Shutout Is Fair Play; Hops Blanked At Pasco

PASCO, Wash. --- One night after shutting out the Tri-City Dust Devils, the Hillsboro Hops suffered the same fate.

Each team had four hits, but the Devils (12-16 2nd half, 46-48 overall), playing as the Columbia River Rooster Tails, cashed in on three early walks and breezed to a 4-0 win over the Hops (11-17, 35-59) Thursday at Gesa Stadium.

The Hops put two on with two outs in the first and rolled the dice when Junior Franco's hot shot grounder caromed off the glove of diving first baseman Matt Coutney. David Martin tried to score from second, but was gunned down at the plate with room to spare by second baseman Adrian Placencia.

The Rooster Tails had a nearly identical scenario in the second inning. Back-to-back one-out walks by Hops starter Jose Cabrera (0-2 with Hops, 4-8 overall) put Arol Vera and Werner Blakely aboard. With two down, Coutney pulled a grounder to the right side that deflected off the glove of diving second baseman Manuel Pena. The speedy Blakely raced around third and scored just ahead of the throw home to put the home team up 2-0.

A leadoff walk started the third inning. D'Shawn Knowles drew the free pass and swiped second. Placencia followed with an infield hit, his first of the series, then he pilfered second. Joe Redfield followed with a deep drive to center. Wilderd Patino sprinted back, turned before the track and back-pedaled, but misjudged the ball, which dropped in front of him. The speedy Redfield steamed around to third with a 2 RBI triple.

That was more than enough for Rooster Tails starting pitcher Michael Darrell-Hicks (2-3 with Tri-City, 5-3 overall), who limited the Hops to three hits over six innings, fanning six with three walks. A good thing too, because the Rooster Tails put runners at third base with fewer than two outs in four of the final six innings and failed to score them.

The Hops bullpen was stout for the third consecutive night. Dillon Larsen retired six straight batters with five consecutive strikeouts after a leadoff walk in the fifth. Carlos Meza pitched a 1-2-3 seventh with a K and Zach Barnes fanned the side in the eighth after a leadoff walk.

Likewise, the Rooster Tails pen was unperturbed, with Dylan Phillips and Roman Phansalkar combined to allow just one base runner over the final three innings.

David Martin reached base three times on a pair of walks and a single. Shane Muntz extended his hit streak to seven games with an 8th-inning single. Kevin Graham's seven-game hit streak was halted.

Redfield hit the ground running as one of only two 2023 draft picks to reach a Northwest League roster so far. After hitting .402 at Sam Houston State this year, the son of a former major leaguer with the same name has hits in all three games with Tri-City and has reached base five times. Coutney was the only player in the game with two hits.

Hillsboro has held Tri-City to five hits or less in all four games of the series so far, but has just two wins to show for it.

Game five of the series is at 7:05 p.m. Saturday night with pregame coverage starting at 6:50 on Rip City Radio 620 AM.