Hot Rods flex offensive muscle in win over Hoppers

GREENSBORO ― Winning pitcher Seth Johnson walked none and struck out 11 in five innings, and Bowling Green's offense collected 16 more hits as the Hot Rods beat the Greensboro Grasshoppers 10-4 at First National Bank Field on Friday night.

Osleivis Basabe went 2-for-5 with a home run to lead Bowling Green, which has 37 hits in back-to-back wins over the Hoppers. All nine players in the Hot Rods lineup Friday had at least one hit.

Johnson (1-1) struck out every Hoppers hitter at least once. The right-hander ranks seventh in the South Atlantic League with 41 strikeouts in 27 innings. Johnson gave up just three hits Friday, including two solo home runs.

Pirates prospects Endy Rodriguez and Sammy Siani hit those blasts for Greensboro.

Rodriguez started at catcher and went 2-for-4 with a 438-foot home run that sailed over the netting in right field and landed across Eugene Street. The versatile 21-year-old is rated by MLB Pipeline as Pittsburgh's No. 7 prospect, and he has played four positions ― catcher, first base, second base and left field ― so far this season.

Siani, a 21-year-old outfielder, also went 2-for-4 and hit his fourth home run of the season, another shot high over the right-field fence. Siani was the 37th overall pick in the 2019 draft, a high school player selected between the first and second rounds.

Center fielder Matt Gorski stayed hot, going 1-for-3 with a double and a run scored. Gorski, coming off back-to-back two-homer games, raised his batting average to .288. The 24-year-old has hit safely in nine of his last 10 games, and he has been on base in 32 of 35 games played.

Gorski leads the South Atlantic league in home runs (14), RBIs (33), runs scored (31), slugging percentage (.703) and OPS (1.080).

Jacob Gonzalez hit an RBI single for the Hoppers, and lead-off hitter Yoyner Fajardo went 1-for-4 with a double.

Losing pitcher Adrian Florencio Adrian Florencio (1-5) struck out five in three innings, but he was tagged for four runs in the second inning when the Hot Rods sent nine batters to the plate. Florencio struck out the side in the third inning, the only one-two-three inning of the game for Hoppers pitching.

NOTES

First baseman Jacob Gonzalez, the reigning South Atlantic League player of the week, has hit safely in eight of nine games since his promotion to Greensboro, going 17-for-35 (.486) with four home runs and nine RBIs. ... Gonzalez, the 23-year-old son of former big-league All-Star Luis Gonzalez, batted .393 with 11 doubles, four home runs and 16 RBIs in 24 games for the Bradenton Marauders before his promotion to Greensboro. He was a second-round pick of the San Francisco Giants in 2017, turning pro right out of high school, and is in his fifth minor-league season.

Yoyner Fajardo has hit safely in 14 of 17 games played, with eight multi-hit games. Fajardo is 22-for-63 and his .349 batting average would lead the Sally League if he had enough plate appearances to qualify.