Alvarez wins first MiLB game, 6-3 over Loons
LANSING, Mich. – Brayan Buelvas hit a two-run homer and Joshwan Wright lined a two-run triple in a pivotal four-run fifth inning, giving acting manager Veronica Alvarez her first Minor League Baseball victory, as the Lansing Lugnuts (20-24, 45-65) beat the Great Lakes Loons (26-18, 66-44), 6-3, on Wednesday night
LANSING, Mich. – Brayan Buelvas hit a two-run homer and Joshwan Wright lined a two-run triple in a pivotal four-run fifth inning, giving acting manager Veronica Alvarez her first Minor League Baseball victory, as the Lansing Lugnuts (20-24, 45-65) beat the Great Lakes Loons (26-18, 66-44), 6-3, on Wednesday night at Jackson® Field™.
Alvarez, the manager of the Team USA Baseball Women’s National Team and a spring training coach with the Oakland Athletics, is managing the Lugnuts for the full six-game series through Sunday while Phil Pohl is away on a scheduled break.
Trailing 2-1 entering the fifth, Sahid Valenzuela welcomed incoming Loons reliever Antonio Knowles with a leadoff single. Buelvas followed with his fifth home run of the year, launching the Nuts into a 3-2 lead. Cooper Bowman then reached on an infield single, Denzel Clarke walked, and Wright tripled both of them in with a liner to right-center, putting the Lugnuts up 5-2.
Max Muncy added insurance with a seventh-inning RBI double, answered in the eighth by a Diego Cartaya solo home run.
But the Loons could get no closer, blanked in the ninth by Calvin Coker following a leadoff single by Luis Díaz.
Nuts starter Christian Fernandez went 3 1/3 innings in a no-decision, allowing two runs on three hits and walk while striking out two. Daniel Martinez blanked the Loons over the next two innings, Angello Infante delivered 1 2/3 scoreless innings and Shohei Tomioka allowed Cartaya’s home run in the eighth before Coker wrapped things up.
The Lugnuts’ offense was led by two-hit games from Valenzuela and Wright. Clarke added two walks, one steal, two runs scored and two marvelous catches in center field.
Thursday brings Lansing Facts Night on a Labatt Blue Thirsty Thursday, with $2 domestics and $5 crafts. Lugnuts right-hander Joey Estes gets the start, opposed by Great Lakes right-hander Carlos Duran at 7:05 p.m. For more information and to purchase tickets, visit lansinglugnuts.com or call (517) 485-4500.
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