Spinners Get to Appel, ValleyCats get last laugh
TROY, NY - Playing in front of a sold-out crowd eager to see 2013 No. 1 Draft Pick Mark Appel make his professional debut, the Lowell Spinners got to Appel right off the but the Tri-City ValleyCats had the last laugh, capitalizing on a 10th inning wild pitch to earn a 5-4 win Friday night at Joseph L. Bruno Stadium in Troy, NY.
Lowell (10-7) was unimpressed by Appel's resume, as Tzu-Wei Lin welcomed him to professional baseball with a triple on the first pitch Appel threw as a professional. A Manuel Margot groundout brought in Lin, but the Spinners weren't done there. Kevin Mager followed with a single through the hole and Aaron King singled to move Mager to third. A Carlos Asuaje single brought in Mager to give the Spinners a 2-0 lead.
Appel was much more efficient in his second and final inning of work, retiring the Spinners 1-2-3 before giving way to the bullpen.
Tri-City (13-6) got Appel off the hook for the loss, knotting the score at two in the third inning on an RBI single by James Ramsey and a run-scoring double from Conrad Gregor.
The two teams traded runs in the fourth inning, as the first three Spinners of the fourth inning recorded hits, highlighted by Cleuluis Rondon's run-scoring single, scoring King but seeing Asuaje gunned down at the place. The ValleyCats would even the score in the bottom half of the inning, taking advantage of a throwing error by David Sopilka and a wild pitch by Sergio Gomez to even things at three apiece.
The Spinners would take the lead right back in the fifth inning, as Lin singled to lead off the inning and Mager was hit by a pitch to give Lowell two on with one out. Austin Houser came in for Tri-City and Rondon brought in a run with an infield-single, giving the Spinners a 4-3 lead.
Lowell had a chance to hang on in the seventh inning, as Gregor hit a potential inning-ending double play comebacker, but Dylan Chavez couldn't make the play cleaning, allowing Tony Kemp to score to tie the game back up at four.
There the score remained until the bottom of the 10th inning when the ValleyCats walked off on a wild play. With two-outs and runners on the corners, Kyle Martin (1-1, 1.00) struck out Luis Alvarez, but the ball got past Sopilka and Tom Lindauer came into score to give Tri-City a walk-off win.
The Spinners look to earn the series win when Mario Alcantara (2-1, 4.50) gets the ball for a 7pm first pitch in the series finale.