Wiel plates seven en route to RBI crown

Entering September, Zander Wiel was tied for second in the Midwest League in RBIs as he and Bowling Green's Brett Sullivan trailed Eloy Jimenez of South Bend by six. Five days later, Wiel punctuated a big second half with a career-high afternoon to snare the title.

The 23-year-old first baseman blasted a grand slam and a two-run homer in Cedar Rapids' 12-2 win over Clinton on Monday afternoon. He finished 3-for-4 with a walk, plating a career-high seven runs in the process.

"I didn't do anything different today -- just trying to treat it like any other game," Wiel said. "I had some opportunities for some RBIs and wanted to put some barrel on the ball, and good stuff happened."

Wiel began his day with a single to left field that drove in Manuel Guzman, but was cut down trying to stretch the hit into a double. Guzman reached on third baseman Logan Taylor's fielding error to open the fourth, and Wiel followed with a two-run homer to left off LumberKings starter Nick Wells (1-9).

"This team has tried to come inside to me with fastballs and try to beat me with those, and he threw me a first-pitch fastball for a strike out over the plate," Wiel said. "Second pitch, he did a quicker slide step and tried to come in with another fastball, and I was just on time for it and able to put a good swing on it."

Minnesota's 2015 12th-round pick walked to lead off the sixth before getting erased on a double play. With the bases loaded in the seventh, right-hander Kyle Wilcox ran the count to 2-0 against Wiel. The 6-foot-3, 232-pound Vanderbilt product crushed the next offering over the left-field wall.

"In that count, obviously you're just looking for something to drive -- something you can do damage with," Wiel said. "With the bases loaded, you're trying not to think about trying to hit a home run; you just want to stay within yourself and put the barrel to the ball. I wanted to meet a fastball out front. I was able to do that and it was pretty cool hitting a grand slam. More than anything, I wanted to stay within myself and not try to do too much."

Wiel finished the season with 86 RBIs -- 11 of which have come in the last four games -- to top Jimenez and Sullivan, who both ended up with 81. Wiel went 9-for-21 with three homers over those four contests.

"I'd say more than anything I just tried to focus on staying short, sometimes I'll get a little big or try to do too much," he said. "It makes me long and that's when I kind of lose my swing and get beat by pitches. I've been just trying to focus this week on being as short as I can and direct to the ball, and it's paid off for sure."

Wiel's run production picked up in the second half as he crushed 15 homers and drove in 54 runs in 65 games since the All-Star break, compared to four long balls and 32 RBIs in 63 first-half contests. He boosted his slugging percentage from .389 on June 23 to .459 after slugging .525 in the second half.

"I was aware of [the stats] coming into this game, but I wasn't really thinking of that when I was playing," Wiel said. "Having the league lead in RBIs, that doesn't really matter to me. It's cool at the end of the year when you look back, but I was more than anything trying to do what I do every game -- take it one game at a time and help my team however I can. I know I'm supposed to be a run producer and that's what I want to do."

Jaylin Davis belted a fourth-inning two-run homer and Guzman scored three times for the Kernels.

Sean Poppen (1-1) relieved Cedar Rapids starter Eduardo Del Rosario to pick up his first win of the year, scattering two hits while striking out two over three scoreless innings.