-3 putout to help Dominguez avoid further trouble.
Jommer Hernández was the first baserunner for Vancouver since the first with a leadoff walk in the fourth against Nuñez. A Machado base hit to left followed but that was all the C’s could muster.
Dominguez was trying to complete five innings but a pair of one-out walks to Barr and Parker helped lead to his downfall. The Parker at-bat should have begun with a called first strike but home plate umpire Shin Koishazawa called it a ball. Dominguez did retire Barr on a liner to center that Brown misjudged at first before making a leaping catch. However, Vancouver manager Brent Lavallee elected to go to the bullpen by bringing Naswell Paulino. A wild pitch from the lefty moved the runners up before Ford walked on a 3-2 pitch. Paulino also had the count full against Ramirez and would have struck him out had Hernández hung on to the ball. The next pitch was ball four and that scored Barr to make it a one-run game. Windish doubled to right to clear the bases and give the Frogs a 6-4 lead. Locklear then walked before Cabrera singled to center to score Windish with Everett’s seventh run. Abdiel Mendoza relieved Paulino and got Bednar to fly out to right for the third out.
Tim Elliott had a 1-2-3 bottom of the fifth for Everett while Mendoza matched that in the top of the sixth, striking out Barr looking on strikes to begin the frame.
The C’s had a pair of infield singles by Machado and Roden to second and short respectively in the bottom of the sixth but Logan Rinehart retired Brown on a comebacker to the mound to stop the rally.
Mendoza whiffed Ford in a perfect seventh to get the C’s back up to the dish but Rinehart also had a 1-2-3 bottom of the frame.
Devereaux Harrison had an inning of extremes as he walked Locklear to begin the eighth and issued a two-out pass to Barr on eight total pitches. He threw nothing but strikes to ring up Cabrera and Bednar before getting Parker to go down swinging.
The C’s could get nothing going against Jarrod Bayless in the bottom of the eighth before Everett salted things away in the ninth. Stock drew a leadoff walk from Connor Cooke, went to second on a passed ball and scored on a Ford single to center. Ramirez also had a base hit to the middle spot of the outfield but Brown threw out Ford trying to get to third. Windish then blasted his second homer of the game to right to give Everett double digits in the run column. Cooke got the next two batters that included a strikeout of Locklear.
Michael Flynn yielded a Machado single to center but sat down the next three hitters to wrap up the bottom of the ninth.
C-Notes
Another roster shuffle took place before Tuesday’s game. Righthanders Conor Larkin and Sam Ryan are now on the C’s Development List and infielder Estiven Machado has been activated from said list. Ryan was briefly promoted to Double-A New Hampshire but it appears that was just a “paper” or an administrative move.
Congratulations to C’s pitcher Chad Dallas for winning the Northwest League Pitcher of the Week award for May 2-7. The former Tennessee Volunteer allowed just one unearned run and struck out nine over six innings to earn the win at Hillsboro on May 3. That’s the second time Dallas has won NWL pitcher of the week honours. The righthander pitched five shutout frames in his first professional start at Tri-City on April 17, 2022.
Hopefully, you were able to hear Dallas’ interview with Tyler Zickel during C’s On Deck when it aired on the local sports radio station on April 30. Unfortunately, the last two episodes have not been archived and it has been hit-and-miss as far as shows making it to the local sports radio website over the last two seasons.
The Around the Nest podcast hosted by Tyler has a new home for 2023 as it can be found with the Artificial Turf Wars show. So far, ATW is 2-for-2 in archiving its episodes.
The Canadians face the AquaSox for the second game of this series. Dallas gets the start for Vancouver. The first pitch is at 7:05 on CanadiansBaseball.com and MiLB.TV.
Adam Macko and Trenton Wallace are listed as the probable starters for Thursday and Friday.
Radar Gun Rundown
Dominguez checked in from 79-94 miles per hour with strikeouts of 81, 92, 81 and 92. Paulino was at 77-93. Mendoza was at 80 and recorded strikeouts of 92 and 94. Harrison had punchouts at 84 and 94 and was at 83-95. Cooke checked in at 86-97 with a strikeout at 87.
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