RailRiders fight back late, but fall to Knights
May 21—Michael Hermosillo's base hit with the bases loaded and two outs in the eighth inning gave Scranton/Wilkes-Barre its first lead of the night.
It wouldn't last long.
Victor Reyes knocked a two-run single in the bottom of the inning, an error added an insurance run, and Charlotte halted the RailRiders' four-game winning streak with a 7-5 win Saturday at Truist Field.
The RailRiders (21-23) were trying to get back to .500 for the first time since April 15, when they were 7-7.
Charlotte (20-24) led for most of the game after scoring four runs in the second inning against Mitch Spence, the first time a RailRiders starting pitcher allowed more than three earned runs since May 5. Nate Mondou homered, then five of the next seven Knights hitters singled, including four in a row at one point. Evan Skoug's made it 2-0, Zach Remillard ripped a sacrifice fly to deep center with the bases loaded that Billy McKinney ran down, and Oscar Colas stretched the lead to four runs with a base hit through the right side.
Spence settled in after that, working six innings and retiring 13 of the final 14 batters he faced, issuing only a two-out walk in the third inning.
The RailRiders offense couldn't kick into gear against Charlotte starter Garrett Davis, who allowed just a solo home run to Carlos Narvaez — it was Narvaez's first home run at Triple-A and the RailRiders' 19th of the series — in six innings. He faced two on and one out in the second, but got out of trouble. He also got a pair of double plays to snuff out rallies before they could get going. The southpaw walked three, fanned five and lowered his ERA to 2.77.
Once he exited, Scranton/Wilkes-Barre loaded the bases with two outs in the seventh thanks to three walks from reliever Edgar Navarro, but Elijah Dunham grounded out to end the threat.
They loaded the bases again in the eighth against Nicholas Padilla, and this time, they got runs across. Oswald Peraza scorched a double to left to start the inning and scored on Franchy Cordero's base hit to cut it to 4-2 with one out. Jesús Bastidas followed with another single and Narvaez's third hit of the game, a popup that landed in shallow right, cut the deficit to one. Jamie Westbrook walked with two outs to load the bases and Hermosillo grounded the first pitch he saw up the middle to plate a pair and give the RailRiders a 5-4 lead.
James Norwood worked the bottom of the eighth for the RailRiders, and his first seven pitches missed the strike zone, with Colas on base quickly as the tying run. He eventually worked his way back to strike out the second hitter, Lenyn Sosa, but Mondou followed with a deep fly ball that Cordero appeared to lose in the twilight. In banged off the base of the wall, putting runners at second and third with one out.
Norwood nearly escaped the jam by overpowering Carlos Perez on a four-pitch strikeout, but Reyes cashed in on the opportunity with a line drive single to right that scored two and put Charlotte back in front. Yolbert Sanchez tacked on a double into the right field corner, and after Cordero managed to dig it out, his throw back to the infield sailed wild and allowed Reyes to score.
The RailRiders worked two more walks in the ninth to put the tying run on base, but Wilmer Difo's broken-bat blooper settled safely into the second baseman Sanchez's glove to end the game.
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