Kelly Drives In Five, Bulls Beat Tides 9-3

Bulls first baseman Dalton Kelly homered and drove in five runs, while five relievers combined for five shutout innings in Durham’s 9-3 win over the Norfolk Tides on Wednesday evening at Durham Bulls Athletic Park.

After the Tides plated single tallies in the second and third frames, the Bulls answered in the last of the second when Kelly clubbed a two-run double to right in the last of the third. After both teams swapped a run, Kelly smashed a two-run blast to right, his team-best 26th of the year, to make it 5-3. Durham would then extend that advantage to five with a three-run sixth, with Kelly driving in his fifth run with an RBI single. 2B Esteban Quiroz one inning later would cap the scoring with a run-scoring double to right in the seventh.

Kelly (3-5, R, 2B, HR, 5 RBI) paced the Bulls order with his three hits and five RBI, while Quiroz (2-2, 2 R, 2B, 2 RBI) and LF Ryan Boldt (2-5) added multi-hit efforts of their own. Kelly’s longball extended Durham’s streak of consecutive contests with a home run to ten games dating back to August 28.

After Bulls starter Aaron Slegers (4.0 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 4 K) fired the first four innings, Ryan Sherriff (2.0 IP, K), Phoenix Sanders (1.0 IP, 2 K), Nick Anderson (1.0 IP, H, 2 K) and Joey Krehbiel (1.0 IP, H, BB, 3 K) combined for the final five scoreless frames. Norfolk southpaw Kevin Smith (4.0 IP, 5 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 3 BB, 3 K) suffered the defeat.

The two teams are set to square off again on Thursday evening, with first pitch scheduled for 6:35pm. RHP Shane Baz (2-0, 1.80) is anticipated to get the nod for Durham, while RHP Ofelky Peralta (3-1, 4.94) is expected to toe the rubber for Norfolk. Tickets for that game, as well as all remaining Bulls home games are available and can be purchased at DurhamBulls.com.