Tri-City Limited Again in Loss to Hillsboro
RF Jadiel Sanchez smacked a late home run for the Tri-City Dust Devils (24-33) to get his team on the board for the first time Wednesday night, but the Hillsboro Hops (29-28) worked around the longball for a 4-1 win at Hillsboro Ballpark. Sanchez’s shot, his first home run since
RF Jadiel Sanchez smacked a late home run for the Tri-City Dust Devils (24-33) to get his team on the board for the first time Wednesday night, but the Hillsboro Hops (29-28) worked around the longball for a 4-1 win at Hillsboro Ballpark.
Sanchez’s shot, his first home run since his two-homer 23rd birthday in Eugene, went over the right field fence and came with two outs in the top of the 8th inning. The homer prevented Hillsboro from shutting out Tri-City for a second consecutive night and aided the Dust Devils in their late comeback bid.
In the end, though, left-hander Spencer Giesting’s third strong performance against Tri-City in 2024 put the visitors behind the proverbial 8-ball. The southpaw threw seven scoreless innings for the Hops, walking two and striking out eight in getting his third win against the Dust Devils this season. His performance, which included working out of a bases loaded jam in the 6th, also stretched his scoreless innings streak against Tri-City to 28 innings without giving up an earned run.
Starter Ryan Costeiu (0-2) struck out five in his 3.2 innings of work, giving up two runs on five hits and working out of major trouble in the bottom of the 1st after a double, wild pitch and sac fly had put Hillsboro up 1-0 through an inning of play. The Clayton, California native continues to try to build up more strength each outing, throwing 63 pitches Wednesday night.
The Hops scored single runs in four innings for their offensive output, beginning with the sac fly by SS Jean Walters that got Hillsboro on the scoreboard first. An RBI ground rule double by 2B Manny Peña that bounced over the fence in deep center scored a run to make it 2-0 in the 4th. A second sac fly, by 1B Gavin Conticello, pushed the lead to three in the 5th inning and 3B Jose Fernandez finished his side’s scoring an inning later with a solo home run over the fence in left for an at-the-time 4-0 advantage.
Outside of the Jadiel Sanchez home run, Hops pitching held the Dust Devils to three hits: singles by 1B Matt Coutney (1st inning), SS Chad Stevens (6th inning), and 3B Andy Blake (7th innings. Coutney’s line drive off Giesting, on the first pitch he saw Wednesday, extended his now-longest on-base streak in the Northwest League to 21 games. On the mound, righty Jake Smith threw 2.1 innings of scoreless and hitless relief to keep his team in the game.
Tri-City and Hillsboro meet for game three of their six-game set at 6:35 p.m. Thursday night at Hillsboro Ballpark. Right-hander Joel Hurtado (5-4, 5.20 ERA), who has won four of his last five starts, goes to the mound for the Dust Devils. The Hops, meanwhile, will send wily lefty foe Avery Short (2-4, 2.42 ERA) to the hill to counter. Broadcast coverage of Thursday night’s tilt begins with the pregame show at 6:15 p.m. both here and on the MiLB app.
After the six-gamer in Hillsboro, Tri-City returns home to host the Vancouver Canadians for a seven-game series that begins with a doubleheader of seven-inning games starting at 4:15 p.m. Tickets for the Vancouver series are on sale now with special ticket rates available for groups of 20 or more. For more information on Dust Devils single game, season, mini-plan (11, 22, 33) and group tickets, visit the team’s official ticketing site, dustdevilsbaseball.com.